Beech Bottom, WV Expedition Records (1930)

Charles Bache

Charles Bache graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1925. His main interest was in Near Eastern archaeology. In 1930 he was the field director for the expedition to Beech Bottom, West Virginia. Along with Linton Satterthwaite, Jr. they excavated the burial mound finding a skeleton that predates the Native Americans. From 1932 to 1936 and 1937-1938, Bache directed excavations in Northern Iraq at the site of Tepe Gawra, which is one of the earliest towns in Iraq dating back to the fifth millennium BCE. He died on December 18, 1942 after a brief illness.

Linton Satterthwaite, Jr.

Linton Satterthwaite, Jr. was born in Trenton, New Jersey in 1897. After graduating from Trenton High School, he enlisted in the Royal Air Force as a cadet then became a flying officer during World War I. After the war, he attended Yale University and received his bachelor's degree. He supported himself through law school by working as a reporter from 1920 to 1923. He briefly practiced law before attending the University of Pennsylvania to obtain a degree in anthropology. Between 1929 and 1931 he worked as an archaeological assistant on expeditions to Texas, West Virginia, and Guatemala. He became the assistant director in 1932 for the Piedras Negras expedition in Guatemala and a year later the field director of that expedition. After receiving his PhD. in anthropology in 1943 he pursued his interests in Mayan hieroglyphs and chronology. From 1950 to 1953, Satterthwaite was in charge of three seasons at Caracol, British Honduras (Belize). The expedition focused on hieroglyphs and chronology but also collected many vessels, stelae, and altars from the early and late classical periods for the museum. In 1956, he became the epigrapher for the Mayan site of Tikal in Guatemala. Satterthwaite became a curator in the American Section of the Penn Museum and a professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Since the beginning of his work in 1930 he published articles for many scientific journals including Scientific American, Archaeology, and Science as well as the Museum Journal until 1962. He retired from the museum and became professor emeritus in 1969 and died on March 11, 1978. He made significant contributions to the field of Maya hieroglyphs and chronology.

History of Expedition

In early 1930 Dwight A. Wagner, vice president of Wheeling Corrugating Company, notified the University of Pennsylvania Museum about a mound found on their property at Beech Bottom in Brook County, West Virginia. Excavations started on July 3 and lasted till August 4. The group was led by field director, Charles Bache, Linton Satterthwaite, the assistant director, Margaret Satterthwaite, and Mary Butler. Wagner's daughter, Sallie, also volunteered to help with excavations. Little information was known about the site but from the size of the mound it was concluded to be important. Shell and beads were found in a burial along with a skeleton attributed to the Adena Culture. The culture is a Pre-Columbian Native American people. The Academy of Natural Sciences from Philadelphia, PA helped analyze the shells. The collection of artifacts was returned to Sallie Wagner and when she moved to California in 1936 the artifacts were returned to the museum. A report was published in the Museum Journal (XXI: 3-4) 1930, 133-188) in 1930.

The Beech Bottom expedition records consist of one archival box of textual and photographic material related to the excavation of the burial mound in Beech Bottom, West Virginia (1930). The collection series assigned are correspondence, expense reports, field notes and notebooks, notes on specimens, transcript of field notes plus drawings, drafts of reports, publicity, and photographs as well as oversized drawings.

The correspondence is one folder that consists of letters between Dwight A. Wagner, vice president of Wheeling Corrugating Company, and Horace H. F. Jayne, director of the University Museum, as well as letters between Linton Satterthwaite, Jr. and Jayne and Satterthwaite and Wagner. There are six folders of Field Notes. Four folders contain the field notebooks of Charles Bache, Linton Satterthwaite and Margaret Satterthwaite. In addition to notes, most of the books also contain finds, maps and drawings. There are three folders of Analysis, post-excavation that include descriptions of artifacts and comparisons between Beech Bottom and other mounds in west Virginia. The Reports and Publications folder contains a draft later published in the Museum Journal (XXI: 3-4) 1930, 133-188) in 1930. The Publicity folder contains a newspaper clipping and an article entitled "Ancient Indian Chief is Dug from Mound with Hairpins" by Roscoe Fleming in the Pittsburgh Press on August 3rd, 1930.

Three folders of photographs remain with the notes and other series. In the group are excavation photos and studio prints of artifacts.

Oversized drawings were moved to P-40-8.

Publication Information: University of Pennsylvania: Penn Museum Archives,

Finding Aid Author:

Use Restrictions:

Personal Name(s)

• Bache, Charles
• Jayne, Horace H.F.
• Satterthwaite, Linton
• Satterthwaite, Margaret

Subject(s)

• Adena Culture