Founded in 2008, the Exploring Joara Foundation (501(c)3) supports archaeology public education and outreach in western North Carolina. The foundation oers year-round programming for school groups and other organizations, eld and laboratory opportunities, summer camps, and special events. In the past year EJF programs reached over 4,000 people including more than 1500 visitors to the developing Catawba Meadows Archaeological Interpretive Center. Map from “The Juan Pardo Expeditions,” by Charles Hudson. Working to involve the public in Berry site excavations. Commemorating Native American communities and the Juan Pardo expeditions. Catawba Meadows Archaeological Interpretive Center. 450th Anniversary of the Pardo Expeditions The Exploring Joara Foundation is planning an 18 month commemoration of the Juan Pardo Expeditions. Local events from Parris Island, S.C., to east Tennessee, December 2016-May 2018. A celebration to commemorate these earliest diplomatic relations between Native peoples and the Spanish colonials. Events that celebrate and commemorate the 16th-century Native American communities and those Native populations that remain in the Carolinas and Tennessee today. Events will include reenactors including membors of the Catawba Nation and the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians. Completion of new archaeology museum at Catawba Meadows Recreation Park. Catawba Meadows Archaeological Interpretive Center, Morganton, NC Catawba Meadows Recreation Park is owned and operated by the City of Morganton Parks and Recreation Department. The city has granted the Exploring Joara Foundation a long-term lease on two locations: one for the outdoor interpretive center and the second, a preexisting building within the park for the museum. The park is a major recreation center for the region hosting tens of thousands of visitors each year. Construction on the outdoor interpretive center is already underway following the successful completion of a $150,000 capital campaign. As construction proceeds on the interpretive center, EJF plans to embark on a $300,000-$400,000 capital campaign to rehab the existing park building and install the archaeological museum and EJF o#ce. The Catawba Meadows facilities will allow EJF to interpret the Juan Pardo expeditions, 16th-century Native American life, Fort San Juan, and western North Carolina regional archaeology. Catawba Meadows will serve as a focal point for the EJF highway marker trail across western North Carolina and will link Pardo’s route with Santa Elena. Location of future archaeology museum and EJF o#ce. Pardo’s forts and Native Villages visited 1566-1568 1500 school children visitors Fort San Pedro 19 20 Fort San Juan 16 Fort San Pablo 18 15 Fort Santiago 14 26 22 21 17 25 23 24 13 12 11 10 27 9 28 8 Fort San Tomás 7 6 5 4 3 2 Fort Nuestra Señora 1 Fort San Felipe The Berry Site: The Location of Joara, Cuenca, and Fort San Juan The Exploring Joara Foundation helps to engage the public in the ongoing archaeological investigations of the Berry site with tours, workshops, and other opportunities including sponsorship of an annual !eld day that brings 500-1000 visitors to the site. The archaeological project is directed by Dr. David Moore (Warren Wilson College), Dr. Robin Beck (University of Michigan), and Dr. Christopher Rodning (Tulane University). Research at the Berry site has revealed evidence of the 16th-century Native town of Joara, !ve burned buildings occupied by Pardo’s soldiers (Cuenca), and in 2013, the !rst clear evidence of Fort San Juan, currently the only one of Pardo’s interior forts to have been identi!ed archaeologically. See following magazine articles about Berry site archaeology. Left: Field school students document remains of one of !ve burned Spanish buildings. Top: Soil colors reveal the southwest corner of the !lled-in ditch or moat surrounding Fort San Juan. Above: The Berry site !eld school annually attracts 40-50 students from around the country. The following are a selection of magazine articles about the Berry site from 2006-2014. Smithsonian, March 2006, “Spain Makes a Stand” American Archaeology, Spring 2008, “Contact and Conflict” Archaeology, July/August 2009, “Spain’s Appalachian Outpost” Our State, December 2013, “A City, Beneath” Discover, January 2014, “Lost Spanish Fort Finally Revealed” New York Times, July 22, 2013, “Fort Tells of Spain’s Early Ambitions” P g v 0 g o O z o g =z t E t Crcwmembers Meriltt Sanders and Cilcket Hefner excavate the heafth at the center of Structare 7.They discovered an unburned piece ot wood that may represent a portion of a tool handle along with the charued pieces of burned fitewood. Elena-as well as their indiscretions with native women, the short term,Joara seems to have benefited from the Pardo eventually soured their relationship with the natives. Histori- expedition." cal accounts