Roosevelt Platform Mound Study Laboratory Manual: A Laboratory Plan for Salado Research

The Roosevelt Platform Mound Study (RPMS) Lab manual entitled "A Laboratory Plan for Salado Research" (2000) represents the final, principal guide for the study's artifact processing, identification, and specialized analyses. In the opening chapter, the manual describes artifact processing and documentation procedures. The second chapter describes the RPMS database and data documentation procedures. In the remaining chapters, the manual details the artifact processing and specialized analyses for individual material classes: ceramics, lithics, groundstone, shell, fauna, samples, and human remains/physical anthropology. These chapters include narratives about each specialized analyses as well as analysis codes and sample forms.

The manual developed during the course of the project from 1989 through 1998 from the original "A Laboratory Plan for Salado Research" (Simon 1990), which was compiled prior to the start of field work. The initial organization and coding for the RPMS manual (Simon 1990) built upon previous ASU Office of Cultural Resource Management (OCRM) projects such as the Marana project(Henderson 1987;Kisselberg 1987), the La Ciudad project (Rice 1987), Tucson Aqueduct project (specifically the Picacho Archaic project (Bayham et al. 1986)), and the Payson Archaeological Research Expeditions (PARE)(Lindauer and Simon 1987). The laboratory, analytical, and data management procedures presented in the final RPMS Laboratory Manual were fitted to the needs of the Roosevelt Platform Mound Study during the test phase and subsequently revised and refined during the four years of field and laboratory work in Tonto Basin.Throughout the project, staff meetings allowed employees at all levels to contribute suggestions that enhanced the capture of data needed to analyze and document the artifacts and excavations.