Transcript

[archaeologist sifting dirt through a screen]

We're excavating areas outside of the third fort here at the Rocky Mountain House National Historic Site.

[overview of the dig site with artifacts]

We're interested in the activities that took place outside of the fur trade proper - the daily lives of the fur trade as we find the evidence in the ground. [Peter Francis - Senior Archaeologist]

It's a public archaeology program, and it's the idea of getting people just to be aware of what goes on here at this particular National Historic Site.

There's always something new to learn here, something new to find here and being able to introduce interested people to that is a really great opportunity. [Jack Porter - Archaeologist]

[archaeologist taking notes of artifacts found]

You're used to dealing with archaeologists who take this all very seriously but sometimes after a while you lose that sense of discovery.

One lady we have out with us today, her mother and father owned this property that the entire National Historic site is situated on.

[Interview setting]

My name is Dawn Phillips, I was born on this property and I came to do an exciting archaeological dig.

Our houseyard and farmbuilding were right over the Northwest Company Fort.

[Dawn presents an overview of the land that belongs to the historic site where Dawn Philips used to live]

This has been a wonderful experience for me to come and do an archaeological dig because my mother always wished she had been an archaeologist. [Dawn Philips - Participant]

And she just leapt into this project, it's been wonderful to work with her. And she's very good, she's got a very good eye.

[interview with Peter Francis]

My exciting find today. It's a tool of some kind, probably a chisel.

[Dawn displays her archaeological find]

She was seeing things when we were screening her dirt that I didn't see.

I think she would be excited. She probably would be down there with me. Actually, she was. . .

[black and white image of Dawn's mother]

It's not so much that you find some interesting artifact - it's the knowledge that goes with that. Why was that artifact there? [Arnold Weisbrot - Participant]

[Participants working with artifacts]

I found a piece of pottery, it was spode floral pattern which apparently has not been found at Rocky Mountain House before.

So that tells the world at large that this particular pattern made it all the way from England, through this torturous route, finally out here to the edge of the frontier - and it was broken!

We found a lot of evidence for processing of bone, for grease production.
[Bison bones being sorted]

People in the fort were always hungry it seemed like, there just wasn't enough food.

When they did hunt something - bison or deer - they used everything. What they would do is break up the bone and boil it to extract the fat. That fat is nourishment.