Damn that sucks. Can you go into details?
LONG POST ALERT!!
I'm going to try...I'm (or was) a contract archaeologist for the local university. What the majority of archaeologists do isn't searching for some lost civilization or carrying a whip, although some of us like to think we do (sarcasm).
Most archaeologists (U.S. archaeologists) do what is called "compliance archaeology." There are ALOT of laws that the federal and state governments have put in to place to protect and preserve potentially significant archaeological sites. An archaeological site could be something like Cahokia Mounds near St. Louis:
http://www.cahokiamounds.com/welcome.htmlMoundville in Alabama:
http://moundville.ua.edu/home.html...or Poverty Point in Louisiana.
http://www.nps.gov/popo/What makes these significant is that they add to the history of our country, or to the history of the human race. Not all archaeological sites have to be this big or significant. A western homestead from the 1800s can be significant, too. A homestead could help researchers better understand past ,iving conditions of the people from this time period.
Also, archaeologists deal mostly with past peoples' "trash," or what they left behind. This trash could be arrowheads, pottery, or burials associated with ancient Native American groups....or, the trash could be plates, marbles, bones, or tons of other stuff from slightly more modern archaeological sites.
That being said, most archaeological sites are found from people doing the "compliance" work that I mentioned earlier.
Compliance work usually comes around when someone in the government (local, state or federal) wants something built...something like a new post office, a new cell tower, or a new road. All of these building projects, and tons others like them, are paid by local, state or federal governments. There are laws out there that say before even a shovel is put in to the ground to build the new post office, road, or whatever, teams of scientists, including archaeologists, biologists, botanists, and scores of others, must examine the construction site before anything is built to make sure nothing historically significant or endangered will be destroyed. We, the scientists, make sure the people who are building these things are in "compliance" with all the mostly federal laws out there. We are sorta the "gatekeepers" or protectors of history...not to sound dramatic or anything....
Hope I'm not loosing anyone....So, the last project I was doing for the university was for the construction of a rock quarry site. This involved the Army Corps of Engineers, the Kentucky Mining Commission, and the Kentucky Heritage Council, all of which are primarily some type of state or federal agency.
Our client, the company paying us to do the compliance work for them, was unhappy that I found something at the construction site.
Well, I found what could POSSIBLY be a prehistoric Native American village or camp site. My boss, the PhD, was out at the site with me that day, and blew it off as insignificant, without properly examining the site and doing research on the site. The site MIGHT be significant, or might not...no one knows for sure.
Instead, so the construction of the quarry could go through and so our client wouldn't get pissed off at us, he wanted to give the green light to the construction. I said no.
With this type of archaeological site, there is a very slight possibility that Native American burials could be found. He refused, in so many words, to make sure nothing of the sort was there. He threatened to fire me if I didn't agree with him.
I know it may not sound like a big deal, but if during the construction someone found Native American burials, and it came back that the site wasn't properly investigated/researched, I could be in HUGE trouble, especially from Native American groups, since I was ultimately in charge of this project. If there's even the slightest possibility that human remains could be found, I'm not going to give the OK to these construction firms...these are people for Christ's sake...I've know a few instances where human remains were found and they were thrown into the local river, just to cover up mistakes made...and those people faced HUGE federal charges when they were caught. Ethically and, well, just out of pure common sense, I'm not going to risk that.
Plus, I found out that my boss has been overcharging our clients and skimming off of my paycheck and pocketing the extra money, instead of putting extra money back into the university so current students could benefit. Believe it or not, there are huge loopholes in the laws that allows him to do that. If he can somehow justify that the extra money is going towards the university, he doesn't have to prove to anyone what that money is actually going towards, including himself...yes, confusing, I know...he's already in trouble with the IRS for not reporting enough income on numerous past years' tax returns...
...what an ass...after it was all said and done, I was going to make about 10k a year...McDonalds could do better than that...and I don't need a degree for that either...
Guess Tynstar will be happy...I can get back to scanning pictures for the RFgen database!
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