The Veterans Curation Program: Unintended Public Archaeology

The Veterans Curation Program was created with the mission to rehabilitate U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) archaeological collections while providing temporary employment and vocational training to veterans. In the nine years that the VCP has been in operation, it has evolved into a dynamic public archaeology effort that engages non-archaeologists in the field of archaeology on a daily basis. This paper explores the varied approaches to public archaeology within the Program, as well as the intended and unintended outcomes.