Digging for history at Rock Hall Museum

Do not be alarmed seeing a hole in the ground adjacent to the Rock Hall Museum in Lawrence. Hofstra University assistant archaeology professor Dr. Bradley Phillippi has been leading a team of students and volunteers that have been excavating at the museum since May 22. He said that this is his first summer at Rock Hall.

“What we’re doing here is called historical archaeology,” Phillippi said. “We’re excavating the site looking through artifacts since there are a lot of things here that we don’t know about.”

He has been excavating historical sites on Long Island since 2010, and said that while no big discoveries have been made on-site, he is not concerned since excavating is a tedious process. “Because of Hollywood, people’s imagination believe that archaeologists are just interested in finding that one big artifact,” he said. “What were really motivated to do is take little pieces and figure out why they’re here and who used them.”

His team has dug up include oyster shells, clothing materials and ceramic. Phillippi has an idea of what time period these artifacts are from. “The Hewlett family owned this land in the mid-1800s and had outbuildings in surrounding lots that presumably were for enslaved and free laborers,” he said. “I could tell by looking at this button that it is from the 1800s.” 

Since the project began, Phillippi has had students join him since he offers class credit. “The students love it because they get a hands-on experience,” he said. “They get a chance to see what archaeology is all about rather than just reading about it in textbooks and articles.” 

Team members vary from day-to-day, but one consistent team member is volunteer Paul Moyer, a retired teacher from Carrie Palmer Weber Middle School in Port Washington. Moyer has accompanied Phillippi since 2011 and said he volunteers as learning is in his bones. “This is like taking a free field study class,” Moyer said, as he took a quick break from digging. “There’s just so much to learn throughout this process.”

Museum Director Linda Barreira has been involved with Rock Hall for roughly 35 years and finds the archeological digging stimulating. “It’s exciting to have them here,” she said. “They’re intensely working at a technical level that we’ve never had here before.” Barreira said evacuation projects have been happening at the museum since 1995, and Rock Hall’s archaeologist Ross Rava helped set up the current project with Hofstra.

Phillippi said he is not sure how much longer the team will be at the museum since it all varies on how much they find. “In archaeology, our goal on any dig is to find sub-soil, which is a layer of earth that humans never occupied,” he said. “I thought we would be done two weeks ago, but artifacts just keep popping up.” 

Barreira said that she hopes this project continues with Hofstra in the future. “I want this to last forever,” she said. “We want to have an open-ended relationship with Hofstra in since there’s a reciprocal benefit for both of us.”