In September 2018, a Save America’s Treasures grant was awarded to the former Glenn A. Black Laboratory of Archaeology (now part of the IU Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology) to rehabilitate and rehouse significant artifact collections from the Angel Mounds archaeological site.
This project not only ensures improved preservation and access to this important archaeological collection, but also provided education and training in museum curation skills for nearly 50 undergraduate and graduate students in the process. This blog site preserves the stories and experiences of many of the students and staff involved in the project.
This multi-year project was faced with many challenges.The vast scope of the collection to rehouse was daunting to begin with – approximately 2.5 million artifacts that had been excavated over the course of four decades at the site. On top of this, the project also overlapped with a total move of all collections to accommodate major building renovations, a merger with another institution, and of course a shut-down during the 2020 COVID pandemic. Despite this, by the end of the project in November 2022, over 2,500 boxes of artifacts had been rehoused and moved to new, state of the art storage facilities. The project greatly improved the preservation outlook for this collection and supports its increased use for research, exhibition, education, and other programming.
