When the MUA “opened” its virtual doors in 2004 our mission was to encourage underwater archaeologists to share their research with the general public and with each other via the Internet.  It was difficult to find that first organization that was willing to post with us.  We were untested and honestly, pretty inexperienced both in public outreach and web design and coding but we believed in the mission.  John W. Morris III, (the first director of LAMP in St. Augustine, FL) took a chance and approached us about using research on the 1764 British sloop Industry for our first exhibit.  For that, we will always be grateful. Since then the MUA has grown to include nearly 300 pages of content written by over 70 professional, student, and avocational underwater archaeologists from around the world.  We are very fortunate that LAMP’s current director, Chuck Meide, still believes in our mission and has worked with us to update the original exhibit with new images, slide shows, zoomviews, and text.  The rather dated look and feel of the original post has been replaced with a new design which we hope does an even better job of telling Industry’s story.

We invite you to view the newly revised British sloop Industry exhibit at the MUA here: http://www.themua.org/exhibit_industry

I recently ran across the following quotation regarding profiting from underwater history, archaeology and ocean environments:

“[Profit] A dirty word?  Should there be financial gain from encouraging respect of the ocean and the history it shrouds?  Of course! Even non-profit organizations survive on donations from other people’s earnings and revenues, which are generated by profit.  The Other ‘P’s depend on the support of the profit, as it depends on them.  Without it, Passion dwindles, the Product loses value, Protection & Preservation suffer, and Promotion becomes pointless.  No Profit, end of Dream!”

In the initial context I read this and its attribution to the President of a firm called Ocean Quest Inc., I ascribed it to a treasure hunter or other for-profit venture.  However, this didn’t mesh comfortably with the UNESCO source cited for it.  So I sought the source; a publication entitled Underwater Cultural Heritage at Risk, Managing Natural and Human Impacts, edit by Robert Grenier, David Nutley and Ian Cochran (2006).  The volume is in the UNESCO online Library with restricted access that was readily given upon request and the volume as a whole is an excellent one.

The quotation above is part of the concluding paragraph of an article entitled, “It’s all about the ‘P’s” by Rick Stanley.  Stanley is indeed the President of Ocean Quest, Inc. Canada, which is an eco-tourism business, but he is also one of the founders of Ocean Net; a non-profit organization with the goal “To Instill an Ocean Conservation Ethic.”  He is also a member of the Steering Committee for Sustainable Tourism with Hospitality Newfoundland & Labrador and an advisor to Parks Canada on the subject of SCUBA diving.  His article is less than three pages long and focuses on his group’s largely successful efforts with respect to the Bell Island Wrecks in Conception Bay, Newfoundland, as a microcosm of global possibilities.

This knowledge of course permits an entirely different take in reading the same paragraph.  Stanley is a dive shop owner and SCUBA instructor, not an archaeologist, but like many such businessmen he has recognized that vandalism and souvenir predation of wrecks, historic or otherwise, is detrimental to his bottom line.¹ Therefore, it’s no surprise that he has a vested interest in generating a profit while preserving the submerged history of the region.  To this end, he is capitalizing on the rising current interest in eco-tourism or adventure tourism.  More and more visitors are not content to “see” a place they want to “do” a place; it’s experiential in a much more physical way than in the past.²

To look a little more closely at his “P’s, “ Protect & Preserve, and Passion, raise the specter of loving the resources to death; that there are impacts even in the most benign visitation but I believe there is a general consensus that this is justified to achieve long range goals.  His use of Product is not a reference to the commoditization of artifacts but of the experience, or the “Dream.”  Similarly, for archaeologists, Products are rarely artifacts but sections of grants or agreements specifying what the grantor will receive for its investment, such as reports, GIS, forms, images, and electronic remote sensing data.  This leaves Stanley’s Promotion and Profit, to which I would add a seven P, Partnerships.

