June 09, 2023
Linda Blaser
Students get practical experience in archaeology, Chicago history
Students gained invaluable hands-on experience this summer while unearthing remains of important historical structures that lie beneath the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) campus.
Fourteen students spent the summer May term in Associate Professor of Anthropology Rebecca Graff’s SOAN 205: Archaeology Field School conducting an urban dig to search for artifacts from the once-vibrant Armour Mission and 194-apartment Armour Flats, built by the Armour Meatpacking Company in the early 1880s for its workers.
The project to unearth the remains has garnered much interest as the IIT campus and surrounding areas were designated the Bronzeville–Black Metropolis National Heritage Area of Chicago in 2022.
After just a few weeks digging at four carefully selected spots in the open green field at the southwest corner of Dearborn and 33rd Street, Graff’s students uncovered original building foundations, red bricks, nails, doll parts, and other artifacts—all that remains of what was once a busy and thriving neighborhood a century ago.
On June 6, an Open House and Media Day at the site drew visitors, curious passersby, and members of the media—including CBS-Chicago TV News, WBEZ (Chicago’s National Public Radio station), and Block Club Chicago—to meet the students and learn about the 2023 Archaeology Field School.
Kris Bostick ’25, a transfer student from Purdue University, found the summer course to be especially meaningful.
“As a person of color whose family lived in Bronzeville at one point, it’s really interesting to find these things so close to the surface,” he said. “If you were to look at this field before we came out here, you wouldn't know there once was a building here and you wouldn’t know that there were people who lived their lives here.”
“We learned all kinds of archaeological field methods…you can get a career in archaeology just from this experience alone.”
— Callie Elms ’24
Even though the buildings were razed in 1962, there are still those who remember what the area was once like.
“As someone who was born in the early 2000s, the 1960s can feel like a whole lifetime ago…but it’s really not,” Bostick said. “Even though the photos of that era are in black-and-white, life wasn’t that different from nowadays.”
For Callie Elms ’24, a double major in studio art and history who is minoring in museum studies, participating in the hands-on archaeology course definitely left its mark. 
“We got home super-tired, for sure, but it was worth it,” she said. “We learned all kinds of archaeological field methods: how to use a trowel, how to sift, and how to use a total station (an electronic instrument used to give precise locations in an archaeological survey).”
With aspirations of working in a museum someday, Elms is grateful for the practical, hands-on experience she can add to her resumé.
“You can get a career in archaeology just from this experience alone,” she said, noting: “This is something I’m going to take with me in the future, for sure.”
View more photos of the summer dig here.
Related Links:
- Check out these FAQs about the 2023 Archaeological Field School
- View the dig coverage by Block Club Chicago, CBS-TV and IIT
- Meet Rebecca Graff and explore the Department of Sociology and Anthropology