Native American Dancers just a part of SRAC’s Event on October 15th

Last minute plans are underway at the Susquehanna River Archaeological Center (SRAC) in Waverly, NY in order to get ready for the 8^th annual free community event, DrumBeats Through Time to be held Saturday, October 15^th from 1-5pm.

Along with the nationally awarded Buffalo Creek Dancers performance from 3-4pm, there will be free admission to the SRAC Exhibit Hall, vendors selling crafts and artwork, many private local artifact collections rarely seen by the public, and special archaeological exhibit titled “Time and Tradition” which is a professionally designed educational exhibit, created in collaboration with archaeologists from Binghamton University’s Anthropology Department, and professional designers from the Roberson Museum in Binghamton. The Seneca Historian Alvin Parker will also be sharing the history of the Seneca people in a presentation at 1:30pm. SRAC’s Deb Twigg said, “This year’s event will be bigger and better with many new things we have never had before. Best of all, it is free for everyone to attend and enjoy with family and friends. We are just really proud to bring so many unique and exceptional events to our community.”

The SRAC annual membership luncheon meeting precedes the public event from 11:30am – 1pm, with the doors opening to the public from 1-5pm. To learn more, visit www.SRACenter.org/events or call the Center at (607)565-7960.

Kettle of Gold - A Boyhood Story of George Catlin, Famous 19th Century Native American Painter

Kettle of Gold - A Boyhood Story of George Catlin, Famous 19th Century Native American Painter
DOWNLOAD FLIER TO SHARE HERE

Eileen Ruggieri -local storyteller and historian will present, “Kettle of Gold - A Boyhood Story of George Catlin, Famous 19th Century Native American Painter” at the Susquehanna River Archaeological Center at 345 Broad Street in Waverly on October 4th from 6:30pm – 7:30pm.

George Catlin (1796-1872) journeyed west five times in the 1830s to paint the Plains Indians and their way of life. Convinced that westward expansion spelled certain disaster for native peoples, he viewed his Indian Gallery as a way "to rescue from oblivion their primitive looks and customs." Catlin was the first artist to record the Plains Indians in their own territories. He admired them as the embodiment of the Enlightenment ideal of "natural man," living in harmony with nature. But the more than 500 paintings in the Indian Gallery also reveal the fateful encounter of two different cultures in a frontier region undergoing dramatic transformation.

A little known fact is that George Catlin spent most of his childhood growing up along the Susquehanna River in South Windsor. He went on to get an education in law, but soon discovered his passion in life was to paint. Ruggieri will share with her listeners the story of George Catlin's first encounter with a Native American as a boy growing up in Windsor and how profoundly that experience influenced the course of his life. He would later set out on a westward journey that would result in his becoming one of the country's most famous 19th century painters of Native Americans.

Ruggieri is coordinator of the Historic Windsor Advisory Committee, formed a year and a half ago by the Town of Windsor. This committee recently put out a book Windsor on the Susquehanna, A Vintage Postcard Book of Broome County's Oldest Town, which she edited. She is Vice President of the Old Onaquaga Historical Society and a longtime member as well. For the past three years, she has been on the Window on the Arts festival committee in Windsor, providing interesting local history programs and exhibits for this special day in September.

An admission donation of $6 for adults, $4 for SRAC members and students is requested. Free admission to the SRAC exhibit hall is included in this donation. For more information, visit www.SRACenter.org , email info@SRAcenter.org, or call the Center at 607-565-7960.

Jewelry & Beading Class at SRAC October 1st

 

 Local artisan Ellen Sisco creates jewelry from a wide variety of materials. Having worked with stones, metals, and beads of all kinds in her jewelry for 25 years, she conducts a popular class on basic beading techniques the Susquehanna River Archaeological Center (SRAC) at 345 Broad Stree, Waverly NY on Saturday, October 1st, from 11:30am – 1:30pm .  Students will be provided with instruction and all the supplies they will need, including semiprecious stone beads, glass beads, metal beads, pearls and tools so that they may create their own gift, keepsake, or special piece. Beads in all colors of the rainbow are available, and Ellen has made a special purchase of unusual and beautiful semiprecious stone beads just for these classes. Learn to make necklaces, bracelets, earrings and other jewelry.

