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PrintPiece by piece, the hidden ruins of the frontier settlement of Lexington are coming together.
After a successful excavation in the summer of 2005, Earl Lubensky, charter member of the Missouri Archaeological Society since 1935, and David Sapp, former president of the Boone County Historical Society, have scheduled a second excavation for Monday through June 17.
They hope to uncover more information and artifacts from the same area as last year, focusing on one location they believe was the site of a blacksmith shop. The town once existed on what is now a farm near Rocheport owned for 16 years by William and Judith Heffernan. Their daughter, Lisa Weil, and her family all pitch in to help on the farm. “It’s a little family affair,” Bill Heffernan said.
The artifacts help archaeologists pinpoint dates and locations of the structures that once stood. Broken pieces of pottery, ceramics, bottles, window glass, buttons, brick fragments and square-cut nails from the 2005 excavation site have been associated with the town of Lexington and date to the period of 1818 to 1837.
Many of the settlers who gave the settlement its name came from Lexington, Ky.
Oliver Parker ran the store in town, which also held the first official post office in Boone County.
Parker later moved to Columbia and became successful running other stores, Sapp said.
Lexington was established on the Boone’s Lick Trail, a route that was used by settlers heading West in search of more productive and inexpensive land. Lexington was one of the last resting stations from St. Charles to Old Franklin, Lubensky said.
“When the trail was detoured to run through Columbia, that section of the road was abandoned,” Lubensky said. “That resulted in the death of the town of Lexington around 1835 or 1837.” The structures were then dismantled so the materials could be salvaged for other uses, Lubensky said.
Lubensky and Sapp hope to recruit more volunteers this year to make the dig more productive. “Obviously the number of volunteers is important because that determines how far we can go,” Sapp said. Ideally, they would like six to eight people each day.
Olin Fugit, a returning volunteer from 2005, didn’t have any experience in archaeological digs before this excavation. “I always wanted to do one of those things,” he said. “It’s hard, but worth it. It’s kind of fun to find stuff.”
Volunteers are expected to show up by 8 a.m. and provide their own lunches and drinking water. They do not have to attend every day for the two weeks, but the Heffernans have provided a camping site for those who wish to stay overnight. “There’s a couple of hundred acres, so I think we can make arrangements,” Heffernan said.
Participants should provide their own Marshalltown trowels. Organizers say the trowels should be available at any Westlake’s Hardware store. Upon arrival, volunteers meet at the site with their trowels and grab other tools such as sifters, probes and metal detectors. After being divided into pairs, they are assigned to a 10-by-10-foot section where they will strip the sod and sort through the soil.
“We simply excavate down until we run out of time, or we’re not getting anything,” Sapp said. Lubensky and Sapp will wash, count, separate and bag artifacts found this year.
Because the artifacts were found on the Heffernan’s farm, they have legal ownership of anything found, yet with their permission the artifacts can be examined at various locations such as the Walters-Boone County Historical Museum.
“We don’t plan on keeping them or anything,” said Heffernan. “The artifacts are more valuable as history for the public,” he said. The Missouri Archaeological Society and the Boone County Historical Society are joint sponsors of the project.
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