In his view promoting his product, eco-adventures/tourism, is a road to both profit and preservation.  For public sector entities, promotion can best be seen as what is generally termed educational outreach with one of its goals being some level of financial return; not usually outright profit but often grant funds to offset or cover costs, usually in a matching arrangement for in-kind contributions of time, goods, or services.  There is discussion among archaeologists as to where the ethical tipping point lies for generating funds from submerged cultural resources; one group argues that as the patrimony of humanity, any fundraising from these sites is exploitation and should be abjured, another that so long as there is minimal physical contact or impact that films, books and experiential visits are acceptable means of educational outreach with the benefit of covering the costs of interpretation or funding additional research.  Into the latter also falls the category of what may be termed the “Polluter Pays,” to add a few more “P’s.”  Many public sector agencies are now requiring that proponents of undertakings that will impact submerged cultural resources include educational components, as well as legally mandated surveys and mitigation.  In cases of legal prosecution, those found guilty cannot physically return a site to its pre-impact state. The Courts are therefore prone to calculating what the costs would have been to undertake excavation of the site if it had been done scientifically, of analyzing any materials already recovered and other costs, and fining the guilty party to have this done. In cases where it cannot be done, the monetary penalty would be used to cover costs of research at another site, usually determined in cooperation with the relevant State or federal entity.

Stanley makes a valid point that, for non-profits, even the donations they solicit/receive are the result of someone’s profit, although one would expect not from illegal or unethical behavior toward archaeological or historical sites and materials.  I doubt there is an archaeologist who hasn’t skulked Ninja-like around an exhibit (s)he finds ethically dubious noting which firms would sponsor it, collecting paper materials to see how it is being spun to the public and so forth.  Conversely, at well realized exhibits, one cribs ideas for grant applications, clever marketing methods and looks for potential Partners in the form of funding entities, institutions, and private sector sponsors.

In general, the public sector doesn’t expect to make a profit, and in some situations is legally prohibited from so doing.  It can usually, at best, break even and often that is a long shot but it can only even attempt this through sound partnerships.  Usually this involves a mix of State, federal, and local government agencies and non-profit organizations plus volunteers from the general public.  I am including students, educational institutions and museums in the foregoing governmental categories.  In tough economic times, many of these fade as possible partners as their upstream funding sources are cut-back, donations and memberships diminish or dry up entirely as people economize, and staffs and budgets shrink without the diminution of ongoing duties and responsibilities.   This results in realignments of priorities, and in more and more entities competing for dwindling monetary resources.  The upshot is that the deepest pockets are found at the federal level and in the private sector.  With respect to the former there is more competition for fewer funds which can limit the nature of research than may be undertaken, or require putting more people at the table to obtain the funding which then can translate into additional research responsibilities to meet the interest/needs of the additional partners and add more layers of complexity.  In the case of private sector partners, many of these have recently taken sufficient financial losses that they don’t need a tax deduction for their donation, and there can be the double-edged sword of the parody of “The Golden Rule;” that those with the gold make the rules or at least think they ought to be allowed to make decisions or hold control of matters that public sector entities must retain.  One other caveat is that a private sector partner may also be a sponsor of other projects or a proponent of issues with which one would prefer not or cannot be associated.  Despite the negative possibilities, many of us are privileged to work with solid individuals in the private sector, like Rick Stanley, or non-profit organizations with comparable goals or similar messages.  The vision, or perhaps I should say Perspective (to remain consistent with the “P’s”), of these people and groups and their flexibility have permitted some interesting and creative approaches to meeting public sector research goals and remain the mainstay of such endeavors regardless of the prevailing economic winds.

¹http://bellislandexpedition.blogspot.com/2007/01/our-personnel.html

²Tarzan was an Eco-Tourist, and Other Tales in the Anthropology of Adventure (2006) is a volume that is an outgrowth of a conference addressing what constitutes “adventure” and while there is not a chapter addressing diving, many of the contributions are clearly comparable.  Conquest of the environment, albeit in a less destructive manner that in earlier times, overcoming challenges to oneself, with an element of danger are all common tropes.  That there is indeed danger and that it is real and not perceived or contrived for participants needs to be borne in mind (http://www.cdnn.info/news/safety/s070204.html).

