Teaching Faculty and Staff
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| Dr. Dennis L. Jenkins |
Dr. Dennis L. Jenkins
1224 Museum of Natural and Cultural History,
University of Oregon,
Eugene, OR 97403-1224
(541)346-3026
djenkins@uoregon.edu
Jenkins is a Senior Staff Archaeologist for the Museum of Natural and Cultural History at the University of Oregon, Eugene. He received his B.A. (1977) and M.A. (1981) from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas where he worked with Claude N. Warren and Margaret M. Lyneis. His early research focused on the Virgin Branch of the Anasazi and Lake Mohave-Pinto sites in the Mojave Desert. He received his Ph.D. (1991) from the University of Oregon where C. Melvin Aikens served as his Committee Chair. He has worked for the Museum at the UO, where he serves as a research archaeologist assigned to Oregon Department of Transportation archaeological projects in the Northern Great Basin, Columbia Plateau, and Klamath Basin, since 1987. He has been teaching, supervising, and directing the Northern Great Basin archaeological field school since 1989. In that capacity he has overseen the education of more than 500 field school students in the methods and theory of archaeological field investigations.
His stint as a large archaeological research project field director at Fort Irwin, California provided him a unique set of interpersonal and interagency experiences that developed in him an exceptional ability to find common ground with diverse groups and individuals alike. This talent, based on honesty and proven trustworthiness, has served him well through more than 20 years of program construction, personnel handling, and interagency consultations involving working closely and successfully in sensitive negotiations with Native American tribes in Oregon.
Research Interests, Area Expertise, and Professional Involvement Jenkins’ primary research interests are the first Paleoamerican colonization of the Americas, ancient human DNA, Great Basin hunting and gathering societies, obsidian sourcing and hydration analysis, and settlement-subsistence patterns in arid lands of the American West. He has conducted archaeological research at >100 sites in Nevada, California, Arizona, and Oregon. His research spans the late Pleistocene from 12,400 radiocarbon years ago through the entire Holocene period down to excavations in a Chinese shanty town at Jackson, Oregon, mapping of the town of Jefferson in Nevada, and excavation of a historic wickiup (ca. 1854) at Boulder Village in the Fort Rock Basin.
Jenkins has authored and co-authored eight books, 19 book chapters, 13 articles, 29 professional reports, and given 46 professional papers at conferences and workshops. His doctoral thesis, Site Structure and Chronology of 37 Lake Mojave and Pinto Assemblages from Two Large Multicomponent Sites in the Central Mojave Desert, Southern California, was the culmination of four years of research focus on the late Pleistocene and early Holocene archaeology of the Mojave Desert as the Field Director of the Fort Irwin Archaeological Project at the U.S. Army’s Desert Warfare Center near Barstow, California. Through the UO field school he has conducted new excavations at the famous Connley Caves previously investigated by Stephen F. Bedwell (1973) and Paisley 5 Mile Point Caves (Cressman 1940), recovering the oldest directly dated human remains—12,400 RCYBP mitochondrial DNA in human coprolites—in the Americas from the Paisley Caves (Gilbert and Jenkins et al. in preparation; Jenkins 2007).
Jenkins is an accomplished, enthusiastic, and engaging teacher. He has been a Chautauqua Lecturer for the Oregon Council for the Humanities since 2000 and is currently engaged in traveling the state presenting a Power Point illustrated lecture entitled, Obsidian: History Through the Volcanic Glass Window, which educates the public about the techniques applied by archaeologists to track the movement of obsidian by Native Americans across the Oregon landscape through thousands of years and across hundreds of miles. He has authored and co-authored a number of articles involving obsidian source characterization and hydration dating of archaeological specimens (Jenkins 2004, 2000, 1987; Jenkins and Warren 1985; Connolly and Jenkins 1997; Skinner et al. 2004; Beck et al. 2004).
As part of his public outreach for the UO field school and Museum, he has filmed three short documentaries and one on-site interview for public education. The first, Paisley Cave Dig, was an Oregon Field Guide segment produced for Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB) of Portland, Oregon. This 10 minute program showed UO field school investigations at the Paisley Caves in the Summer Lake Basin of central Oregon, ending with a brief synopsis of preliminary findings as of the 2003 summer field session. Tracking Obsidian, filmed by OPB in 2004, was a segment explaining the search for the location of an as yet unlocated obsidian source near Silver Lake in the Fort Rock Basin just north of the Summer Lake Basin. The on-site interview, Finding Pre-Clovis Humans in the Oregon High Desert: An interview with Dennis Jenkins, is a 40 minute segment filmed at the Paisley Caves by The Archaeology Channel during the summer of 2007. It covers the topic of recovering human DNA from coprolites in the caves. It will be released with the publication of a professional article currently submitted to a high-profile scientific magazine. Finally, Jenkins has recently completed filming the
lead segment (about 7 minutes) for a two hour documentary entitled All About Dung produced by Icon Films (Bristol, United Kingdom) for the History Channel. This very entertaining investigation into the fascinating and funny topic of pooh is scheduled to be aired in June 2008.
