Warm Mineral Springs Little Salt Spring Archaeological Society (WMSLSSAS)
A CHAPTER OF THE FLORIDA ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY
Located in North Port, Florida, we promote education of Florida archaeology through scholarly speakers, field trips, newsletters, and public events. We are a group of local citizens interested in the cultural heritage and history of our state, country, and world. Our focus is on education and historic preservation and we support professional research. We provide public presentations on archaeology, history, paleontology, and related subjects.
OUR MEETINGS
We meet the second Tuesday of the month (except June-August) at 7:00pm, currently via ZOOM. All meetings are open to the public.
FIELD TRIPS & EVENTS
We often take trips to regional historic or archaeological sites, as well as Florida museums, to learn and have fun. These trips may include bus rides or carpooling, sometimes walking and hiking, and usually a lunch or other snacks. Costs will vary, and most trips are open to the public.
VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES
We inform members when volunteer opportunities are available on professionally supervised excavations and encourage participation. We work with city and county governments on local preservation projects. Volunteer experience level can vary. It's a great way to learn archaeological techniques.
September 8
CALUSA, CANOES, AND COORDINATING CONFLICT IN CONTACT-ERA FLORIDA
Dr. Peter Ferdinando
Florida’s Native Americans have a long history with watercraft, with their dugout canoe use going back at least 6,000 years. Contact-era accounts from the 1500s to the early 1700s further reveal the inter-connected nature of the peninsula, with the regionally influential Calusa and their allies ranging hundreds of kilometers in canoes around and across Florida. They used canoes to establish and maintain alliances with other Indigenous groups and Europeans, for gift-giving and making exchanges, and crucially to wage war. From the Calusa sending “eighty canoes bulwarked with shields” to attack Juan Ponce de León in 1513 to them leading “more than three hundred canoes” to attack Spanish-aligned Mocoço villages in Tampa Bay in 1614, their ability to marshal and project force is particularly telling. The Calusan leadership’s coordination of such conflicts demonstrates their capacity to organize large-scale collective action across their allied communities.
ZOOM LINK Meeting ID: 818 8487 5930 Passcode: 472140
Peter J. Ferdinando is an Associate Teaching Professor and Director of Public History in the Department of History at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He earned his Ph.D. in History from Florida International University and an M.A. in Anthropology from Florida Atlantic University. This dual focus on the historical and archaeological records serves Peter’s interests in erasing the pre-/post-contact boundary in telling Indigenous American history. His current book project, “Rich from the Sea”: Indigenous Wrecking and Maritime Trade in the Atlantic World, examines how Florida’s coastal Native Americans adapted their existing maritime skills as an effective strategy to exploit the Spanish, French, English, and Dutch vessels which were dashed on the rocks and reefs of Florida’s east coast from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries.
October 13
DANCING WITH FLORIDA ARCHAEOLOGY
John McCarthy
This illustrated program will provide a view of Florida Archaeology through the lens of a local native who has spent a lifetime being intrigued with Florida and its amazing history. In addition to some personal stories, this program will feature examples of how archaeological sites were discovered and described, going back to the 1870s in Sarasota County. The program will also share some of the latest improvements and upcoming activities at the Historic Spanish Point Campus of Marie Selby Botanical Gardens.
ZOOM LINK Meeting ID: 818 8487 5930 Passcode: 472140
John McCarthy is passionate about Florida ecology and history. A skilled storyteller, John is well-known for his encyclopedic knowledge of the Sarasota region, which he shares through presentations, tours, and publications. John is a native Floridian and has lived in Sarasota since 1968. He attended Pine View School and received his B.S. from Goshen College, Indiana. John worked with Sarasota County Government for 32 years; as an Environmental Specialist, County Historian, and Director of Parks and Recreation. He joined the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens team in 2020, when the organization adopted the Historic Spanish Point Campus.