The Greatest Day	by Richard L. O’Brien
Central States Archaeological Societies 2022 January Journal	Oswego, Illinois

This excerpt from "The Greatest Day" published in the 2022 Central States Archaeological Societies 2022 January Journal Read this and mores in the Central States Archaeological 2022 January Journal which can be purchased on-line after March 2023
The three field finds of October 12, 2018.

We have all seen stories about “the greatest day of my life.” If you ask my wife, she would have a different day or two in mind. October 12, 2018 was one of my greatest days on two accounts-my grandson got his driver’s license that day (after a long time of his grandmothers’ coaching) and I found a bannerstone!

I have walked this particular field for nearly 10 years. Many times it was a day to just get some exercise and fresh air. I had gotten so discouraged that I even started to go to knap-ins to learn the craft of arrowhead making, which I discovered it is much harder than it looks to make a point.

That year, the beans had been harvested. I had walked the field right after and came up empty handed. A week or so later while talking to the land owner, he told me he had disked the field and it had rained over an inch since. He thought it would be a good time to go looking. This field has not been very productive in the fall over the years. My best luck had always been in the late spring. I have not found a lot of points but enough. In addition, the broken points, scrapers and debitage keep me interested. As luck would have it, it rained over an inch the second time before I could get out to the field.

October 12, 2018, was a nice sweatshirt kind of day. The ground was damp but not muddy. The stones and pebbles were nice and clean and stood out. There are two areas in the field that seem to have more concentrated artifacts. For some reason I reversed my search pattern that day. The ground slopes up gently away from a creek, the high area producing ancient scrapers previously. As I searched at the top, I found a nice point with broken base. I thought, this is a great day, only been here 30-45 minutes and finding something already. But another half an hour up there and nothing more was to be found. I decided to head for a runoff area at the far end of the field. This lower area around the dip has been the best part of the field as far as numbers is concerned. While walking diagonally across the higher part of the field, where I’ve never found anything, lo and behold another....

 

Read other great columns in the Central States Archaeological Societies 2022 January Journal which can be purchased on-line after March 2023