also tell of the destruction of the fort and the Nonetheless, political changes could have also contrib- escape ofthe lone soldier. uted to Joara's demise, according to Moore. By their mere The archaeologists can only guess what transpired."One presence, the Spanish could have affected the balance of scenario we could see was if there had been a surprise attack power between various native groups in the area. Another on the soldiers," Moore speculated. But the small number of of the many consequences of Contact was the decimation artifacts in Structure 5, the only building that's been com- of native populations by European-borne diseases such as pletely excavated, appears to argue against that scenario. If smallpox, against which the natives'immune systems were soldiers residing in Structure 5 had been taken by surprise defenseless. European diseases may have wreaked havoc at by the nativ€s, the archaeologists assume they would have Joara, but the archaeologists need much more evidence to found an aft:fact scatter reflecting the soldiers'panicked be certain of that. response. "Everphing on the floor would have still been "something disrupted what seemed to be a very effi- there," said Moore. Instead, "the arca appears to be swept cient polity that was viable for a century," Moore said. He clean before it was burned." Rodning said the archaeologists and his colleagues hope to identifii what that something hope to solve this mystery by excavating the other burned was. But despite the several unanswered questions, Beck buildings "to clarify whether they were built for the same said that one thing is clear: though its colonial enterprise purposes and activities as Structure 5, and whether these conquered the formidable Aztec and Inca empires, "Spain other structufes were cleaned out before they were burned failed to actually embed its tentacles into" the interior of down or not." the American Southeast. A separate, but perhaps related mystery is the ultimate journalist,editor,and fate of Joara.As yet, there is no evidence that native peoples C0NSTANCE E. RICHARDS is a author based inAshevil/e, were living in the upper Catawba Valley afler the mid-l7th North Carolina, r,vho writes for TIME Magazine and other publications. century. "something led to the abandonment of the area," Beck said. "Not Juan Pardo himself...the Spanish may have To learn mole about the Belry site excavation, visit the boosted Joam's local standing-gaining military capital. In Web site www.wanen-wilson.edu/-atch sPring ' 2963 Our State December 201 3 Pottery and other SPanish artifacts unearthed at the site are providing clues about life in North Carolina before the Lost Colony. ##dre years The Spanish Lead balls Over the The Spanish When the This hand- gave fired from an Moore has found copper to American wrought nail settlers cut arquebus an bits of a blue aglets, Indians got is about 21/z iron knives - make muzzle- majolica medicine hold of copper inches long, like this one to early which they gun jar used to store brought by the and is typical the American loaded - used to helP the salves (top), and Spanish, they of ones the lndians suggest tie laces on of a jar in Spanish used Spanish settlers shards garments sonretrmes which the Spanish repurposed to build offerings. felt a need ano snoes. stored olive oil. the rnetal into their fort. themselves. arrowheads. landowners Swannanoa, Moore is everY bit the several sites, but many dig on their archaeologist a lanky rtran in his 50s turned down his request to - were wearing jeans, btlots, and a f'aded blue property. James and Pat Berry mechanic's shirt. l,t-rng strands of hair alnong the few who said Yes' frame a weather-beaten f'ace urlder a Moore is still here. Every summer. .f'he broad-brirnmed hat. answers are Braving heat, heavy rain, and thunder knowl- in the soils, he says, stooping to scrapc to slowly fill in the gaPs of Carolina before the the grt-,urrd with a trotrel. Hc rcrcals a edge about North sandy-colored outline a few yards wide Lost Colony. in the middle of a trench of dark mud' Since 2001, David Moore andhis have led a summer 'Ib rnost people, the trench lo<.rks like Spanish herita$e colleaglres at the language feels new to the archaeological freld school a sand castle. But r\{oore The Spanish well-groorued site, which allows students to Carolina foothills. But its speak- sees the outline of a tnoat. North experience a dig fi rsthand' known Moore has been digging and scrap- ers have made their presence - The E>rploringi Joara Foundation 'fhat's newsstand at the the school and is also ing these fields since 1986' when, fromLaNoticia on the sponsors to the garage on working on a public archaeology site as a doctoral student at the University Morganton Food Lion at the Catawba Meadows Parkin (.hapel he sct Cr-rllege Street converted into a store' <-,f North Carolina at Hill.