Research & Sponsored Programs Report ResearchAnnual201819-electronic | Page 14

Gulf Power
project allows
UWF archaeologists
to uncover remains of
colonial Pensacola
While Gulf Power crews work to upgrade down-
town Pensacola’s power grid, University of West
Florida archaeologists are uncovering evidence
of the city’s colonial past. UWF archaeologists have been able to uncover
finds from Pensacola’s First Spanish, British,
Second Spanish, and American periods along
Jefferson and Zaragoza streets.
Stains in the ground reveal the locations of
former building foundations and trash pits dating
to Pensacola’s First Spanish (circa 1740-1763
A.D.), British (1763-1781) and Second Spanish
(1781-1821) occupations. “(Gulf Power) has been flexible with us,” said
April Holmes, staff archaeologist with the
Archaeology Institute. “They are giving us the
time to document all the intact deposits and co-
lonial features before they do their work.”
UWF researchers have been working in concert
with Gulf Power since May 2018 as the utility re-
places aging power lines as part of a five-year,
$83 million project to modernize the 70-year old
power network. Some of the remains uncovered include a series
of barrel wells that date to First Spanish, British,
Second Spanish, and American periods. The
wells were constructed by hand excavating a
large pit down to the water table (about 7 feet
down in this part of Pensacola), and then placing
an upright barrel that has had its ends removed
into the water. A second barrel may be stacked
on top of the first, and then the whole construc-
tion pit is backfilled, leaving an open shaft to the
water inside the stacked barrels. Archaeologists
can discern and record the disturbed sediments
in the construction pit, the remains of the barrels
and the fill inside the well.
“Once they get the pavement up, we hand exca-
vate it right away,” said Dr. Elizabeth Benchley,
director of the Archaeology Institute at UWF.
“And then (Gulf Power) brings in their machines,
and we watch and record what they come up
with that might be different from what we
documented.”
Datable artifacts, such as broken sherds of pot-
tery bowls and plates, can be used to estimate
when the well was dug and when it was aban-
doned. After the well is no longer used, it is often
filled with trash including animal bones, broken
bottles and dishes, nails and other debris. In two
cases on the Gulf Power project, UWF archae-
ologists have recovered intact barrels preserved
below the water table. One barrel dated to the
Top: April A. Holmes, M.A., RPA Faculty Research Associate/Archaeologist,
examines artifacts discovered during the excavation.
Above: Grad student Hillary Jolly talks with Holmes at an excavation site
in downtown Pensacola.
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2018-2019 Research Annual Report