Archaeologists dig into Greenham peace camp

[i_love_rocks]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/dec/08/archaeologists-greenham-science-politics

[Dirty Dave Lincoln]

So much for recycling their old bottles! not very enviromentally friendly of them!

[kevin wooldridge]

Can I tell you my Greenham Common story.

In the mid-1980s I worked for an urban unit based not very far away from the Greenham Common base. Most Monday evenings a small group of archaeological protesters set off from our place of work to track the mobile missile carriers from Greenham Common airbase around the Berkshire and north Hampshire countryside.

This seemed in general to be a non-violent protest, but the small group from our unit did like to stock up with plastic bags full of paint in case the opportunity came to be close enough to pelt a missile carrier. Anyway this particular day we had a couple of new people start work on our site and during a tea-break one expressed an interest in joining that evenng's protest. This very much endeared the new person to the main protest group and she was made very welcome. Come mid afternoon however and a crisis was looming on the protest front. Lots of plastic bags but no paint!!

Quick as a flash new girl volunteered to 'go to the shops and buy paint'. The protest group leader allowed her to do this (despite it being worktime) and asked her to bring back a receipt, saying the group would recompense her for the cost of the paint. Girl goes off to shop and returns 30 minutes or so later with tin of paint. However when she handed over the receipt to the protest leader, I saw a glazed look come into her eyes. 'How much did you pay for this paint? £25 quid!! Where did you buy it for heavens sake?'

'Habitat' of course the new girl replied 'Isn't that where everyone buys paint?

So I am hoping that the excavations at Greenham uncover evidence of a Habitat paint tin......

[Oxbeast]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/dec/22/archaeology-london-protest

more on contemporary archaeology

[mercenary]

The recent Guardian article was an interesting change from the standard archaeology article in the press. I'm sure that, like all the others it was intended to portray archaeologists as bonkers though.

On this subject I'm not sure I disagree. The infamous Transit van excavation must have been manna from heaven for the "aren't archaeologists bonkers?" -leaning hack.

Anyway, I particularly like this bit:

Badcock's main project is a survey of treehouses and aerial walkways built by protesters in a successful struggle to protect the Nine Ladies Bronze Age stone circle from quarrying. Similar work may be started shortly at Thornborough Henges in North Yorkshire, where protests are still under way against gravel extraction.

As someone who has tried extremely hard to find 'real' archaeology at Thornborough with limited success over the years, I will be amazed how they plan to find the ongoing protest camps that unlike the Nine Ladies camps, have never to my knowledge existed! :face-huh: The protest so far has been entirely conducted in the media and the legal system.

That would be quite an innovative archaeological technique! Would it perhaps involve Google?