Shanna Daniel Joins the QAR Conservation Team

On May 1st we were pleased to welcome Shanna Daniel to the QAR conservation laboratory. Shanna joins us in apermanent position as an Assistant Conservator. She was born and raised in Texas. She did her undergraduate studies at Stephen F. Austin State University where she received a BA (2003) in Sociology with an emphasis in Anthropology/Archaeology. She furthered her academic studies at Texas A&M University where she received a MA (2007) in Anthropology with an emphasis in archaeology and conservation. Her thesis is titled A Mammoth of a Project: The Conservation of a Columbian Mammoth. She is certified in Scanning Electron Microscope, Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope, Historical Preservation, and Conservation (Center for Maritime Archaeology and Conservation Certificate). While at Texas A&M, Shanna worked as a Graduate Assistant at the Conservation Research Lab, where her duties included conservation of artifacts recovered from the wreck of La Salle's ship La Belle (1686).

QAR Paperweights Weigh In

Leeanne Cronk, a teacher at the charter Two Rivers Community School in Boone, N.C., knew a good student project when she saw one. She spied a small bag of processed sand from the Queen Anne's Revenge shipwreck site and knew that her eighth grade NC History class could use it and the QAR project as the central focus using the expedition method. This involves a team approach in a variety of subjects with the end result being the design or development of products that represent their studies. Her students were currently studying North Carolina colonial times including artifacts. Why not, she reasoned, use a resin machine they had to make clear paperweights with processed QAR sand and shells and donate them to the QAR Project? When the students visited the area in June to tour the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort, Fort Macon, and the NC Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores, they presented QAR Director Mark Wilde-Ramsing with the remainder of over 100 paperweights that they donated to the project. One of those was purchased by Joe Purifoy, Captain of the UNC-IMS research vessel Capricorn who sent one to his nephew in Iraq. The commander of the unit was so taken with the QAR paper weight that Joe's nephew gave it to him. Way to go, Two Rivers Shipmates!!

Traveling the NCCT

Our QAR education coordinator, Sim Wilde and his wife, Erwin, decided to take our advice and travel the North Carolina Colonial Trail (NCCT) recommended on our website. Since they don't have the time to do it all in one trip (which would probably take a week or ten days), they plan to tour it by segments as time permits. Sim and Erwin began in March by taking a portion of the Southern Segment, only somewhat in reverse order from the way it is listed on the website. They took US 17 out of Wilmington to NC 133, and then followed the sign to Brunswick Town Historic Site on the banks of the Cape Fear River. Relics and structures there include those from the 1700's and the Civil War era. Back on NC 133, they drove to Southport at the mouth of the Cape Fear River. They expected to find a quaint little fishing village, but on a Friday afternoon it bustled with traffic, tourists, and locals. Downtown the visited a branch of the Southport branch of North Carolina Maritime Museum (NCMM) chock full of interesting artifacts and displays. Southport is a Mecca for shoppers with its large number of antique, craft and variety stores. There are plenty of good restaurants and numerous motels. On Saturday morning,they took the ferry across the river to the Fort Fisher area and spent the rest of the day wandering around this historic area and walking through its spectacular aquarium. On Sunday they visited family and friends and returned home satisfied that our website gave good travel advice. Of course we want you to visit the NCMM in Beaufort where many of our QAR shipwreck artifacts are exhibited. But, in getting there, try coming through some of the NCCT segments. We think you will be glad you did.

Queen Anne Heads to the North Carolina Maritime Museum

On June 12th eighty-four QAR artifact numbers containing 1,942 individual artifacts were transferred to the NCMM in Beaufort. Artifacts included: gold grains, a copper alloy weight, a cockerel finial, pewter chargers, lead tacks, brick fragments, glass beads, a case bottle base, a bottleneck with cork, ceramic sherds, a pipe tamper, a pipe bowl and pipe stem fragments, cask hoop fragments and over 1,200 lead shot.

The most interesting artifact was recovered in the Fall 2006 season. At first glance you would think this was a coin but it is actually a coin weight (QAR1234.001). On the obverse (head side) the legend reads "ANNA DEI GRATIA" around a left facing portrait bust of Queen Anne. On the other side (the reverse) there is a crown and below reads a "1", then "GUINEA" and below is a "W". Each monarch issued their own coinage and coin weights with their portraits on one side. As this legend indicates, Queen Anne issued this coin weight and therefore we can date its manufacture to her reign 1702-1714. A coin weight is a piece of metal that exactly reproduces the weight of a known coin, in this case a 1 Guinea gold coin. It was used to check if the actual coin was of the proper weight and fineness. It could also be used for weighing out the amount of gold dust equivalent to a 1 Guinea coin. Gold guineas were first made in 1663 and nicknamed guinea because that was where the gold came from.