Just ask about any style you would like to try, and Ellen will teach you how to create jewelry to match your wardrobe, and to make things for the holidays; now you can make your own jewelry for Halloween and Christmas. The fee for this two hour beading class is $25. RSVP's are greatly appreciated by calling the Center at (607)565-7960 or by emailing info@SRAcenter.org.

Ancient American Magazine publishes article by SRAC's Deb Twigg

The Ancient American Magazine recently released their September issue that includes an article by SRAC's Deb Twigg.

Twigg's article is entitled, "Spanish Hill: The Search for Answers" and examines the earthen embankments that once enclosed ten acres on the summit of the site. Twigg claims, "the embankments seem to be identical to a site in Ohio and there is other evidence along the Susquehanna River that seem to relate to the same Mound Builder culture known as the "Fort Ancients."

SRAC members will be able to read the article in the latest SRAC Journal that will be arriving soon in their mailboxes. New members will receive a copy of the latest SRAC Journal as a part of their membership and can join today at:
http://www.SRACenter.org/join/

Non SRAC members are invited to order their own copy of the Ancient American Magazine by using the following link: 
http://ancientamerican.com/backissues.html#cover92


 

Native American Dancers Return to SRAC Oct. 15th

SRAC members should be receiving a postcard in the mail in the next few days asking you all to save the date of October 15th for our 8th Annual Membership Meeting and FREE "DrumBeats Through Time" event that we host with authentic Native American dancers - "The Seneca Buffalo Creek Dancers" and free guest speaker/presentation by the Seneca Historian, Al Parker who will tell us the Seneca History of our region. We also will have local artisans in vendor tents set up out front, and tons of great snacks all day long!

So if you get a membership postcard - use it as your invitation to the annual membership meeting which runs from 11:30am - 1pm October 15th, and non members are welcome to join in on the fun with the presentation and dancing later in the day FOR FREE! It is our way of saying thanks to all of you who support us throughout the year! Spread the word!

Not a member or want to renew your membership? Visit http://www.sracenter.org/join/ today!

SRAC Receives Tioga County Seniors Grant

The Susquehanna River Archaeological Center recently was awarded $1,000 from the Tioga County Seniors Foundation. The grant was awarded in order to fund SRAC programs and speakers geared towards the senior community for the following year.

To learn more visit: http://tcseniorfoundation.com/

 

The goal of Tioga County Seniors Foundation is to enhance the quality of life of senior citizens living in Tioga County, New York. This is accomplished through grants awarded to agencies that provide support for the needs, interests, safety and comfort of the county’s senior population. Since 1982, a total of $1,465,827 has been awarded to grant requestors. Typically, grant awards are made to those applicants providing direct services to senior citizens. For example, over the last 10 years Senior Citizens Foundation has contributed $85,420 to the libraries in Tioga County to support librarians’ requests for items such as large print books and books on CD. Senior Citizens Foundation also gladly supports the requests of the eleven senior citizen clubs located in Tioga County. These clubs often become the main link to other people and services for our many aging citizens. Since the year 2000, Senior Citizens Foundation has put $86,300 into the activities of the senior citizen clubs found throughout Tioga County.  To learn more about the Tioga County Seniors Foundation visit http://tcseniorfoundation.com/ .

SRAC's Deb Twigg stated, "We want to thank the Tioga County Seniors Foundation for supporting SRAC and our efforts again this year and look forward to bringing more and better events and special programming for the seniors in our area because of their support."

A wild and woolly discovery: Tibetan Woolly Rino

Geochemistry Professor Yang Wang and an international team of researchers uncovered the oldest known species of woolly rhino. Yang Wang was chosen to take part in a team of researchers that uncovered the oldest prehistoric woolly rhino ever found. The international team of paleontologists set out in 2007 to explore one of the most isolated places on earth: the Zanda (ZAH-dah) Basin in Tibet, located at the feet of the Himalaya Mountains.

