Tomorrow night the New Albany Common Council will consider a resolution (R-13-09) in support of mining Floyd County's past; not a search for nature's riches hidden below ground, but rather a search for elucidation of our predecessors' days buried by time.
Some weeks ago I was contacted by the cousin of a constituent who has the opportunity to compete for a grant through the U.S. Department of the Interior to engage in archaeological sleuthing in counties that have received relatively little attention. In our area, Floyd County has had less study than either its eastern or western neighbors. Rebecca VanSessen, the cousin of the constituent, lived in Floyd County as a child and identified her childhood environs as a place which might fit the criteria of the grant. She is a research associate at the University of Indianapolis, and along with Dr. Chris Moore they hope to demonstrate the worth of their project which can bring to light facts about the ancient inhabitants of our county.
During a brief meeting and discussion over a modern version of an ancient beverage, Dr. Moore mentioned a term I had never heard, Industrial Archaeology. This study of relatively recent artifacts can also help us understand some of the early settlers here who lived a life more akin to our own today, yet still blurred by the passage of time.
The two archaeologists will speak at an informational session before the meeting tomorrow night. They will outline some of their plans and discuss the richness of our past. Since I've had the pleasure of meeting with them already I can attest that what they have to say will be interesting and worth the time to attend.
The informational session will be held in the Strassweg Auditorium in the New Albany Floyd County Public Library beginning at 6:30PM. Around 7:15 Council members will cross the street to the City County Building for the regular Council meeting at 7:30PM.
7 comments:
Neat project but meaningless resolution.
How about a public accounting of bicentennial funds? Has the commission paid back the redevelopment book loan? An apples to apples cost breakdown of aquatics expenditures, as compared to other cities? Can we see some solid plans for the indoor sports center site?
The unveiling of the ridiculously overpriced bicentennial park will be embarrassing enough. Is this council ever going to do due diligence?
Jeff:
I'll disagree on one point. The resolution regarding the archaeology funding was not meaningless as you charge. Dr. Moore and Ms. VanSessen are in better position now to receive the state/federal funds with a show of support from the community. The potential amount of funding is $50,000 and I would hope that can be leveraged with additional funds from the Horseshoe Foundation.
Lending support in the quest for knowledge and understanding never seems like a meaningless effort to me.
Point taken, John, but you'll notice that most of the remaining phrases in my post end with question marks, making them quests for knowledge and understanding.
Comparatively, they are more important and have received less public support from this council. That can and should be corrected, with the lending of support being both public and immediate.
It may be too late for bicentennial park but not for the others.
Some questions are yet to be answered, while others are yet to be asked.
That's interesting, considering that no one has heard or read those questions or answers being issued publicly. If the council has meeting time for these types of resolutions, it has time to to address majorly muddled spending initiatives-- out loud and on record.
It's nice to see that with Kitchen table apparently down for good, "anonymous" still has a hood to gurgle.
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