The Landscape of Van Winkle’s Mill: Identity, Myth, and Modernity in the Ozark Upland South

Abstract

Archaeological investigations at Van Winkle’s Mill (3BE413), a mid-to-late-19th century sawmill in the Arkansas Ozarks, were conducted between October 1997 and October 2003. These investigations yielded information that may help clarify the changing social relations and race constructions associated with the end of the antebellum era as expressed via landscape usage. Additionally, the excavations have much to say regarding our stereotypes of both slavery (and by extension the whole African Diaspora) and the inhabitants of the American upland South.