Bibliography

Stanley, Rick. 2006. “It’s all about the ‘P’s.” in Underwater Cultural Heritage at Risk: Managing Natural and Human Impacts. R. Grenier, D. Nuttley and I Cochran, editors.  Heritage at Risk, Special Edition. ICOMOS, UNESCO. Pp. 2-4.

Vivanco, L and R. Gordon, editors. 2006.  Tarzan was an Eco-Tourist, and Other Tales in the Anthropology of Adventure, Berghahn Books, NY.

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Dr. Susan Langley is the Maryland State Underwater Archaeologist, a position housed in the State Historic Preservation Office/Maryland Historical Trust. In addition to holding Adjunct Professor positions at St. Mary’s College of Maryland and Johns Hopkins University, she holds the Archaeological Research Chair on the Monitor National Marine Sanctuary’s Sanctuary Advisory Council and serves on the Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology.  She holds a BA with Honors in Anthropology from Trinity College, University of Toronto, and an MA and Ph.D. in Archaeology with emphasis on law and underwater archaeology from The University of Calgary.  She also has Certificates in Heritage Resource Management through the Faculty of Environmental Design at The University of Calgary and as a Master Spinner from Olds College.  A professional diver for more than 30 years, she is also a Master SCUBA Diver Trainer, and an Instructor in both Emergency First Response and Oxygen Provision.  In addition to book reviews and chapters for larger volumes, she is presently working on a book about her research involving a proposal to build aircraft carriers of ice during WWII. U-Haul International is currently featuring her project as a Supergraphic on 1500 of its trucks; more information may be found at: http://www.uhaul.com/supergraphics/landing.aspx?site_id=169&sort_order=0.

From East Carolina University's Shipwrecks in Bermuda Exhibit

The students and faculty in East Carolina University’s 2008 Maritime Studies Fall field school have produced an exhibit based on their research on a selection of shipwrecks and abandoned watercraft within the vicinity of St. George’s Harbor, in Bermuda’s East End.  Videos, slideshows, maps, photographs, and zoom-able images tell the story of how these students explored this incredible collection of submerged cultural resources.

We hope you enjoy this latest edition to the MUA.  To view the exhibit click on the “ECU’s Shipwrecks in Bermuda” link on our home here:

http://www.themua.org

Artist Reconstruction of Medieval Fishing Village.

PhD researcher Sorna Khakzad returns to the MUA with her second post featuring underwater archaeology in Europe.  Today’s entry on Belgium highlights past work including submerged medieval fishing villages, shipwrecks, exhibitions, and an online maritime database.

You can view her post by clicking on the “Maritime Archaeology in Belgium” link on our main page here: http://www.themua.org

In 2010, less than one year from now, George F. Bass and the Institute of Nautical Archaeology will go back to Cape Gelidonya and take a new look at the Late Bronze Age site that 50 years ago was the first shipwreck to be excavated in its entirety on the seabed, by a diving archaeologist, and using the common standards of land archaeology.  The careful excavation, conservation, study, and publication of its artifact collection led archaeologists to believe that this late 13^th-Century BCE ship was originally Near Eastern, probably Syrian or Canaanite, and pushed the beginning of the Phoenician seafaring tradition several centuries back.  Such can be the importance of a shipwreck excavation.

Since that summer in 1960 nautical archaeology has developed continuously.  In 1961 Vasa, the Swedish royal ship sank in 1628, was raised, and the excavation of that four-story structure, with almost all of its contents inside, started.  A year later, in 1962, Ole Crumlin-Pedersen started the excavation of five 11^th-Century ships at Skuldelev, in Denmark…

As it happens with land sites, most projects started as long ago as that have yielded impressive amounts of information and many are still being studied or re-studied.  Each generation looks at the past with different eyes, and when information is professionally stored, it is possible to go back to projects studied many years ago and ask different questions from the data.

