Alumna and Archaeologist Amanda Sutphin Profiled in Time Out New York
Photo: Cinzia Reale-Castello |
reprinted from Time Out: She can dig it
City archaeologist Amanda Sutphin unearths Manhattan's buried history
By Katherine Pushkar
UNDERGROUND HERO Sutphin says treasures are buried under the city's brownstone neighborhoods. Amanda Sutphin is not accustomed to being in the limelight. As the chief archaeologist for the city of New York, her days typically involve lots of research, meetings, looking at maps, examining excavation plans and more research. But for the department of archaeology, these are not typical days. Early last month, Sutphin was among the city and MTA officials to announce the discovery of a wall, dating to at least the 18th century, unearthed by workers building the new South Ferry subway station in Battery Park.
"It's huge," Sutphin says, describing the wall—although the description applies to the find as well. "Eight feet wide and about 40 feet long," she continues. "I mean, we don't have anything like it." No one is sure yet exactly what the wall was or roughly how old it is. The prevailing theories locate the wall as part of a 17th-century fort or an 18th-century battery. Experts do agree, Sutphin says, that "it's definitely a pre–Revolutionary War structure."
But no one's sure what to do with the thing. "The wall appears to be directly in the way of where the subway tunnel is supposed to go," Sutphin acknowledges. That's a fact that the MTA is not too happy about; work has been halted around the wall since its discovery, and can't recommence until the issue is dealt with.
A variety of outcomes are possible. "One option is removing and replacing the wall at the surface, so people could see it," Sutphin explains, "or removing it and putting it in the subway station that's being constructed, or perhaps there's a way that it can remain in place." The last option seems unlikely—the MTA has already hired a conservation firm to assess the structure and figure out how to excavate it. "I personally would like the public to have access to it," Sutphin says. "It's special when people can actually see such old artifacts."
Sutphin, 35, has spent most of her life excavating artifacts. Born in Philadelphia, she'd dig up marbles in her Society Hill backyard and wonder who played with them. She fell in love with New York as a Barnard undergrad and came back after graduate school 11 years ago to dig among our rubble, which, she says, is surprisingly fecund—"especially in the brownstone neighborhoods." In the 19th century, many houses had cisterns or privies, which were used for water collection and sewage. Once the public water and sewer systems came on line, they became dumping grounds. "They're like a time capsule for that period," she says.
Unfortunately, those time capsules get destroyed all the time. Sutphin's department has jurisdiction only when a project is done on public land or financed with public money, as with the Battery Park wall. If someone's remodeling their kitchen in Park Slope and happens across some historical artifacts, it's up to him what to do with them. "No matter what wonderful thing might be on the site," she laments, "we can't get in there."
In many ways, Sutphin says, what's good about being an archaeologist in New York City is also what's bad about it. "New York is a city that's always been focused on development," she says. "People are constantly tearing down and rebuilding, and tearing down and rebuilding again." That dynamic means archaeologists have many opportunities to get a look at what's underneath, but it also means that a lot of history gets destroyed.
It's vexing, she admits, but Sutphin remains focused on matters she can affect, like the wall—and working on establishing a repository for the city's relics. Currently, artifacts are deposited at the state museum in Albany. "For a long time things would go to the South Street Seaport Museum, because they had this wonderful program called New York Unearthed, which was really an archaeology museum," she explains. "It's since shut, and all those collections went to Albany."
Sutphin describes the lack of a repository as "a huge problem," and one that she intends to make her department's next big project. At least, after she gets done with that wall.
Copyright ©2005 Time Out New York
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