Click to Enlarge

Blackbeard: A Canvas Tale

A large group of visitors and dignitaries were present at the Museum of History in Raleigh on May 23 to view the unveiling of an oil painting, "Under the Black Flag", by artist Jack Saylor. Blackbeard's flag dominates its background: a white skeleton holding an arrow pointed to a heart dripping with blood. Underneath, are artifacts recovered from the Queen Anne's Revenge shipwreck, including cannon balls, wine bottles, and a pewter platter. Saylor, a native of Wilson, N.C. well known for his seascape paintings, is a Wilson, N.C. native who was living in Beaufort at the time of the QAR discovery. He used the real artifacts as his models, but in his remarks about the North Carolina symbolism in the painting, said it was not about the artifacts so much as the dark spirit of Blackbeard. Copyright of the painting has been assigned to the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. Sale of signed reproductions will cost $60 and will benefit the QAR Shipwreck Project. A Flagship Edition, which will include a sketch of the Queen Anne's Revenge, will cost $120. Purchases may be made at the Museum of History in Raleigh, N.C. or at the N.C. Maritime Museum in Beaufort. Orders may be placed with the Historical Publications Section (N), Office of Archives and History, 4622 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, N.C. 27699-4622. Credit card orders may be placed by calling (919) 433-7442 or online at http://nc-historical-publications.stores.yahoo.net/ .

Cannon 25 (C25)

In early November of last year, a small cannon (C25) embedded in concretion was recovered in the stern area of the ship from Unit 94. The cannon was visible in the concretion but it was also evident that other artifacts surrounded it. The cannon concretion (QAR1274.000) was x-rayed at the North Carolina Museum of Art on November 15th. The x-ray images not only revealed the shape of the gun and the presence of a yoke or rail mount, but also allowed us to see the other artifacts around the gun such as fasteners, lead shot and glass beads. Photographs and drawings were used to document the process as C25 was removed from concretion. Using the x-ray images as a guide, large sections of concretion were removed from around the gun leaving C25 and the yoke still encrusted in concretion. Once the concretion was cleaned from the surface of the gun, a 19.1in(48.5cm) bronze cannon was revealed, however no visible marks were found. The yoke attached to the gun was outlined and the condition of the wrought iron is very degraded. Cannon 25 and its yoke will continue the desalination process and any new information learned will be posted.

Hunter's Creek Elementary School Visit

On May 18th QAR Assistant Conservator, Wendy Welsh traveled to Hunter's Creek Elementary School in Jacksonville, NC to speak to the entire third grade about the QAR Project.Long time follower of the QAR Project and third grade teacher, Bonnie Krcmar organized the visit.The large number of students (c.150) required them to be divided up into two groups. Both groups were given a dive gear demonstration and a slide show presentation. A display board full of pictures about different aspects of the project was also available for them to view. The children were very enthusiastic and asked a lot of interesting questions. They were very knowledgeable about the project because Mrs. Krcmar and the other teachers took the third graders on a field trip to Beaufort where they visited the North Carolina Maritime Museum. It's always fun to see children get excited about archaeology.

Director's Report

The newsletter entries that you have just read sum up the wide range of activities from education to research and display that are on-going at the QAR project. The one disappointing aspect was our inability to get out to shipwreck site this spring to recover cannon C-16. But sometimes things happen for a reason and perhaps it is best that we hold excavation and recovery until August when we plan to continue our full recovery operation. Because of set-up time required to get the site prepared for archaeological excavation and as we experienced recently, unpredictable weather, it is more cost effective to plan for a long field season rather than a series of short ones. Our plans for the fall are to spend up to 12 weeks continuing excavations in the stern and then moving to the northern part of the site in order to recover artifacts from diagnostic areas of the vessel (bow and stern). It will be an extremely exciting period for the project and we intend to keep you informed every inch of the way!

The Queen's Report is written and edited by Sim Wilde, Wendy Welsh, and Mark Wilde-Ramsing; images and Internet technology are provided by Karen Browning.