Artifacts associated with popular culture have potential to reveal activities, interests, and societal influence amongst a community. This is especially true on Native American reservations, where families balanced participation in dominant economies with preservation of traditional practices. This project examines a 1930s comic book fragment excavated during the 2017 Field Methods in Indigenous Archaeology field school conducted on the Grand Ronde Reservation in Oregon. The comic book is a unique find that provides historical information about Grand Ronde children growing up on the reservation. This research provides a better sense of students’ activities at the schoolhouse site and explores the impacts and influence of pop culture on the students of Grand Ronde. We use several methodologies for this project, including: paper conservation, archival research, and analyzing physical artifacts collected via the excavation. By sourcing and dating the comic book, we make inferences about the entertainment experience of students at the Grand Ronde school through exploring the influence of popular culture at this site and the impact that mainstream media had on those attending Bureau of Indian Affairs scholastic institutions. This research contributes to knowledge of the cultural interplay of mainstream influences within a reservation schoolhouse environment.

Archaeologists have long used ceramics as evidence for reconstructing what people ate, what they did, and how they impacted the world. However, few studies examine the use of Euro-American manufactured ceramics by Native communities. For this project, I examined decorated ceramic pieces recovered from the Grande Ronde Agency schoolhouse archaeological site from 2015 to 2017. A wide variety of ceramic artifacts were found at this site, which illustrate everyday activities within the schoolhouse. This schoolhouse was in operation from the late nineteenth to early twentieth century, and the decorated pottery gives a significant illustration of when, where, and how ceramic pottery was acquired and utilized on the reservation during this time. To determine this, I examined the physical characteristics of the ceramics such as sherd form, paste, and decoration. The results suggest that students had access to utilitarian, medium-quality dishware, and some higher quality porcelain of various decoration styles. This project provides significant insight into mealtime activities and other aspects of student life at the schoolhouse.

The stories and activities of children are usually disregarded in the archaeological record. However, at the nineteenth to early twentieth century Grand Ronde Agency Schoolhouse, excavated by the Field Methods in Indigenous Archaeology field school, it is hard to ignore the presence of children in the material remains. Using historical records, objects of personal adornment, and school-related artifacts, I examine how children at the Grand Ronde schoolhouse stayed connected to their culture and community. Analysis of these objects convey information about identity and cultural practices of the children at schoolhouse. I analyzed artifacts excavated at the schoolhouse privy like buttons, barrettes, beads, and other accessories subject to personal choice as well as child-sized scissors and pencils. The current knowledge and research about reservation schools has been focused on the tragedies that happened at reservation and boarding schools, but the Grand Ronde material and historical records are stories of survival and optimism during the reservation periods.

Archaeological studies of Native American communities focus primarily on pre-colonial periods. Analysis of nail types and styles from Native sites are thus quite rare. Recent fieldwork conducted by Field Methods in Indigenous Archaeology (FMIA) on the Grand Ronde Reservation in northwestern Oregon provides more information about colonial life and gives more attention to reservation inhabitants. The nails excavated by FMIA offer a glimpse into reservation life during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This project focuses on nails recovered from a property in the east central reservation that was occupied by reservation families from the 1850s through at least the 1920s. I developed a typology of the nails recovered from the site and compiled this information into a comprehensive database. This database provides unique insight into the builders, inhabitants, and significant events that took place at the site. Nails shed light on builders’ access to resources, while their building paradigms can tell us of their cultural backgrounds and ideologies. Nails also tell us about the day-to-day lives of inhabitants and whether buildings sustained damage and consequentially required repairs. This project adds clarity to our understanding of the built environment at Grand Ronde. This archaeological analysis offers an approach to tracking construction projects on the reservation in the absence of maps and written records about these structures.