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| Patrick O'Grady |
Patrick O'Grady
O'Grady is a third-degree Duck, having earned his B.S. (1996), M.S. (1999), and Ph.D. (2006) from the University of Oregon. He has served on twelve University of Oregon field schools since 1994, first as a student, then as an assistant, supervisor, and instructor. His primary research interests include hunter-gatherer subsistence practices and early Holocene cultural trends in the Great Basin of western North America, zooarchaeology, patterns of mobility, and remote sensing applications in archaeological contexts.
His Master's research "Human Occupation Patterns in the Uplands: An Analysis of Sourced Obsidian Projectile Points from Playa Villages in the Fort Rock Uplands, Lake County, Oregon" was an exploration of highland village settlement and mobility patterns in the uplands between the Fort Rock and Summer Lake basins in south-central Oregon. His Ph.D. research "Before Winter Comes: Archaeological Investigations of Settlement and Subsistence in Harney Valley, Harney County, Oregon" is an examination of mid to late Holocene multi-elevation land use patterns encompassing wetland to upland settings within a large, well watered valley in the Great Basin. Master's and doctoral researches were conducted under the direction of Dr. C. Melvin Aikens.
O'Grady is a staff archaeologist at the University of Oregon Museum of Natural and Cultural History. He was an archaeologist for the Oregon Department of Transportation from 2002–2005, and has also worked for the Burns District Bureau of Land Management, which was instrumental in funding his dissertation research during the 2000–2002 field seasons. Recent publications include "Zooarchaeological Analysis of Cultural Features from Four Early to Middle Holocene Sites in the Fort Rock Basin" in Early and Middle Holocene Archaeology in the Northern Great Basin, edited by Dennis L. Jenkins, Thomas J. Connolly, and C. Melvin Aikens (University of Oregon Anthropological Papers 62) and "Housepits in the Chewaucan Marsh: Investigations at the Gravelly Ford Bridge Site" by Brian L. O'Neill, Dennis L. Jenkins, Charles M. Hodges, Patrick O'Grady, and Thomas J. Connolly in Beads, Points, and Pit Houses: A Northern Great Basin Miscellany, edited by Brian L. O'Neill (University of Oregon Anthropological Papers 66). He taught the 2008 field school at the Sage Hen Gap fluted point site and Sheep Mountain Clovis site and looks forward to new challenges in 2009.
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| Dustin Kennedy at Desert Field Rockshelters |
Dustin Kennedy
Dustin received his B.S. in Anthropology at the University of Oregon in 2002 and since has been employed at the Museum of Natural and Cultural History. He began as a field and laboratory technician and now holds the position of research assistant. His work has allowed him to participate in archaeological investigations throughout the entire state of Oregon. He has also excavated on San Miguel Island, a Northern Channel Island off the Southern California Coast. He has participated in four University of Oregon field schools; first as a student and then as an assistant supervisor under Dr. Dennis Jenkins. His interests lie in the Northern Great Basin focusing on contributing to the understanding of prehistoric peoples in the Catlow Valley. He is in the University of Oregon Graduate Program and will be conducting surveys with field school students in the Catlow Valley for his Master's research.
Education
BS in Anthropology August 2002,
University of Oregon, Eugene, OR.
Field School Teaching Experience
Northern Great Basin Prehistory Project, University of Oregon, Dr Dennis Jenkins.
Sage Hen Gap and Sheep Mountain, Wagontire, OR
Supervisor for 6 weeks during summer of 2008 field school under Dr. Patrick O'Grady
Paisley 5 Mile Caves, Paisley OR.
Supervisor for 6 weeks during summer of 2007 under Dr. Dennis Jenkins.
Desert Field Rock Shelters, Catlow Valley OR,
Supervisor for 3 weeks during summer of 2006 under Dr. Dennis Jenkins.
Redmond Caves, Redmond OR,
Supervisor for 3 weeks during summer of 2006 under Dr. Patrick O’grady.