Half a century after these glorious pioneering efforts, it is interesting to take a look at this sub discipline of Archaeology, and ask a few questions.  Was it worth the effort?  What have we learned?  The answer is: a lot.  We came a long way.  Ships are amazing artifacts, and the people that thought, built, and man them, never fail to excite us, from the sailors that explored and colonized the Polynesian triangle to the Viking explorers, from the Indian Ocean merchants that inspired the legend of Sinbad the sailor to the Iberian explorers of the 15^th century, or from the pirates of the Caribbean to the sailors of the Battleship Potemkin.  The study of ships has opened many exciting windows into the histories of ideas and technology.  A better understanding of their design, capacity, performance, cost, and strength through time, has improved our knowledge of the history of exploration that continuously shrank the planet for more than two millennia.

What’s next?  The last fifty years can perhaps be divided into two periods.  The sixties and seventies saw excavation and recording techniques being developed, tested, and discussed, and at Texas A&M University – a rather implausible place, when we think about it – nautical archaeology acquired the status of an academic program.  The eighties saw the rise of treasure hunting as an industry, while anthropologists and historians discussed alternative theoretical approaches to the field.  The last three decades saw the appearance of nautical archaeology programs in universities throughout the world, an enormous growth in the number of nautical archaeologists and nautical archaeology projects worldwide, the proliferation of journals and scientific meetings dealing exclusively, or accepting naval history or nautical archaeology papers, and even the rise of an international convention for the protection of the submerged cultural heritage.

The next decades seem promising.  On one side, the amount of data accumulated during the last fifty years, combined with roughly one century of studies in naval history, history of art, and history in general, are allowing archaeologists to ask a few “big questions” for the first time.  On the other hand the development of new technologies promises to let us look at more shipwrecks, quicker, and in places previously not accessible to us.  We can think about looking for patterns without engaging in long term excavations.  The growth of the field in many countries around the world and multiplication of international meetings have brought new voices into the ongoing discussions, and is inviting more and more attempts to branch out into other disciplines and enrich the anthropological approach with other viewpoints, including some promising input from the hard sciences.  Many meetings now include engineers, architects, computer scientists, historians, philologists and historians of science.  A more integrated approach – which was present from the beginning in certain projects – is becoming common ground.

There are a few problems to address, I must avow.  Many archaeologists have been notoriously lazy in studying and publishing the shipwrecks they dig.  Many love to start new excavations and projects before finishing the old ones.   Others (especially in Europe) seem to avoid sharing information as if their peers were their enemies in a vicious competition for some unknown form of power or honor that no one seems to be able to define.  Another group (small, but quite effective) has clustered around a small number of international organizations and spends all its time and energy trying to prevent the younger generations from digging anything.  Even others ignore the general public as if they were not worth their time and energy, mostly when they live and work in countries where treasure hunting is illegal.  This is especially serious because treasure hunters have also multiplied since the eighties.  And they got sophisticated: first they hired public relations’ specialists, then “archaeologists,” and lately lawyers, who try to terrorize whoever dares to say anything against their destructions.  Archaeologists have been terribly slow to get organized and react against this cowardly and ignoble strategy.  Treasure hunters will never go away.  Like creationists and all other snake oil salesmen, they are here to stay and will always have a public ready to defend their viewpoints.

These problems aside, I believe that the next decades will probably be very exciting, both from the viewpoint of the discoveries to be made, and from that of the synthesis made possible by a growing amount of data available.  Perhaps one day shipwrecks will be treated like fossil vertebrates and analyzed within an evolutionary model, memetics seeming the most adequate from where I stand.  And perhaps we will start building databases and cooperating in large numbers.  The next decade will certainly call from crunching large amounts of data and organizing our ships through both taxonomic and cladistic analyses.  To track the creation, transfer, adaptation, and evolution of the knowledge behind the construction of every ship type sounds like an exciting direction to take within the field of nautical archaeology.

