Event: Wednesday Talks: Rehousing Old Collections and New Excavations at the Pedersen Site in Minnesota: What I Did Before Coming To UCLA

Abstract: People have occupied and visited the Pedersen Site (21LN2), an island site in southwestern Minnesota, for at least 12,000 years. The site is rare in Minnesota, containing some of the earliest stone tools and evidence of repeated occupation up to the present day. The Science Museum of Minnesota began investigating the site from 1973-1975, amassing a large collection that remained largely uninventoried for many decades, making it difficult to access or research. In this talk, I will discuss the rehousing of the collection to adhere to modern standards as well as  preliminary findings and some pretty cool artifacts in the assemblage. The second part of the talk will be about the 2021-2022 excavation/survey of the island to explore previously uninvestigated areas, detailing why we were there and the amazing finds we uncovered during the dig.

Bio: Taylor Brehm is a first-year conservation master's graduate student in the UCLA/Getty Conservation Program. She received her BA in archaeology with a minor in anthropology from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. Before arriving at UCLA, she worked in the conservation and archaeology departments at the Science Museum of Minnesota as well as a private practice conservation firm in Minneapolis, Minnesota.