07/28/08

The Log College Monument

While working at another site and looking for the outline of a building, I was asked if I had ever scanned around the monument to the Log College that the Reverend William Tennent and his sons built in the early 18^th century.  I had not, but the question aroused my curiosity and the next day I went there with a friend to scan.  I had not expected to find anything.  There have been many who said that the college was not at that location.  In addition, the structure is known to have been razed in the early 19^th century.  There was a drawing of the structure that had been seen drawn in an old bible in the mid 19^th century, out in California, and it depicted the Log College facing west and a fireplace with its chimney on the south side.  I began my scan on the south side near the monument.  I am a bit emotional about the history of this structure since there were tens of colleges that descended from it.  The first of these colleges later became Princeton University.  There is a commemorative plaque at the entrance of Nassau Hall at Princeton University that tells of the connection.  As I scanned, I found a line, and then another where the fireplace might have been.  I was doing the scanning in a rain storm, but there was additional water running down my cheeks.  My God, what have I found?  We completed the scan in the rain that day and found a rectangle of about 25 feet long by 14 feet deep with a nominal 3 foot by 3 foot outline where the fireplace might have been .  It was located around the large monument that was placed there, in 1927, on the 200^th anniversary of the founding of the Log College, at that site.  The center plaque on the monument commemorates William Tennent and the historic site.  The outer two plaques list 63 colleges and universities that are descendant from the college.

We did archaeology there during the 2007 season. We did a full site survey and marked out the outline of the structure. We did a detailed scan in the "fireplace" and marked it by scoring the sod. See the picture above and click on it to see a larger version.   We found hardly any artifacts,  There were, however, many pieces of stone with low grade mortal that have been preliminarily identified as chinking for a colonial log structure.