What is Archaeology? How to become an archaeologist.

Contract Archaeology as I see it.

	As a child growing up in the Midwest, I was fascinated by all things "Indian." Especially axes and arrowheads! That's me on the left, standing next to my older brother Kevin. After discovering in the 4th grade that I couldn't actually "be" an Indian when I grew up, my interests tended to focus more on baseball, drawing, comic books, and video games. Of course my interest in Native American cultural history was always rekindled during the family visits to Dickson Mounds Museum near Lewiston, Illinois. I retain many fond memories of the times my uncle Mickey would take me out to search for arrowheads and pieces of pottery across the plowed fields of my grandparents' farm near Chambersburg, and other places he was familiar with such as the banks of the Illinois River.

Skipping forward many years to 1989, I was employed at a balloon factory in Kewanee, Illinois, when I heard that an archaeology firm was planning to conduct a survey along a highway in the vicinity of Elmira, Illinois, not far from the area I where I had grown up. Intrigued, I contacted the firm and inquired about the possibility of working alongside them as a volunteer in order to see first hand exactly what archaeologists do. They agreed, so I took a week-long vacation from the warm interior of the balloon company in order to trudge across frozen corn and bean fields through stabbing winter winds, sleet, and light snow, in search of historic and prehistoric artifacts and cultural features. During that week, we managed to locate and record only a few sparse artifact scatters and isolated artifacts. Never before had I seen so many different forms, maps, and interesting pieces of equipment. I was hooked! I must have done a decent job, since I was given the chance to work as a contract archaeologist for the Center for American Archaeology a few months later, and have made archaeology my livelihood since then.

	I am forever indebted to my first field directors Robert Hickson and David Nolan for putting up with my seemingly bottomless pit of dumb questions and lack of experience, while pointing me in the right direction and teaching me some of the most valuable lessons in archaeology. These lessons ranged from using terms such as "projectile point" instead of "arrowhead" to the theory of how to maintain straight survey transects while looking at the ground. They also helped me to set up and excavate my first, second, third, etc... 1 x 2-meter test units, explained what types of information to look for and how to record it while the artifacts and features remained "in situ" rather than simply picking up the artifact and saying "Neat!" So, thanks guys, for showing me that contract archaeology can be as fun and rewarding as it is interesting and often- very tedious and difficult work.

In a nut shell, contract archaeology has provided endless opportunities for me to travel around the United States, find kool things, and get paid. Like anything else, the return depends what you're willing to invest. I've been lucky enough to search for and discover extremely interesting artifacts and other physical remains that have been manufactured and left behind by peoples across the country, but predominately in the southwest, over the past 12,000 years (give or take several). I've done everything from "shovel bum" with various environmental companies in North Dakota and Montana; survey large linear and block areas (often previously disturbed) for projects such as highway maintenance activities and basic inventories, housing developments, utility corridors, government land exchanges, and gravel pits across Arizona, New Mexico, and Illinois; work on and eventually run testing and data recovery efforts at National Register of Historic Places eligible sites including 4,000-year-old hunting "kill sites," numerous small, long-term prehistoric habitations with pit houses, trash middens, burials, canals; record amazing rock art in remote areas; and help peal off a 40-year old parking lot in what was once the original townsite of Phoenix, Arizona- revealing the foundation of the 1st (well, 2nd actually) Presbyterian Church. (I highly recommend Phoenix to anyone looking to study archaeology, or is looking for work as a contract archaeologist.)

	I've also served as a mobile field lab manager during the excavation of a number of prehistoric sites prior to the construction of a natural gas pipeline that crossed Utah from the southwest to northeast corners in which we processed more than 1 million artifacts over an 8-month-period, and have managed to be employed full-time (more or less) with normal benefits as laboratory manager and director, ceramic and stone tool analyst, authored and coauthored a number of technical reports for clients including power companies, highway departments, mining interests, scam artists, and Indian communities for submission to various City, State, and Federal agencies for projects driven by the Section 106 process (please ask someone else about the Section 106 process). I've also been extremely fortunate in that I've been able to produce graphics such as maps, scale drawings of sites and features, and artifact illustrations for technical reports and various papers and presentations. That's my favorite part of the entire show.

It is my desire to honor the many friendships I've developed with my colleagues over the years through my artwork, and at the same time, share my view of contract archaeology with you via my products that I offer for sale on this site and at various conferences and meetings. Some names will be changed to protect the guilty and/or shy.

	I hope that my efforts here might help nudge those persons who are thinking that "archaeology sounds like a neat thing to do, but maybe not for me" to give it a whirl. The industry is always looking for people with strong work ethics who are willing to walk along a proposed trail alignment, or sift through buckets of sediment for hour after hour for weeks (or months) on end, or wash and label thousands of artifacts for little pay. (Hmmm... perhaps I shouldn't have mentioned the pay.) In addition to working for environmental firms like I have, a person could be employed as an archaeologist for museums, universities, forests and other government agencies. There are also many opportunities for interested persons to help out on volunteer surveys and excavations, which will help you determine whether or not archaeology is for you.

I guess I should add that all artwork and photos displayed on this website are property of Kris Shepard and protected by myriad copyrights. On the other hand, that doesn't mean that I won't let you use them for your own purposes. I ask that you please contact me in advance and let me know how you intend to use any particular graphic. And by all means, let's talk if you have a plan for using any of these images for financial gain.

Contract Archaeology as I see it.