Paisley 5 Mile Caves, Paisley OR.
Supervisor for total of 12 weeks during summers of 2002 and 2003 under Dr. Dennis Jenkins.
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Responsibilities for all four field schools included: organizing all materials needed to excavate for an extended period of time including field camp equipment and supervising and teaching archaeological field and laboratory methods for 20-30 students per excavation.
Field School
Northern Great Basin Prehistory Project, University of Oregon, Dr Dennis Jenkins.
Connley Caves, Silver Lake OR.
Attended field school for 6 weeks in the summer of 2001.
Employment
August 2007- September 2007
BLM Warner Valley Fuels Archaeological Survey.
Archaeological Tech.
January 2004-Present:
Museum of Natural and Cultural History, University of Oregon
Research Assistant
August 2002-January 2004:
Museum of Natural and Cultural History, University of Oregon
Field and Laboratory Crew Temporary Employee
Professional Papers
Kennedy, Dustin G, Dennis L. Jenkins and Peter J. Mehringer
2007 Archaeology and Geoarchaeology at Desert Field: Catlow Valley, Oregon paper presented at the 60th annual Northwestern Anthropology Conference.
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| Jaime Dexter |
Jaime Dexter
Jaime received her B.S. in anthropology in 2003 from the University of Oregon, after beginning her collegiate career at the University of Arizona. After graduation, she was hired on by the UO Museum of Natural and Cultural History, where she worked as a research assistant. Here, she gained experience working both as a field technician and laboratory assistant to the staff macro floral analyst. In 2005, she accepted a position at Paleo Research Institute, Inc., in Golden, Colorado. While employed at PRI, Jaime sorted, identified, and aided in the analysis of macro floral remains from sites, both historic and prehistoric, around the world. Upon her return to the Pacific Northwest, she rejoined the museum where she is currently employed as a research assistant and is responsible for the majority of macro floral analyses conducted by the UO Museum of Natural and Cultural History. She participated in her first UO field school at Paisley 5-Mile Caves in 2007 as an assistant to supervisor Dr. Dennis Jenkins. Her research interests lie primarily in paleo-environmental studies and the emergence of agriculture. Jaime is a graduate student at the University of Oregon.
Dr. William H. Lyons
Education
2001
Ph.D. Anthropology, Washington State University
1971
B.A.with high distinction (Phi Beta Kappa), Classics, University of Nebraska at Lincoln
Teaching and Professional Experience
2001-2004.
Temporary faculty, Washington State University. Taught cultural ecology (Anth 309, FS'02); origins of culture and civilization (Anth 330, FS'03); gender and culture (Anth 316, FS'01, SS'03); art and society (Anth 201, FS'02, SS'03); introduction to Anthropology (FS'94 as graduate instructor; SS, FS'03); and world civilizations before AD 1500 (FS'92 as graduate instructor).
2001
Instructor and Field Director, Geoarchaeological Field School, Malheur Field Station, Princeton, Oregon. Field Methods in Geoarchaeology. FSArch 455/555 credit given through Portland State University.
1995
Instructor and Field Supervisor, Washington State University Summer Archaeological Field School at Lost Dune, Harney County, Oregon.
1996 to 2000
Field Supervisor, research for WSU and BLM at the Lost Dune site, Harney County, Oregon.
1993, 1994
Field Supervisor, US Fish and Wildlife Service in co-operation with University of Nevada, Reno field school at Warner Valley (archaeological survey and subsurface testing at Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge, Lake County, Oregon.
Current Research
2002 to pres.
Director, Oregon Fine-grained Volcanic Geochemical Survey. In cooperation with Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries, Baker City, Oregon, and Northwest Research Obsidian Studies Laboratory, Corvallis. Project is developing methods and a geochemical data base for matching artifacts to the fine-grained volcanic tool stones (basalts, andesites, rhyolites, etc.) in Oregon.
2002 to pres.
Owner, Earth Materials Laboratory, Albion, Washington, a small consulting sediments and materials laboratory serving archaeologists and geoarchaeologists. Services are mainly particle size distribution of sediments, and include geochemical survey and characterization, and instrumental neutron activation analysis in co-operation with the Nuclear Radiation Center at WSU.
2000 to pres.
Chert and obsidian geochemistry survey in Oregon, Idaho and Nevada.
Locating and sampling major tool stone sources for chemical characterization and artifact identification. Obsidian survey in cooperation with Norwest Research Obsidian Studies Laboratory, Corvallis; chert survey in co-operation with Burns District BLM.
