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Below the heat of the sun in a Salt Lake City backyard, urban archaeologist Timothy Scarlett stands on 1885, digging up the pioneer past.
The Michigan Technological University professor's face is moist with sweat and caked with dirt. It's hard enough to dig a hole the size of a small pool without caring what's in the ground.
For Scarlett, shaving is not important. A shower can wait. What matters now is unearthing as many clues as possible from 19th century dirt near 600 South and 300 East.
So far, Scarlett and his assistant, Chris Merritt, can tell you with confidence that somebody in the 1920s buried two dogs on the site and that sometime during George Bush Sr.'s presidency, a Pacific Islander man roasted a pig in a pit. But solving those mysteries is secondary to understanding what lies beneath: remnants of a Danish immigrant potter's work from the late 1800s.
Frederick Petersen came to Utah as a master potter's apprentice in 1852. Earlier, the LDS Church had tried to establish a successful pottery enterprise by financing artisans' immigration to Utah, as well as their work.
The attempts failed.
But, within six months of the arrival of Petersen, three other apprentices and their master, this group had successfully fired a kiln by themselves.
"This is Fred learning how to use coal in his kiln," says Scarlett as he picks up an unevenly glazed shard of pottery.
The owner of the Salt Lake City plot not only allowed Scarlett to dig up his backyard, but also postponed planned additions to his house for more than a year to give the professor time to organize the project.
Scarlett, a Pennsylvania native, is grateful because many potential pottery finds around the nation have been covered by freeways and large buildings. In Utah, sites remain more accessible.
"From an archaeologist's perspective, there isn't another region in the country where you can get this kind of collection representing a single type of folk art," Scarlett says. "People in New England or in the South or in California, they would be terribly, terribly jealous of the opportunity here to actually have this comprehensive collection."
The two archaeologists work with borrowed tools and a tight budget. To help save money, Scarlett left a hostel, where he paid $28 a night, for a campground in Big Cottonwood Canyon, where he'll stay until he finishes Saturday. But shallow pockets won't deter him from wrapping up the project he began in 1999.
"As long as we can continue to work in this way, with private land owners and raising money to do the work, we could establish a collection that would be just unparalleled," Scarlett says. "No one else would have anything similar."
The array of glazed marbles, pots, lids and other historical findings, however, may never end up in Utah - despite Scarlett's personal wishes.
All five state facilities qualified to curate an exhibit turned down his proposal, so the materials will go back to Michigan Tech - for now.
"Historical collections space is limited," Scarlett says. "It's expensive. . . . And in making decisions as to what to accept and reject, the pattern has been that the older things are more important."
Eventually, Scarlett hopes the collection will find a home in Utah, and he would like to help build an authentic Danish kiln at a history-interpretation site such as This Is The Place Heritage Park.
A man who hated history class growing up, Scarlett says he enjoys his work because it provides a peek into the daily lives of those who came before.
"The more you struggle with how other people conduct their lives," he says, "we're able to reflect upon ourselves and it makes us more empathetic toward others."
Photos by Al Hartmann/The Salt Lake Tribune
Michigan Technological University professor Timothy Scarlett holds a large pottery shard excavated from a site in Salt Lake City where a pottery shop and kiln were operated by Danish immigrant Frederick Petersen in the 19th century. Pioneers used pottery crocks for canning and storage.
At left, Chris Merritt, a graduate student, and Timothy Scarlett, right, work the dig in a Salt Lake City backyard. Above, one of the items unearthed is a children's marble made of polished clay.