ASI
528 Bathurst Street M5S 2P9 Toronto, ON, Canada

The former Cannon Knitting Mills can be found in Hamilton's Beasley neighbourhood, and are one the few remaining historical industrial complexes in Hamilton. The site includes seven connected buildings that began their life as a stove foundry in the 1830s. Various adaptive reuse plans for the site have been proposed, and they are currently slated to be adapted into condo lofts. ASI's Cultural Heritage Analyst Laura Wickett photographed the site in 2015 as part of her heritage conservation studies at Willowbank. Photo credit: Laura Wickett

Are you debating with yourself whether this soil is a 10YR 4/3 or 10YR 4/6 on the Munsell chart? If so, we want you on our team! We are currently hiring Field Directors to lead our Toronto and Burlington based crews. Get your applications in by March 21st! https://asiheritage.ca/about-us/careers/

For International Women’s Day, we recommend checking out Heritage Toronto’s digital walking tour and exhibit Lady Action: Toronto’s Trailblazing Women. There are so many interesting stories to explore about women pioneers in the arts, medicine and politics! We were particularly intrigued by the history of the Margaret Eaton school which was situated at Yonge and Gerrard. It was the first specialized physical education school for women, creating a generation of leaders who broke gender barriers in professional sports and sports journalism in the 1920s and 30s. https://www.heritagetoronto.org//toronto-women-history-rig

Check out this great deep dive into the history of GPS technology! The article highlights the pioneering work of Gladys West, who created the computer program that calculated the exact shape of the Earth with enough precision to make GPS possible. GPS has become an essential tool for archaeology and heritage work, so we salute Ms West for her vital contributions to our field!

Laurentian University is currently in a financial crisis which may lead to cuts to their archaeology program, one of the few that focus on Ontario archaeology and give hands on training through local Field Schools. We have hired many Laurentian grads who have come to us with great skills, and good knowledge of Indigenous archaeology and reconciliation. Our Artifact Analyst Liz Matwey is a Laurentian graduate who leveraged her field school experience to begin a long career with us in 2007. Liz went on to Field Direct many of our most complex Indigenous archaeological sites. This is a great program that we can't afford to lose! #HumansofLU #FundLU

For Remembrance Day today, we recommend reading this great interview with two women veterans of World War Two. Their resolve to help in any way possible is inspiring, and their stories really make the past come alive! Stevens was 18 when she joined. She had a brother in the army. When he found out from their mother that his sister wanted to join the navy, he came home on leave from Quebec to try to talk her out of it. But her brother and a few other people she knew were bein...g sent overseas. And she would not be dissuaded. I just said, 'No, I'm going to join. And that's it.'" See more

Trevor Orchard from UTM has put together a strong session for tomorrow's OAS Symposium on "New Insights from Old Collections: The Research Potential of Legacy Collections in Ontario Archaeology." We are proud to be participating in this important conversation! Peter Carruthers, Christian Gates-St Pierre, Suzanne Needs-Howarth, and Robert Wojtowicz are presenting on the The Research Potential and Challenges of Unpublished Legacy Collections: The Quackenbush Site Robert Wojto...wicz and Caitlin Coleman are presenting on What’s in the Box? Ceramic Analysis of Charlie Garrad’s Legacy Collections And Alexis Dunlop is presenting on "Oldies but Goodies: The Use of CRM Legacy Collections for Academic Research." We can learn so much by looking at older collections with a fresh perspective for potential and ongoing research projects. We hope to see you there tomorrow morning!

We are loving this beautiful fall weather! Enjoy this collection of gorgeous field photos from Field Director Poorya Kashani.

The discovery was spectacular, but what to do with over 2000 mammoth bones? The construction of a new airport in Mexico City resulted in the largest trove of mammoth fossils in history, which is presenting a challenge to conservators and curators. This will be a project to watch!

Join us this Saturday at the OAS Symposium for a panel discussion on Telling Great Stories. As archaeologists we find our work endlessly fascinating but capturing the public imagination is a unique skill. Learn from the best storytellers in the business with a conversation featuring John Lorinc of Spacing Magazine , Holly Martelle of TMHC, Paul Racher of ARA, and our founder Ron Williamson! Photo by Meghan Wels from the Town of Whitby- from last year's Doors Open

These footprints have left quite an impression on us! They were found in New Mexico and date between 13 000 to 11 500 years before present. They tell the story of a long perilous journey likely made by a woman carrying a child. Her path is crisscrossed by the prints of many dangerous animals, including saber-tooth cats and giant sloths.