2001 to 2004
Owyhee Uplands ceramic sources survey. Project locates soil and geologic clay bodies in the Owyhee Uplands of Oregon, Idaho and Nevada and characterizes their particle distribution and other properties for study of prehistoric ceramic production in the region. Unfunded project of Earth Materials Laboratory.
Awards
The Nicholas Michael Scoales Fellowship for 1994/1995, for archaeological research in lithic technology and the American interior West, Washington State University.
Professional and Scholarly Societies
Phi Beta Kappa, Society for American Archaeology (Geoarchaeology interest group), Association of Oregon Archaeologists
Publications
| Lyons, William H., Michael D. Glascock and Peter J. Mehringer, Jr. | |
| 2003 | Silica from sources to sites: Ultraviolet fluorescence and trace elements identify cherts from Lost Dune, southeastern Oregon. Journal of Archaeological Science 30:1139-1159. |
| Lyons, William H. and Michael L. Cummings | |
| 2002 | Sources of sandstone artifacts and pottery at Lost Dune, a Late Prehistoric site in Harney County, southeastern Oregon. Geoarchaeology: An International Journal 17(7):717-748. |
| Lyons, William H, Scott P. Thomas and Craig E. Skinner | |
| 2001 | Changing obsidian sources at the Lost Dune and McCoy Creek sites, Blitzen Valley, Harney County, Oregon. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 23(2):273-296. |
| Lyons, William H. | |
| 2001 | Where the lost was found: Geologic sources of artifact raw materials at the Lost Dune archaeological site, Harney County, Oregon (272 pages). Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, Washington State University, Pullman. |
| 1994 | Lithic technology at the Hall Creek site (35GR420B), Silvies Valley, Grant County, Oregon (162 pages). M.A. Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Washington State University, Pullman. |
Reports
Lyons, William H.
| 2007 | Letter report of Sediment Analysis for the Desert Fields Site, Harney County, Oregon. Submitted to Prof. Peter J. Mehringer, Jr, Washington State University. |
| 1997 | Archaeological testing at Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge, Lake County, Oregon, 1994: Sediments and Cultural Stratigraphy (47 pages). Report submitted to US Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Office, Portland. |
| 1997 | Archaeological survey at Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge, Lake County, Oregon, 1994: Rock Features (30 pages). Report submitted to US Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Office, Portland. |
| 1994 | 1993 Archaeological survey of Hart Mountain National Antelope Refuge, southern Oregon (66 pages). Report submitted to US Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Office, Portland. |
Papers Presented
Lyons, William H.
| 2007 | Error and Acceptance in Raw Material Source Assignments. Paper presented to the 60th annual Northwest Anthropological Conference, Pullman, Washington. |
| 2004 | Lost Dune: Raw Materials and Great Basin Home Ranges. Paper presented at the 57th Annual Northwest Anthropological Conference, Eugene, Oregon. |
| 2004 | Intermountain Tradition variation: Conformity and identity among seven Oregon pots. Paper presented at the 28th Great Basin Anthropological Conference, Reno, Nevada. |
| 2002 | Sources and proportions of obsidian, chert, sandstone and pottery temper at Lost Dune show home ranges of interacting Great Basin peoples. Paper presented at the 55th annual Northwest Anthropological Conference, Boise. |
| 1998 | Sherds as tools: Within-site breakage, movement, reuse and repair of pot fragments at Lost Dune, southeastern Oregon. Paper presented at 26th Great Basin Anthropological Conference, Bend, Oregon. |
| 1996 | Time storage: A model of forager time allocation and food resources of semiarid regions. Paper presented at the 49th annual Northwest Anthropological Conference, Moscow, Idaho. Winner of the graduate student paper competition. |
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| Michael F. Rondeau |
Michael F. Rondeau
Michael Rondeau (M.A., Anthropology, California State University Sacramento, 1979), was an archaeologist for the State of California for 25 years and has been sole proprietor for over 30 years of Rondeau Archeological, a consulting firm specializing in various forms of lithic analysis. Michael Rondeau is currently involved in a long term research project studying the variability in fluted projectile points of the Far West. He has done fieldwork in California, Nevada and Arizona. His lithic research has included California, Oregon, Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico. He has research interests in geoarchaeology, Paleoindian adaptations, the application of lithic technology to improving the accuracy of obsidian hydration band width analysis, the interpretative logic used to derive information from collected data as well as new approaches to lithic analysis that may elucidate the subsistence practices of hunter-gatherers. He is the author or co-author of more than 25 published articles and papers with several more currently in press.