The Value of Recognition

                       THE VALUE OF RECOGNITION

                                                                            By John Nass, Jr.

                                                        Editor, President Mon-Yough Chapter #3

     Introduction

     For millennia societies around the world have developed means to recognize personal achievement. Such recognition can take many forms, such as metals, awards, titles, promotions, and even having one’s name listed on a plaque often seen at restaurants reserved for employee of the month.

     Recognition is a form of acknowledgement given to an individual or to a group for the successful completion of a task or some sort of demonstrable achievement. However, for the individual, recognition by one’s peers is a form of proclamation of achievement. It can represent a milestone in the career of an individual, or the accomplishments of a career.

     One such organization that bestows group and individual awards is the Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology. Two types of group awards are given to chapters. The first type recognizes the recruitment, and the second recognizes the number new sites recorded with the state and/or updated. Both are specialty awards and are non-competitive. It is possible for two chapters to tie for the number of new sites registered with the state and/or updated, as well the number of members. Both awards bear the names of individuals and were created by the society to recognize their outstanding contributions in the history of the SPA.

     The Whittoff Award is given to the chapter(s) that recruited the most new SPA members and/or reinstating the highest number of delinquent state members in the previous calendar year. The Mon-Yough Chapter has won the award twice since 2012, when it was reinstated. The award is determined by the SPA Treasurer and the Secretary.      The award recognizes the career of Dr. John Witthoft, former professor of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, who passed in 1993 after teaching for 20 years. Dr. Witthoff’s areas of expertise were Native American Ethnology, pre-contact archaeology, and colonial archaeology. Prior to his tenure at Penn, Dr. Witthoff was the state archaeologist for Pennsylvania from 1948-1966.  

     The Frances Dorrance Award is given to a chapter(s) that recorded the most new sites and/or submitted the most site updates with the Pennsylvania Archaeology Site Survey (PASS) at the State Historic Preservation Office in the previous calendar year. The award is determined by the SHPO staff.      The award is named for Frances Dorrance, a remarkable woman who championed local history and the preservation of pre-contact Native American sites and collections from those sites for scientific study. Aware of the enormity of the effort needed to insure archaeological sites and collections were preserved for future study, Dorrance in collaboration with J. Alden Mason, organized the Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology in 1929. The award was created in 1976 to honor her memory and her substantial contribution to Pennsylvania history and archaeology. 

     The society confers four awards that recognize individual achievement. These awards may or may not be presented at the annual meeting. Three of these, the Life-Time Achievement, J. Alden Mason, and Archey Award, emphasize longevity of service, while the Shrader/George Youth Award, recognizes the achievements of young adults under the age of 18 years of age.      

     The Life-Time Achievement Award created in 2008, recognizes the career achievements of an individual who can be a professional archaeologist in Pennsylvania, a professional in a closely related science, or an avocational archaeologist with at least 20 years of outstanding service to the archaeology of Pennsylvania, and/or historic preservation, and must be an exemplary proponent of the mission of the SPA. The award was created in 2008.      The J. Alden Mason Award recognizes the educational achievements of Dr. J. Alden Mason, a professor at University of Pennsylvania, who helped organize the SPA in 1929. The award, created in 1970, is given to a professional archaeologist or a professional in a related science, who holds either a Master’s degree or P.D. in Archaeology or a related science. The award acknowledges the career of an individual and her/his personal impact upon the education of students and advocationlists and SPA members, as well as encouraging advocationlists and SPA members in the proper usage of field methods in the investigation of archaeological sites.

     The Archey Award is the oldest of the individual awards given by the SPA. Created in 1958, the award recognizes the achievements of an advocationlists who is a member of the SPA. The recipient of the award is an individual who has given unselfishly of her/his time over a appreciable period, to the furtherance of Pennsylvania’s archaeology through public outreach, publications, offices held, number and kinds of sites recorded and/or excavated, and work with students to teach them proper field methods for site excavation. 

     The Shrader/George Youth Award is given to a SPA member who is 18 years old or younger. The award recognizes their accomplishments, their character, and their unselfish effort towards the furtherance of Pennsylvania archaeology. Recipients must be a member of a chapter, as well as the society.

     The legacies of Witthoff, Mason and Dorrance and their impact on the archaeology of Pennsylvania merit further discussion. For this reason, the second edition of Volume 5 will be devoted to narratives about these individuals and why the awards were created to honor them.