Join us this Saturday afternoon at the OAS Symposium, where we are sponsoring a session on Collaborations in History: Archaeology and GLAMS (galleries, libraries, archives and museums). We will also be co-presenting on two fantastic exhibits that we were lucky enough to collaborate on this year! You will hear about the Whitchurch-Stoufville Museum exhibit Archaeology Alive! The Jean-Baptiste Lainé Site, which featured an amazing virtual reality longhouse created by our fri...end Michael Carter and his team. And a big congratulations is in order; the exhibit just won the Ontario Museum Association 2020 Award of Excellence! We also participated in the City of Niagara Falls and Landscape of Nations exhibit Empathic Traditions: A New Look at an Old Collection. This exhibit absolutely blew us away with their amazing photography by Mark Zelinski. https://empathictraditions.ca/ You can register for this year's pay-what-you-can Symposium here! https://www.ontarioarchaeology.org/event-4004647

Another important Indigenous event has gone virtual this year, the Niagara Regional Native Centre's fall Powwow will be free to livestream through their Facebook and Youtube channel this Sunday at 4pm. Join in online to see a beautiful selection of dance, songs and stories! https://firstontariopac.ca/Online/default.asp

Join us this Thursday at 7:30 pm for a historical ceramic workshop presented by our very own Katie Hull! The workshop was created specifically for non-specialists, and is part of the Digital OAS Symposium, which is pay-what-you-can this year! We will be sharing our tips and tricks on how to identify, date, and contextualize all those shiny ceramic sherds and vessels. You can register for the conference here: https://www.ontarioarchaeology.org/event-4004647

One of the best ways that we grow as a company, is to learn new skills from each other and reflect on what we have learned from past projects! In our Cultural Heritage Division, Meredith Stewart recently gave a talk to her colleagues on how to identify mid century architectural materials and modern architecture. One of the interesting features she highlighted was how older streetscapes were modernized between the 1930s-1950s, and how to recognize those mid-century face lifts.

These archival photos highlight just how comparatively empty Toronto looked before the modern building boom brought density to the urban core. It is fascinating to see the Rogers Centre beside empty lots, and Roy Thomson Hall in a sea of empty parking lots. While excessive urban density is often discussed as a negative, it is clear that Toronto is a much busier and more vibrant city today due in part to condo expansion since the 1980s.

PPE doesn't always mean vests and hardhats. Health and safety is an important consideration for our lab workers as well, who clean and handle artifacts from all contexts- including former privies (also known as outhouses). These locations can be a great source of artifacts, like this lovely figurine, but we always make sure to be safe while washing them! Thanks to our Lab Tech Kaitlyn McMullen for the photo!

Excavation of a 1,200-year-old soap factory outside the Bedouin Township of Rahat has allowed researchers to recreate the production process! The archaeologists decoded the ancient recipe of olive oil and saltwort ash by analysing traces of the organic material left behind. This project was made possible through the work of hundreds of local volunteers, and there are plans to build a visitor centre near the site to commemorate the region’s history. A wonderful example of community involvement in heritage work!

Field Director Poorya Kashani photographed this beautiful black button decorated with a moulded image of a house! This is the first time we have seen this motif of a small house surrounded by tall pine trees. Could this be what a 19th century button manufacturer in Birmingham imagined a colonial house to look like?

Surprisingly, this beautiful Art Deco office building in downtown Toronto has been sitting empty for decades. The exterior has been maintained while the interior is completely empty, because bringing it up to modern fire code would be incredibly expensive. This well researched article has beautiful archival photos, it is worth a read!

What a great photo, definitely some familiar faces there!

Niagara’s annual Indigenous arts gathering has gone virtual this year! Beginning tomorrow evening, the Celebration of Nations features musical performances, storytelling, and a series of great speakers. Our Managing Partner Dr. Robert MacDonald and Senior Archaeologist Martin Cooper will be speaking on Saturday afternoon between 3-4pm on "13,000 Years of Indigenous Navigation and Settlement in the Great Lakes Watershed." This presentation will highlight both the environmental... changes and how Indigenous peoples responded to these changes in the Niagara Region and throughout the Great Lakes watershed. This talk is free to all and will be livestreamed through the Celebration of Nations site, which can be found here: https://www.celebrationofnations.ca/2020-virtual-events/

Here’s a fun surprise discovered during ceramic analysis! Senior Archaeologist Rob Wojtowicz saw this small seed while examining ceramics from Charlie Garrad’s avocational collection. This artifact comes from the Sidey-Mackey site, a Tionontaté village that dates to the late 16th century. It was likely included in the ceramic by accident but presents a clue to the natural environment 400 years ago. Our paleobotanical expert Jes Lytle identified the seed as belonging to the Asteraceae family- which includes daisies and sunflowers!

Indigenous peoples have been working for decades to bring attention to the dark history of residential schools in Canada, and today that work has resulted in the Federal Government designating two new national historic sites. One of those sites is the Portage La Prairie Residential School in Manitoba which was acquired by Long Plain First Nation in 1981 and currently holds a small museum, with a library and memorial garden in the planning stages. From Chief Dennis Meeches: "There will come a day when all of our survivors will have gone on. A national historic site that designation is forever."

The Oshawa Museum has produced a really fun interactive map that lets you explore historical buildings, landmarks, and industries! This entry on the Regent Theatre has gorgeous archival photos, a heartwarming story of a local landmark being saved and reused, and the fun fact that the theatre was once transformed into a nightclub called "Adrenalyn" in the 1990s! http://discoverhistoricoshawa.com/listings/regent-theatre/

We recently needed to test pit a field that had horses in it! The client asked us to brainstorm solutions to protect the horses from the holes we were about to dig in their field. As usual, our crafty Senior Archaeologist Andrew Clish came up with a great answer. He developed a fence with wooden post caps so the horses would not injure themselves on the metal posts. Jes Lytle, Lauren Vince, and Allan Jones helped him make the fence caps, and Andrew Sparling and Brandon Reimer helped install the fence, a true team!