The Florida Archaeology collection represents a broad resource of objects and artifacts from all over Florida, donated by private individuals, major institutions, and long-time research projects and dig sites. The department also curates collections, field notes, reports, and other information relevant to site investigations carried out by Florida Museum and University of Florida archaeologists and graduate students.

Exhibit Objects

Timeline

1952

The Florida Museum founded an Anthropology Department and received all of the records and collections of the Florida Park Service’s archaeology division. This included files, field notes, reports, photograph archive, and correspondence of Park Service archaeologists. Ripley Bullen joined the Museum as its first archaeologist, and his wife, bioanthropologist Adelaide Kendall Bullen joined our curatorial staff.

1955

William H. Sears joined the Museum as curator in archaeology. His notes and works, as well as those of subsequent anthropological curators, are housed in the Museum’s collections. A great deal of these materials focus on Pre-Columbian and Colonial period archaeology of Florida.

Early 1970s

The archaeological collections and archival materials stored in the University of Florida’s Department of Anthropology were transferred to the museum.

1975

Jerald T. Milanich joined the Museum as Assistant Curator in archaeology. Many important collections and documents produced in his 32-year tenure are curated in the Museum’s collections.

1998

Scott Mitchell became full time Collections Manager and initiated a reorganization effort to make the holdings more accessible to researchers and the general public.

2003

The Aucilla River Prehistory Project (ARPP) collections were transferred to the Florida Archaeology collections to be curated with the rest of the archaeological material from Florida

*Collection information was accurate at the time the exhibit was on display in 2017. Please visit the collection website for updated information.