Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
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| Eric Schmitt Showing Newly Recovered 1714 Mexico One-Escudo Photo submitted by Dan B. |
Congrats to Eric and the Aarrr Booty!
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Duane C. found this ring on a North Carolina beach and wondered if anyone could offer any information or opinions. It seems to be Pewter and and he thought might be hand carved from a spoon.
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| Pewter Ring Found on N. C. Beach. Photos and find by Duane C. |
Did you know the Antiquities Act is 110 years-old this year? Here is a link to a National Park Service site about the act and what it does.
https://www.nps.gov/archeology/sites/antiquities/continuing.htm
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Here is an article by the National Park Service from 1999 describing their view of future of archaeology.
https://www.nps.gov/archeology/cg/win_1999/Pubarch.htm
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And here is a report on a lengthy survey of the public's perceptions of archaeology. Conducted in the year 2000, it is a bit out of date too.
https://www.nps.gov/archeology/pubs/Harris/index.htm
Very revealing was the item on how people learn about archaeology. Most people mentioned TV.
The survey failed to include the internet as a choice. As I said, the survey was conducted in the year 2000. The internet has become much more important in the last 16 years.
Here is one paragraph from the report.
The general public has a strong level of awareness regarding what happens to things that are dug up or found by archaeologists. Ninety-six percent (96%) of the respondents gave an answer to this question and the majority of the answers were accurate. A large percentage of respondents (77%) mentioned that the items are donated/ sold to museums/ museum researchers. This is an interesting finding considering that in questions later in the survey only 9% of the respondents said that they have learned about archaeology through museums, and yet, 88% said that they had visited a museum exhibiting archaeological material. This disparity may be a function of many factors such as that the reason(s) for the public to visit museums may not be to see archaeological material, and the amount and type of publicity that museums receive when they acquire archaeological objects.
If you are interested in the sample population use the link above to check it out.
Below is one of the charts.
Not only is the internet not listed, but neither is museums. That seems to me to be an odd omission. If they want to do a better job of reaching the public, institutions will have to make better use of information technologies. The world has changed.
The war on terror will have to be fought very differently if we are to win. It is really a new ball game. I'm not going to say any more. I don't want to give the bad guys any hints.
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On the Treasure Coast, it looks like we'll have a flat surf until Sunday.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