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Filipe Castro is the Frederick Mayer II associate professor in Nautical Archaeology at Texas A&M University’s Department of Anthropology and director of the J. Richard Steffy Ship Reconstruction Laboratory.  He currently serves in the executive board of directors of the Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology, the editorial advisory board of the Nautical Research Journal, the executive board of directors of the International Committee for the History of Nautical Science, and on the editorial board of Historical Archaeology. His publications include the books A nau de Portugal, Lisbon: Prefácio, 2003, The Pepper Wreck, College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2005, and Edge of Empire, Proceedings of the Symposium held at 2006 SHA Annual Meeting, Lisbon: Caleidoscópio, 2008 (edited with his former student K. Custer).

The underwater archaeology students from the University of West Florida’s summer field school posted their wrap up entry on the MUA. Their work provided details about 16th-century Spanish ship construction and a mid19th-century schooner. Their post also discusses their conservation efforts as well as their search for additional wrecks in Florida’s waters. You can view their final entry here:

http://www.uri.edu/artsci/his/mua/project_journals/wf09/wf09_week13.shtml

The Institute of Maritime History (IMH) just posted an update on the MUA about all the projects they are working on in 2009. It has been a busy year for this group of avocational and professional underwater archaeologists. Check out their post on projects from Florida to Massachusetts to see an excellent model of how the public and professionals can work together to preserve shipwrecks and other submerged sites. It’s a great alternative to the tired conflict between archaeologists and treasure hunters.

You can view the IMH post by clicking on their link under the “New
Entries” section on our home page here:
http://www.themua.org

Ok, so there is no underwater archaeology in this. At least there is something in this about piracy, the Royal Navy, and scuba diving so that’s qualifies as maritime history right? The Expedition to Lake Pahoe.

The MUA is proud to announce the launch of a new fully developed exhibit entitled: Raising the Fleet: an Art / Science Initiative. This innovate project conducted in Lake George, New York brings together underwater archaeology, cell biology, and art in a multidisciplinary study.

Viewers might ask how these three fields can intersect, but artist Elinor Mossop fails to see how they cannot. The sunken remains of British bateaux and the single celled creatures that inhabit the lake bed are all part of the same environment.

The artwork created as a result of this endeavor is on display in three venues; at the Lake George Arts Project Gallery (opening today 8/25/09), on easels resting on the lake bed near sunken British bateaux, and online at the MUA.

We’re proud to take part in such an unusual and creative effort. The web exhibit includes information on the historical background of the colonial sites involved, the methodology used to collect the data and create the artwork, a video about the project, and of course the artwork itself. We hope you enjoy the new exhibit which can be seen here:

http://www.themua.org/raisingthefleet/

The two previous blog postings have included, to a certain extent, a discussion on the issue of treasure hunting versus archaeology. It is unfortunate that so many conversations on marine archaeology often turn to this well-worn argument; however, it remains an important issue and one that will no doubt continue for the foreseeable future. One reason archaeologists are losing the battle of educating the public on the need to protect submerged archaeological resources is because we fail to voice our concerns in large enough numbers to lawmakers and regulators. So I thought I’d move the discussion toward mentioning an initiative currently underway in the United States.

The vast majority of the seafloor remains unregulated and unprotected from the impacts of treasure hunting operations on historic shipwrecks. Technological advances in the last decade have made it possible to identify and excavate shipwrecks miles underwater. Depths that were once thought to be unreachable are now surveyed on a regular basis. In the Gulf of Mexico alone, over two dozen shipwrecks have been identified in water depths ranging between 1,000 and 7,000 feet. Yet legislation to protect these non-renewable cultural resources has not kept up with the technology, leaving these sites open to potential salvage operations.

