Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site (32WI17), Material Culture Reports, Part I: A Critical Review of the Archeological Investigations

This report is one of a series which describes the results of National Park Service archeological excavations at Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site from 1968 through 1972. Although a preliminary report describing the extent and nature of the excavations was produced shortly after the close of each season's fieldwork, until recently the extensive collection of artifacts and other materials recovered during that work has remained largely unanalyzed and unreported for want of sufficient funding.

A systematic effort to analyze and report all classes of material in the Fort Union collection was initiated in 1978 under the direction of Dick Ping Hsu with assistance from Leslie A. Perry. When Hsu transferred from the Midwest Archeological Center in 1981 and Perry left the National Park Service in 1982, this work was continued by William J. Hunt, Jr. These efforts have resulted in a series of manuscript reports, each focusing on a particular aspect of the 1968-1972 work at Fort Union. The series, entitled "Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site (32WI17) Material Culture Reports," consists of a volume (Part I) by Hunt which critically assesses the fieldwork accomplished during the four seasons of work at the site; four volumes, with sections authored by Hunt or Perry or both, which describe the food-related artifacts (Part II); personal and recreational materials (Part III); the firearms, trapping and fishing equipment (Part IV); and the buttons (Part V) recovered from the site. Another volume (Part VI), by Carole A. Angus and Carl R. Falk, summarizes information about the vertebrate faunal remains from the Fort Union excavations. As more classes of material in this large and important collection are analyzed, more descriptive reports will be completed in this series.

Because of the size and number of these reports, only a limited number of paper copies have been produced for distribution to active researchers in fur trade archeology. Microfiche copies of these reports may be obtained from the Midwest Archeological Center, Federal Building, ,Room 474, 100 Centennial Mall North, Lincoln, Nebraska 68508-3873.