Experts help people unearth the truth about found artifacts

By Tim Damos / News Republic

Dale Jaedike was about 7 or 8 years old when he glanced at the ground near his family's Honey Creek farm to notice an oddly shaped rock.

"I saw it just sitting there in the dirt," he said.

Jaedike knew it was important, so he tucked it away for safe keeping. But it wasn't until Saturday — about 40 years after he found the stone — that he learned just how important it was.

Jaedike had stumbled across a 12,000-year-old spearhead, just one of the many artifacts identified by experts Saturday at the University of Wisconsin-Baraboo/Sauk County campus during Artifact Identification Day.

About 30 people brought personal findings to the event to get an expert's take on items they found.

Buying and selling artifacts is not illegal, and sellers move merchandise on Internet auction sites like eBay. But experts say the artifact market should be avoided.

"It encourages people to go out and loot archeological sites," said Ernie Boszhardt, regional archaeologist with the Mississippi Valley Archaeology Center at the University of Wisconsin La Crosse.

When that happens, researchers don't have the benefit of knowing where an item was found and may not be able to put it in historical context, Boszhardt said.

Boszhardt — who was on hand Saturday to identify findings — said buying historic items is dangerous, because it's easy for crooks to make counterfeits.

"If you buy, eventually you will get stung," he said.

Boszhardt surveys land on behalf of the Wisconsin Department of Transportation prior to major road construction efforts to make sure no historically significant sites are disturbed.

Congress has mandated that federally funded projects cannot destroy archaeological sites.

Finding a historic site can create a dilemma for the DOT, Boszhardt said. Many times, because of the size of a site, carefully processing it and collecting the artifacts may be too expensive.

"Sometimes it may be cheaper for the DOT to move the road," he said.

Plowed farm fields are among the best places to look for artifacts, said Gene Hynek of Richland Center, who had his collection displayed Saturday.

He usually walks about 3 to 5 miles before finding one artifact, he said, and finding more than one in a particular spot is uncommon.

"A couple of times I've bent down to pick one up and there's been another one within arm's reach," he said. "But only a couple of times."

Hynek ventures out looking for arrowheads and spearheads about six to 12 times a year and has had success searching near Hixton, a small village north of Black River Falls.

Hynek's collection includes a number of significant items, including a flat stone with American Indian art etched into its face. The picture shows a hunter with a bow and arrow along with two animals, likely buffalo.

The hunter and the animals have lines from their mouths to their inner chest called heart lines. The lines on the animals are crossed, which may symbolize their death, Hynek said.

Patience is key to finding archaeological items, Hynek said, but other than that, there's no big secrets.

"I tend to go back to the places where I find good stuff," he said.