Archeology Day Set For This Saturday at Kreische Brewery & Monument Hill

Kreische Brewery & Monument Hill State Historic Sites will host Archeology Day on Saturday, October 9 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

The day’s programming will include family activities, exhibits of rarely seen artifacts, special archeological tours, and information from Texas Historical Commission Archeological Stewards. Staff and volunteers are excited to welcome students, families, and community members who have interests in uncovering Texas’ past.

Family activities will include mock excavations, mapping exercises, and hands-on artifact tables. “These activities help share our local history and introduce visitors to tools for exploring and understanding our past,” says Assistant Sites Manager Gavin Miculka. “On Archeology Day, families can try their hands at archeological tools and methods, construct hypotheses about various artifacts’ use and purpose, and learn how archeology helps tell the stories of our communities and ancestors.”

THC Archeological Stewards will share information about archeology across Texas, with an emphasis on Fayette County. Stewards will also feature a tabletop show and tell covering a late 19th century Texas homestead and a Middle Archaic occupation site. If community members have an unknown artifact at home, they are welcome to bring it to archeology day where stewards can attempt to identify it and provide information about the object’s history.

“Archeological excavations performed by Texas Parks & Wildlife in the 1970s and 1980s uncovered a wide array of material culture related to the Kreische Brewery Complex,” says Miculka. Special tours of the Kreische House and Kreische Brewery will discuss these excavations and highlight the history they revealed about the Kreische family, the people of 19th century Fayette County, and Texas’ early industries. A special exhibit in the sites’ visitors center will display select artifacts from these excavations that are on temporary loan from Texas Historical Commission’s Curatorial Facility for Artifact Research.

Archeology Day is part of Texas Archeology Month which celebrates the state’s archeological heritage, the importance of proper archeological practices, and the contributions of professional and avocational archeologists. Events are held across the state and online during the month of October.

For more information about Archeology Day and Texas Archeology Month, please contact the sites visitors center at (979) 968-5658 or kbmh@thc.texas.gov.