“Elements of the nation’s heritage are being neglected and forgotten in thousands of boxes that contain millions of objects neither identified nor accounted for,” according to a new report by the inspector general of the U.S. Department of the Interior. The National Park Service alone has a backlog of an estimated 60 million items, and five of the seven Bureau of Indian Affairs facilities “were unable to provide a current inventory listing of the objects in their collections.” The report concluded that poor management, and a lack of manpower and money, caused the problems.

Archaeologists have recovered more than 2,000 artifacts made of bronze, iron, porcelain, bone, and shell from a 2,500-year-old tomb in central Vietnam.  

Circular basins cut into a granite terrace located near a salty lake and two saltwater streams in California were probably used by the Miwok people to process salt for trade. They would have been able to produce about three tons of salt a year, “a large and valuable surplus to trade with other tribes – an early example of commerce by hunter-gatherer people,” said geologist James G. Moore.  

Reburial has been planned for Australian and British soldiers who were killed during the World War I Battle of Frommelles. The men had been buried in mass graves in northern France by German troops.   

Mark Holbrook of the Ohio Historical Society says that SunCoke Energy, Inc., has “complied with all of the procedures” that would make the prehistoric American Indian site, discovered during the construction of a new plant, eligible for the National Historic Preservation registry.   

Here’s more information on the badly decayed molar discovered in the attic of the Boleyn family estate in England. Believe it or not, the tooth will go on display in February.

Happy New Year! The news will return on Monday, January 4.

This entry was posted by Jessica E. Saraceni on Thursday, December 31, 2009. Discussion of this blog entry is now closed.

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