What drew the researchers to the basin wasn't its raw beauty, however. They came to explore its buried treasures. The largely untouched Zanda Basin is a fossil hunter's paradise, and the team was determined to make scientific breakthroughs.

They did just that, finding the complete skull and lower jaw of a previously unknown and long-extinct animal. They christened it the Tibetan woolly rhino (Coelodonta thibetana). "This is the oldest, most primitive woolly rhino every found," Wang said of the team's discovery. The ancient beast stood perhaps 6 feet tall and 12 to 14 feet long. It bore two great horns. One grew from the tip of its nose and was about 3 feet long. A much smaller horn arose from between its eyes. The Tibetan woolly rhino was stocky like today's rhino but had long, thick hair. It is often mentioned in the same breath with woolly mammoths, giant sloths and sabertooth cats, all giant mammals of the period that became extinct.

Prior to the team's discovery, the oldest woolly rhino ever found was 2.6 million years old, making it an inhabitant of the Pleistocene era (2.6 million years ago to 11,700 years ago). But the Tibetan woolly rhino found by the team is 3.7 million years old. That means it lived during the Pliocene epoch (5.3 million to 2.6 million years ago).

The new time frame also indicates that the Tibetan woolly rhino was alive before the last Ice Age.

The expedition team also found horse, elephant and deer fossils. Most of the fossils, including the Tibetan woolly rhino's complete skull, are being kept at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, at its Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology.

Wang and other members of the team, led by Xiaoming Wang, curator of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, plan to return to the basin again in the summer of 2012.

"Cold places, such as Tibet, the Arctic and the Antarctic, are where the most unexpected discoveries will be made in the future — these are the remaining frontiers that are still largely unexplored," said Xiaoming Wang.

Fused Glass Class - September 24th

Kettle of Gold - A Boyhood Story of George Catlin

Kettle of Gold - A Boyhood Story of George Catlin, Famous 19th Century Native American Painter
DOWNLOAD FLIER TO SHARE HERE

Eileen Ruggieri -local storyteller and historian will present, “Kettle of Gold - A Boyhood Story of George Catlin, Famous 19th Century Native American Painter” at the Susquehanna River Archaeological Center at 345 Broad Street in Waverly on October 4th from 6:30pm – 7:30pm.

George Catlin (1796-1872) journeyed west five times in the 1830s to paint the Plains Indians and their way of life. Convinced that westward expansion spelled certain disaster for native peoples, he viewed his Indian Gallery as a way "to rescue from oblivion their primitive looks and customs." Catlin was the first artist to record the Plains Indians in their own territories. He admired them as the embodiment of the Enlightenment ideal of "natural man," living in harmony with nature. But the more than 500 paintings in the Indian Gallery also reveal the fateful encounter of two different cultures in a frontier region undergoing dramatic transformation.

A little known fact is that George Catlin spent most of his childhood growing up along the Susquehanna River in South Windsor. He went on to get an education in law, but soon discovered his passion in life was to paint. Ruggieri will share with her listeners the story of George Catlin's first encounter with a Native American as a boy growing up in Windsor and how profoundly that experience influenced the course of his life. He would later set out on a westward journey that would result in his becoming one of the country's most famous 19th century painters of Native Americans.

Ruggieri is coordinator of the Historic Windsor Advisory Committee, formed a year and a half ago by the Town of Windsor. This committee recently put out a book Windsor on the Susquehanna, A Vintage Postcard Book of Broome County's Oldest Town, which she edited. She is Vice President of the Old Onaquaga Historical Society and a longtime member as well. For the past three years, she has been on the Window on the Arts festival committee in Windsor, providing interesting local history programs and exhibits for this special day in September.

An admission donation of $6 for adults, $4 for SRAC members and students is requested. Free admission to the SRAC exhibit hall is included in this donation. For more information, visit www.SRACenter.org , email info@SRAcenter.org, or call the Center at 607-565-7960.

