Archaeologist speaks at Middlesex Elementary School

On Wednesday, November 9, Professor Julia King of St. Mary’s College, Maryland spoke to Mrs. Paige Moore’s fifth grade classes about on-going archaeological research in Middlesex County. 

Dr King

On Wednesday, November 9, Professor Julia King of St. Mary’s College, Maryland spoke to Mrs. Paige Moore’s fifth grade classes about on-going archaeological research in Middlesex County. Dr. King was accompanied by Bob Prichard, who is the current Vice President of the Middlesex County Museum and Historical Society. The Museum and Historical Society helped arranged for the visit to the elementary school and had previously sponsored an on-line presentation by Dr. King about her work with the Rappahannock tribe.

Dr. King has been working with a crew of professionals and volunteers who spent two weeks in late October and early November of this year investigating a site on Locust Grove Farm in Topping that showed signs of Native American habitation. She brought illustrations of early Virginia maps, and used samples of pottery shards, shells, projectile points, and a glass bead from the investigation in her presentation. She built on earlier class discussions on the first of the maps—that created by Captain John Smith based on a 1608 expedition. Dr. King was impressed by insights that the students in Mrs. Moore’s class gained from the Smith map and by thoughtful questions they asked about the archaeological research.