Zooarchaeological Evidence for Animal Husbandry and Foodways at Sylvester Manor

Analysis of over 12,000 zooarchaeological specimens recovered from Sylvester Manor provides archaeological evidence to complement the limited historical information about stock raising and food consumption on the plantation. The analyzed collection derives from the south lawn midden deposit at the site, and contains primarily the remains of domestic sheep, cattle, and pigs. The domestic animal ages, based on tooth eruption and wear, suggest aspects of the animal husbandry system. The patterns of skeletal part representation suggest most of the bones from the midden are refuse from household consumption rather than waste from exported foodstuffs. The Sylvesters and their tenant farmers maintained a dietary emphasis on traditional European domesticates and this diet would have represented a major change for the plantation’s African and Native American occupants

Au-delà du boeuf : variabilité diététique et alimentation dans la ville minière de Hammondville, New York, État-Unis, à la fin du XIX<sup>e</sup> siècle

Cette étude emploie une combinaison de documents historiques et de restes fauniques pour examiner les stratégies d’approvisionnement alimentaire, les schémas d’achats et les pratiques alimentaires parmi les résidents de Hammondville, une ville minière multi-ethnique de la fin du xixe siècle détenue par la société Crown Point Iron Company (C.P.I. Co.), située dans la région des Adirondack à l’Est du Nord-Ouest de l’état de New York (Upstate New York, États-Unis). La C.P.I. Co. opérait le seul magasin du village, contrôlant de ce fait à la fois le revenu de ses habitants et le type de nourriture qui leur était possible d’acheter. Malgré tout, une analyse des registres du magasin de la C.P.I. Co. et des données zooarchéologiques suggère que les individus et les familles de différentes origines oeuvraient à l’intérieur des structures de contrôle de la compagnie pour construite des diètes qui, à la fois, rencontraient leurs besoins de subsistance et exprimaient leurs identités culturelles. Pour ce faire, ils utilisaient l’inventaire du magasin de façon sélective et supplémentaient les aliments commerciaux avec les produits de la pêche, de la chasse, et de l’élevage d’un petit nombre d’animaux domestiqués.This study employs a combination of historical documents and faunal remains to examine food procurement strategies, purchasing patterns and foodways among the residents of Hammondville, a late 19th-century, multi-ethnic, company-owned mining town located in the Adirondack region of eastern upstate New York (USA). The Crown Point Iron Company (C.P.I.Co.), which operated the only store in the village, controlled both peoples’ incomes and the types of food available for purchase. Despite this, analysis of company store records and zooarchaeological data suggest that individuals and families from different backgrounds worked within the structures of company control to construct diets that met their subsistence needs and expressed their cultural identities. They accomplished this by selectively utilising the store inventory and by supplementing store-bought foods through fishing, hunting and raising small numbers of domesticated animals.</p

Halcyon Days: The Historical Archaeology of Community and Identity, 1870--1900

This dissertation combines the methods of historical archaeology and ethnohistory in a community study of a late 19th-century company-owned mining town with a diverse population. The village of Hammondville (1870–1900) was one of many short-lived mining towns in the Adirondack-Champlain region of upstate New York. It was built, owned and operated by the Crown Point Iron Company to facilitate their iron-ore mining enterprise and abandoned during the 1890s when that venture failed. The majority of Hammondville residents were recent immigrants from Ireland, Quebec, Sweden and England, although native-born Americans also lived and worked at the site. Hammondville residents lived in a world where people differentiated themselves and were differentiated by others based on socially constructed and culturally constituted categories of ancestry, religion and social class. These aspects of identity influenced people\u27s access to economic and social resources, informed their relationships and sometimes resulted in the formation of tensions and boundaries between different groups. As a result, the people of Hammondville navigated a complex social and political milieu. ^ This research combines the rich historical and archaeological records of Hammondville to create a multi-vocal history of the community and to shed light on the ways individuals and groups in the village forged, maintained and expressed their social identities through daily practice, enabling them to negotiate the complex landscape of a plural, paternalistic “company town.” To accomplish this, I focus on four key aspects of daily life in the village: social interactions, labor relations, cultural landscape and foodways. Historical data indicates that people at Hammondville maintained and expanded pre-existing social networks to create their own dynamic communities within the larger context of the village. These communities, based primarily in kinship, shared religious belief and common ancestry, provided people with a way to express their cultural identities while establishing a place for themselves in their new home. Archaeological assemblages recovered from four domestic sites in the village suggest that Hammondville residents also constructed and expressed their social identities materially, through the foods they ate, the material culture they used and the ways they organized their daily activities and domestic space.