SAVE THE DATE! 8th Annual DrumBeats - 10/15

SRAC members should be receiving a postcard in the mail in the next few days asking you all to save the date of October 15th for our 8th Annual Membership Meeting and FREE "DrumBeats Through Time" event that we host with authentic Native American dancers - "The Seneca Buffalo Creek Dancers" and free guest speaker/presentation by the Seneca Historian, Al Parker who will tell us the Seneca History of our region. We also will have local artisans in vendor tents set up out front, and tons of great snacks all day long!

So if you get a membership postcard - use it as your invitation to the annual membership meeting which runs from 11:30am - 1pm October 15th, and non members are welcome to join in on the fun with the presentation and dancing later in the day FOR FREE! It is our way of saying thanks to all of you who support us throughout the year! Spread the word!

Not a member or want to renew your membership? Visit http://www.sracenter.org/join/ today!

JSTOR Giving Away Articles!

JSTOR is one of the On September 6, 2011, they announced that they are making journal content in JSTOR published prior to 1923 in the United States and prior to 1870 elsewhere freely available to anyone, anywhere in the world. This “Early Journal Content” includes discourse and scholarship in the arts and humanities, economics and politics, and in mathematics and other sciences. It includes nearly 500,000 articles from more than 200 journals. This represents 6% of the content on JSTOR. While JSTOR currently provides access to scholarly content to people through a growing network of more than 7,000 institutions in 153 countries, they also know there are independent scholars and other people that they are still not reaching in this way. Making the Early Journal Content freely available is a first step in a larger effort to provide more access options to the content on JSTOR for these individuals. The Early Journal Content will be released on a rolling basis beginning today.

Here is a very interesting article by Warren K. Moorehead about being nearly buried alive in a mound in Ohio in 1892: Buried Alive, -- One's Sensations and Thoughts, Author(s): Warren K. Moorehead
Source: Science, Vol. 21, No. 522 (Feb. 3, 1893), p. 61:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/1768057.pdf


Please read JSTOR's Frequently Asked Questions if you have additional questions about the Early Journal Content or contact them at support@jstor.org.

Download a brief program description that lists some Early Journal Content highlights.

Ice Age Returns to Waverly This Tuesday!

Robert M. Ross, Associate Director for Outreach, Paleontological Research Institution at the Museum of the Earth will present “Bones in the Backyard: Excavation of the Renowned Hyde Park Mastodon” at the Susquehanna River Archaeological Center (SRAC) at 345 Broad Street, Waverly, NY on Tuesday, September 6^th from 6:30 – 7:30pm.

The Museum of the Earth will also be displaying sediments from the excavation as well as many actual life size specimens of ice age vertebrates that lived in our region 12 – 15 thousand years ago. Visitors of all ages are sure to learn new things and be amazed as they experience what life was like during the ice age in our region.

In summer 2000 one of the best preserved mastodons ever found was discovered and excavated from a suburban backyard pond, outside Poughkeepsie, NY. Staff of the Paleontological Research Institution, partnering with scientific colleagues from around the Northeast U.S., spent a decade researching the mastodon and geological history of the site. The skeleton of this mastodon is on display at PRI's Museum of the Earth (Ithaca, NY.) Ross will tell the story of the excavation and the science and outreach that has occurred since.

Robert Ross has run the outreach program at the Paleontological Research Institution at the Museum of the Earth since 1997. He received a PhD in Earth and Planetary Sciences from Harvard University, focusing on paleontology, and held academic positions in Germany and Japan before moving to Ithaca to work at PRI. Ross participated in the Hyde Park excavation and in educational programming and citizen science associated with sediment from the site.

Download a flier to share here!

A donation of $6 for general admission and $4 for SRAC members is requested. Students are invited to attend this event for free. Free admission to the SRAC exhibit hall is included in your admission donation. For more information, call the Center at (607)565-7960 or email info@SRAcenter.org.

Upcoming Jewelry Classes at SRAC in September!

We have two great jewelry making classes coming up in September! Don't miss your chance to make a custom piece of jewelry for yourself or a loved one at SRAC!