In the United States, there are a number of historic preservation laws that apply to submerged cultural resources within State boundaries. Most of these laws were initially developed for terrestrial lands, but have been used to regulate submerged cultural resources on State submerged bottomlands. Yet, once the transition from State to Federal waters is crossed, most of these laws no longer apply. The Abandoned Shipwrecks Act, for instance, assigns ownership of all abandoned vessels located on State-controlled waterways, yet its jurisdiction ends at the State/Federal boundary; while the Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979 specifically exempts the Outer Continental Shelf and therefore does not apply at all. As a result, the only Federal historic preservation legislation that provides protection for submerged archaeological resources off the coast of the United States are: Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, which requires Federal agencies to consider the effects of its undertakings on archaeological resources and is applied out to the extent of the U.S. Economic Exclusion Zone; the National Marine Sanctuaries Act, which protects submerged cultural resources within sanctuary boundaries; and the Sunken Military Craft Act, which among other things confirms the right of title to the United States of all submerged U.S. military vessels.

Efforts have been underway for some time to address this legislative gap and provide protection of submerged archaeological resources outside of current jurisdiction. For example, the recent ratification of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage establishes guidelines for conducting scientific investigations of submerged cultural resources and clearly advocates against commercial exploitation of these resources. Similarly, the RMS Titanic Maritime Memorial Act sets a new precedent by providing protection on an historically significant shipwreck in international waters.

Recently, President Barack Obama issued a proclamation declaring June 2009 as National Oceans Month. On that same day, 12 June 2009, the President also sent a memorandum to all Federal agencies and executive departments in the United States announcing the creation of an Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force. One of the responsibilities of this Task Force is to develop recommendations for a “national policy that ensures the protection, maintenance, and restoration of the health of ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes ecosystems and resources, enhances the sustainability of ocean and coastal economies, preserves our maritime heritage, provides for adaptive management to enhance our understanding of and capacity to respond to climate change, and is coordinated with our national security and foreign policy interests.” Note that the Task Force is charged with developing recommendations that will “preserve our maritime heritage.” This is an important issue that is often overlooked when developing national policy on ocean issues, and one that could be glossed over again without public and professional comment.

Too often these national initiatives focus primarily on protecting natural resources such as marine mammals, coral reefs, or chemosynthetic communities. If cultural resources are mentioned at all, it’s as an afterthought and the issue is usually marginalized or disappears completely. One of the best ways to keep cultural resources concerns on the table is through public comment, and a lot of it. The squeaky wheel gets greased. This became painfully obvious last year when I, along with two other marine archaeologists, attended a public workshop of interested parties held by the Sea Grant Consortium to solicit research priorities for the Gulf of Mexico. At the time, Sea Grant was holding a series of workshops in coastal states to prioritize future research needs. The majority of people that participated in the workshop I attended were biologists and geologists. We broke into small groups and developed lists of research priorities, then met as a whole and voted on each. Unfortunately, the three marine archaeologists present were far outnumbered and our concerns were dropped to the bottom of the list. To my knowledge, no other marine archaeologists made it to any other meetings. Had our population attended these meetings en masse, the outcome on research priorities would have been significantly different.

Fortunately, the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the group that has been charged with leading the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force, has established a website to solicit comments on the new oceans initiative. The commenting period will end after 90 days from the 12 June memorandum, somewhere around 10 September. With about three weeks remaining, I encourage all who read this blog to visit this website and provide comments to the CEQ on the importance of protecting non-renewable archaeological resources on the seafloor. And if you happen to read this after the comment period closes, then I encourage you to become more vocal during the public commenting periods for other Federal initiatives, environmental impact statements, and environmental assessments; all of which are regularly posted in the Federal Register.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/eop/ceq/initiatives/oceans/

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David Ball is the Senior Marine Archaeologist and Diving Safety Officer for the Minerals Management Service. He is also a Board Member of the Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology. He has been involved with documenting dozens of historic shipwrecks in the Gulf of Mexico, including the remains of a 200-year-old vessel in 4,000 feet of water, known as the Mardi Gras Shipwreck Project. He has also participated in archaeological investigations on World War II shipwrecks in the Gulf of Mexico and the Battle of the Atlantic Expedition off the North Carolina coast. Dave received a Master of Arts degree from Florida State University in 1998 and has led terrestrial and underwater projects throughout the United States.

* The views expressed in this blog are the personal opinions of the author and do not represent the official position of the U.S. Government, the Minerals Management Service, or the Department of the Interior.