CRM Tools

Though Cultural Resources Management (CRM) is associated with rescue archaeology, the two are not necessarily identical fields. However, the idea of managing cultural heritage grew out of the need for strong initiatives in the world of rescue archaeology, and many of the tools used by either are shared in the two fields.

Shovelbums, as many people working on site-to-site CRM projects affectionately call themselves, use a large variety of tools when working on these digs. Oftentimes, they have to be completed at a great pace, to prevent holding up land development. However, the biggest of these tools is not a physical machine but rather the goodwill of the developer themselves.

Without a good rapport between the developer and the research team, no other tool can be put to use. As the archaeological record of the industrial period is coming of greater prominence, this becomes even more important. For instance, as the empty husks of old factory complexes are seen more and more as cultural artifacts, the ability to preserve them long enough to salvage some data from them is quite useful. Therefore, a mutual understanding between the developer and the team might be able to keep them standing just long enough for an excavation to take place.

That’s not to say that the only tools that CRM teams use are concepts. In fact, early on, sifts were extremely important. Though soil should be sifted in any proper archaeological excavation, rescue archaeology has often had to be literally worked between the teeth of an oncoming bulldozer.