One advantage the covid pandemic has given us avocational archaeologists is the opportunity to become familiar with the abundance of online sources suitable for our continuing education and entertainment. Here is another such source we'd encourage everyone to check out: it's Mike Ruggeri's clearinghouse for links to lectures, events, and web pages regarding archaeological investigations throughout North, Central, and South America, including our own region of interest.

Mike Ruggeri showcases Ancient Americas events on Tumblr - bookmark this link and refer to it early in each month for that whole month's list of Zoom lectures & live conferences: http://mikeruggerisevents.tumblr.com

Links to his web pages featuring the cultures of Northern Mexico, Mesoamerica, Mississippian, and many more are here: https://mikeruggerispages.tumblr.com/

Finally, to connect to YouTube videos of past lectures including those of the Amerind Foundation, Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, Steve Lekson, Paul Minnis, the Peabody Museum, and so much more throughout our hemisphere, go to this page: https://mikeruggerisyoutube.tumblr.com/

/s/ webmaster [photos of Tzintzuntzan and Yaxchilan by M.Smith]

GCAS member Thatcher Rogers is currently a PhD student at UNM, a ceramics analyst/archaeologist for the Office of Contract Archeology and Aspen CRM Solutions, and one of the recipients of our Nancy Coinman Grant Awards. He has kindly allowed us to include on our website his recently-published paper, "Mimbreños y Paquiméños: Historicism and the Ancestry of the Casas Grandes Ceramic Tradition."

Our monthly GCAS general meeting happens on Zoom on Wednesday, May 19, 2021, 7 PM: As is our Zoom custom, our brief-if-any business meeting will be immediately followed by our Featured Speaker, John Stocke, Colorado University-Boulder professor of Astrophysical & Planetary Sciences (1985-2017), who returns to discuss Ethnic Astronomy with us. If you recall any of his past presentations such as the significance of The Pleiades, or aspects of Polynesian celestial navigation, you know to join us online at 6:45 to get situated before Dr. Stocke begins at 7:00 PM sharp. A Q&A session will follow the talk. Check your email inbox for your Zoom invitation about one week before the presentation, and learn more about Dr. Stocke's ongoing projects here.

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The GCAS is thrilled to introduce the two recipients of this year's Nancy Coinman Grant Awards, Jonah Jankovik and Thatcher Rogers.

Established in 2018, the Nancy Coinman Grant Awards are an essential component of our mission: to recognize and support students of anthropology and archaeology in their efforts to analyze, preserve, and protect archaeological resources and culturally significant places and objects. We offer these grant awards to PhD candidates and/or Master's level students. The application period for our 2021 award cycle expired on March 1, 2021. We subsequently provided two awards as follows:

PhD candidate Thatcher Rogers received an award of $1000. Read his research proposal here.

Master's candidate Jonah Jankovik also received an award of $1000. Read her research proposal here.

Everyone is welcome to read past awardees' progress reports by starting on our main Grant Awards page.

Congratulations, Jonah and Thatcher! The GCAS is happy to support your work and look forward to hearing more about your research.

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Please join us online at 7PM next week, on Wednesday, April 21, 2021, for our monthly GCAS meeting via Zoom. As usual during these pandemic times we expect to have no business meeting, allowing us to get straightaway to welcoming our Featured Speaker, Wendy Sutton, PhD. Dr. Sutton will introduce us to the timely and sensitive issues surrounding: "The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act at 30 – Challenges and Successes in Returning the Ancestors to their Communities within a Federal Context." Dr Sutton explains,

"NAGPRA (Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act) was passed on November 16, 1990. While the act was passed with human rights motivations, it was written as property law. For the last 30 years museums and agencies subject to NAGPRA have struggled to meet its intent and vision. This presentation will discuss the historic roots of NAGPRA, what it requires, how it influences archaeological projects on federal lands, and the Forest Service’s progress towards meeting NAGPRA requirements."

Please set aside time on Wednesday, March 17, 2021, at 7:00 PM to meet our Featured Speaker, Chris Euler, South Zone Archaeologist for the USFS in the Gila National Forest. Chris will discuss how LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging, a remote sensing method using a pulsed laser) is applied to archaeological surveys and will describe how he has used it to identify archaeological features during several years of investigations in Ohio and New Mexico.

Chris worked for the Wayne National Forest in Ohio for 13 years before moving to the Gila National Forest in 2019. During his time in Ohio, and now on the Gila, Chris worked with LiDAR technology to assess cultural resource concerns in the Forest. Chris applied and tested several techniques and methods for analyzing the landscape for potential cultural resources, as well as using LiDAR for site definition, project impacts to resources, and various Fire needs related to cultural resources. Please join us for his presentation!

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Join us Wednesday, February 17, 2021, at 7:00 PM on Zoom to hear our Featured Speaker, Lawrence (Larry) Loendorf of Sacred Sites Research, Inc. explain the relationships he and other anthropologists, archaeologists, and ethnobotanists have studied between "Medicinal Plants and Rock Art Sites in Southern New Mexico."

Larry was born and raised in Montana. His BA and MA degrees are in anthropology and archaeology from the University of Montana and his PhD is from the University of Missouri-Columbia. After receiving his PhD, he taught at the University of North Dakota for 22 years and then moved to undertake research and teaching at the University of Arizona and New Mexico State University. He currently manages Sacred Sites Research, Inc., a non-profit company that is dedicated to protecting ancient pictograph and petroglyph sites.

Regular readers of this here site know that we generally prefer focusing our news on what's happening archaeologically in our own Southwest US/Northern Mexico region. However, we remain open-minded enough to occasionally publish news from further afield, especially when it contains implications for our own area. In this case, the article's headline is fully descriptive:

"A Remarkable New Study Suggests That Stonehenge Was Built to Amplify Sound During Ancient Ruling-Class Rituals - The stones also worked as a sound chamber, keeping outside noise out."

Roughly 90 years ago, archaeologists sponsored by universities in the US Midwestern and Eastern states excavated numerous sites throughout the Mimbres-Mogollon cultural region. As was the custom, they shipped the human remains and artifacts they uncovered to the universities and museums that had underwritten their projects. Their activities and research in our area inspired in large part the formation of our own Grant County Archaeological Society in 1928.

Wednesday, January 20, 2021, 7:00 PM via Zoom: 2021's first GCAS general meeting features speaker David Greenwald of the nonprofit Jornada Research Institute. Dave describes that he:

"...will be discussing the high points of the archaeological resources in Tularosa Canyon that date to the Mesilla phase (specifically between AD 600 and 900) focusing on Creekside Village, but also bringing the Twin Kivas Site and the Great, Great Kiva Site into the discussion. His presentation is titled EARLY JORNADA MOGOLLON SUBSISTENCE, SOCIO-POLITICAL, AND COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION IN TULAROSA CANYON, OTERO COUNTY, NEW MEXICO. Thus far, the Jornada Research Institute has published the first volume on the research at Creekside Village, a preliminary report, research design and plan for expanded investigations. Ongoing studies include a focus on the reservoir and irrigation systems, terraced agricultural features, and pit houses at Creekside Village, and the great kivas, canals, and field systems in Tularosa Canyon."

Watch your email for our Zoom invite. There will be no business meeting so join us at about 6:45 PM to get settled,  and enjoy Dave's presentation when it begins at 7:00 PM sharp!

Learn more about Dave's extensive background in his own words: