The State Museum’s Section of Archaeology will be at the Kipona Fest 2010

This weekend our staff along with a few volunteers will be participating in the 14th annual Native American Pow-Wow at Kipona Fest 2010 . We will be bringing the ever popular recreated dugout canoe, informational brochures on State Museum programs with coupons for reduced admission, children's activity worksheets, the 2010 Archaeology Month poster, and an exhibit of select artifacts from City Island excavations.

We view public outreach as an important responsibility of The State Museum's Section of Archaeology. As a state agency, it is our obligation to get information on Pennsylvania archaeology to the public. We do this through book publications, brochures, exhibits, our web site and this blog. In addition, we do presentations at schools, to civic groups, tours of our Anthropology and Archaeology gallery in The State Museum and exhibits at large public events.

For example, partnering with the Society for Pennsylvania, Inc, in mid August, we set up an exhibit using our dugout canoe and a demonstration of our geographic information system at Cabela’s in Berks County. We spoke to roughly3500 people that weekend. We hope to greet and share our enthusiasm for archaeology with more visitors this weekend at Kipona Fest. Kipona Fest is a huge attraction for South-central Pennsylvania and we are pleased to be able to participate.

The purpose of our presence at the pow-wow is to raise awareness of all things archaeological. Archaeology is the only science that can reveal the past prior to writing. Evidence of native peoples discovered through archaeology have yielded important information regarding the lifeways of these groups. Archaeological sites are important non-renewable resources. Once these sites, both historic and prehistoric, are destroyed the link to our heritage which they may yield is lost.

Further public outreach programs include the upcoming public archaeology program at Fort Hunter Park. October is Archaeology Month in Pennsylvania, watch for programs in your area, we will post any that we are involved in or aware of on our blog. We will participate in Archaeology Day at the State Capitol in October to recognize the significance of archaeology in our daily lives. We encourage visitation to The State Museum and our websites for additional information on archaeology in Pennsylvania .

Come out and enjoy the unofficial end of summer this weekend at the Pow-Wow on City Island!

For more information, visit PAarchaeology.state.pa.us or the Hall of Anthropology and Archaeology at The State Museum of Pennsylvania .