THE TRANSITION FROM "SALVAGE' TO "RESEARCH" ARCHAEOLOGY

ON THE NATIONAL FORESTS IN CALIFORNIA

Donald S. Miller

Regional Archaeologist

California Region, U.S. Forest Service

Under the general rubric of "Salvage Archaeology' one may
list at least three sub-divisions based on the nature of the

activity that jeopardizes the existence of -archaeological data:
(1) Highway Salvage, (2) River Basin or Reservoir Salvage, and
(3) Urban Salvage. As we all know, the Federal Government has

been instrumental in providing the funds and the legal sanctions
to perform most salvage operations in the United States. With
the possible exception of River Basin Salvage, the Federal

government has had little to do with research credibility of
the archaeological examinations associated with Salvage

Archaeology programs. There are reasons for this, some of which
will be the subject of this paper.

I will restrict this paper to my own experiences with the
California Region of the U.S. Forest Service. I must caution
the reader that what I say may not apply to other Federal

agencies, and it would be a misinterpretation to draw such an
impression.

As you enter any of the 17 National Forests in California
you will probably see a sign giving the Forest's name. Under
that name you will read: "Land of Many Uses."   To the Forest
Service this motto translates: "balanced management. " From

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the 82 Ranger Districts on the 17 National Forests in California,
balanced management is the prime working philosophy.

We may isolate two major components of the Forest Services'

balanced management program: (1) use-management and (2) protective-
management, both of which vary to the degree of emphasis an

existing or anticipated situation may have on a given resource.
These components are part of a management system and, thus, are
not mutually exclusive. Cross-cutting these management

components is a management planning dimension which may be

labeled from immediate (or short-term) to long-term planning.

This simplified model of forest service management provides
us with an opportunity to view the significance of Salvage

Archaeology from within Forest Service bureaucracy. Salvage

Archaeology is most often associated with protective-management
on an immediate planning basis. As such, it is a protective-
management response to a use-management situation that has
probably been in the planning for a long period of time.
What this means is that Salvage Archaeology is a type of

archaeology that is completely in the service of other forest

uses, such as timber sales, recreation developments, engineering
construction, and land exchanges. From a management point of
view, Salvage Archaeology has little impact on the total
management system.

Archaeologists in California have, in the past, tended to
perpetuate this limited function for Archaeology. Their bread

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and butter tended to come from Salvage Archaeology programs.

The often elaborate research rationales necessary for foundation
funds simply were not necessary for receiving contracts to do
'Salvage Archaeology. Qualitative and quantitative selective

factors were made to conform with the "worlds" of salvage and
research archaeology: in a word, if you wanted to do research
NSF funding was sought; if you wanted to train or save sites
(I could add to the various rationales for salvage) you kent
your eyes on Division of Highways proposed routing maps.

Now it seems to me that what current trends in archaeology
are demanding is that archaeology is no longer in a position
to be in the service of any other discipline or function.
What this means to the Forest Service is that in order to
accomodate the expanding research interests of American

Archaeology, archaeology has to become one of the uses in the

motto "Land of Many Uses." Once it becomes totally integrated
throughout the management system, it will function much more
efficiently than at present.

In an attempt to make archaeology a part of use-management

and long-range planning, we have encouraged several universities
and colleges in California and other States to consider

directing their research interests to the National Forests of
California. We are presently working on a proposal from

Michigan State University which outlines a research/training
project along fifty miles of the Klamath River drainage in

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northwestern California. That proposal calls for three major

functions within the overall research/training design as follows:
Professional Training (50%), Recovery of data for Scientific
Research (30%), and the Recovery of data for use by public

lands administrators (20%). Another example of directions we

are taking is an agreement of understanding between the Forest

Service and Long Beach State University. Through the supervision
of Dr. Margaret Weide, two graduate students, Shirley Kirkberg

and Clyde Kuhn, have designed a long-range research program for
the entire Trabuco Ranger District of the Cleveland National

Forest. This means that much of the University's research and
training sophistication will be developed within one large

geographic area over about a five year period. The professional
services of the Forest Service will be available, logistics
will be considered on an ongoing basis, and, in a sense, the
archaeologist will become "resident." The University will
provide data well in advance as a means of avoiding salvage

situations; but where salvage becomes necessary they will have
generated the expertise to conduct such work under contract

within the context of a continuously developing research program.
Similar agreements are being made with other universities and
colleges.

What is happening in California is that we are putting
Salvage Archaeology in its place -- merely one component of

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the total archaeological research system and merely one
component of the Forest Service-management svstem.

For those who may feel that this is drawing archaeologists'
interests away from "Critical Salvage Projects,' let me

indicate some of the emergencies in the "pristine forests."

Of the total amount of commercial timber in the NJational
Forests in California about 70% has already been affected bv
logging operations. One figure estimates that about 60% of
the total has occurred since W.W. II. This relates to

archaeology in a very special way. Logging equipment landings,
skid trails, and equipment servicing areas are invariablv

placed on locations where prehistoric habitation and other
uses occurred. Thus, it is probably not too surprising to

predict that a great number of archaeological sites have been
damaged or destroyed on the National Forests in California.
Further, I would predict that the greatest amount of that

damage took place prior to the establishment of the National
Forest system in 1905. A sampling of campgrounds and

administrative sites suggests that the majority of them are
located on or immediately adjacent to archaeological sites.

The interesting history of archaeological research in
California reveals another situation. Of the more than

20,000 known archaeological sites in the various files of
the University of California, less than 10% are within
National Forest boundaries. If you consider life-zones

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instead of Forest boundaries, that figure is considerably less
within each zone.

It is my hope that this paper, with the vigorous support
of the other papers of this symposium, will let American
archaeologists know that there IS a crisis in American

Archaeology. It is a crisis that can be responded to by the kind
of research thinking being generated in current archaeological
circles. It can also receive solution-directed support from

the federal land managing agencies if archaeologists think of
themselves as "users" of public lands on a long-term basis,
rather than as protectionists on a short-term basis.

Thus, the title of this paper suggests that Salvage

Archaeology should gradually blend into Research Archaeology
until it becomes nothing more than an historical phase within
our professional development.

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