Archaeology Resumes at Historic Colonial Site in MO on New France Campus

The 2017 archaeological field season at the François Valle II house picks up where last year’s work left off. We will be examining the archaeological footprint of a portion of the Valle dwelling, built as early as the 1780s, which may have been damaged or destroyed as a result of the New Madrid earthquake of 1811. The surviving portion of the Valle home, built of vertical logs on a stone foundation, may have been a 1790s addition to an earlier portion of the house, built of vertical logs sent into directly into the ground. The 2016 Field season exposed a portion of this dwelling, as well as a small sample of artifacts associated with the Valle family’s tenure on the property during the 1790s and first decade of the 1800s.

Work at the site this month will expand on those excavations, in hopes of defining the full footprint of the building, and retrieving more artifacts dating to the colonial period of Ste. Genevieve Missouri. This project is sponsored by The Versailles Foundation, and is being conducted for New France: The Other Colonial America (NFTOCA), and the National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Missouri (NSCDA-MO).

The Valle archaeological project begins September 19, and the public will be allowed access to the excavations beginning September 22. An open house of the finished excavation will be held Saturday, September 30. For information on seeing the excavation or for specialized tours of the archaeological site, contact Robbie Pratte at the New France office at (573) 883-3105 or email robbie.pratte@bolduchouse.org