Crucian David Hayes, an archaeological consultant, is working as the manager on the recently unearthed Krondprindsens Gade Archaeological Site in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, and he can’t hide his excitement.
“This is a huge site and incredibly rich,” Hayes said.
“I’m the manager of the project and I won’t get to dig,” Hayes said with a hearty laugh. Digging in the dirt is the fun part, much more so than managing. He flies from his St. Croix home to St. Thomas for work so much lately they know him by name at the seaplane.
The 2,000-year-old pre-Columbian site was discovered by the Department of Public Works during construction on the Rothschild Francis Square Enhancements project. The site is on Krondprindsens Gade (Main Street) between Strande and General Gades.
Public Works and its contractor, along with the Department of Planning and Natural Resources and the State Historic Preservation Society, worked together to decide how best to preserve the area.
Some construction work in the area stopped, but Public Works will continue with its planned renovation of the Main Street area.
Hayes says since January he has been monitoring the 100-percent federally funded project. He will hire a crew of around 25 people, of those 10 to 12 will be highly skilled. He says they are waiting on paperwork to move ahead.
The dig site can teach archaeologists a lot about the first people of Charlotte Amalie, their environment, what they ate, what their lives were like.
He said he has around 150 boxes of artifacts collected from the site to catalog. Some items will be carbon dated. There is a well, animal bones, whelk shells, stone tools, pottery and other artifacts that are associated with a human settlement.
They have dug down through five feet of earth and in one layer have found a burned out building that housed tar and pitch, probably used for ships. Hayes said the tar acted as a preservative.
“I knew there had been a fire,” Hayes said. “It was amazing, it still smelled like fire.”
He added the town of Charlotte Amalie burned repeatedly.
There is always a chance of finding human bones, but they haven’t yet, he said.
Hayes was born on St. Croix, and said his mother, teacher Margaret Hayes, exposed him to exploration and the love of collecting plants, animals and fossils at Cruzan Gardens, which she owned and operated.
“I always had fun playing in the gardens,” Hayes said.
In the fourth grade he left St. Croix for boarding-school in the states. He earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of California at Berkley, and has his master’s degree in industrial archeology from Michigan Technological University.
In 1979 he came back to St. Croix to help his father, Al Hayes, in the families’ auto dealership. He has also taught calculus at Country Day School.
He became an active volunteer and member in the St. Croix Landmarks Society while working on restoration of steam engines used in cane crushing at Whim Museum. He is a lifetime member of the society and has held board positions and offices.
Hayes is a founding member of the St. Croix Archaeological Society, dedicated to getting residents and visitors excited about the pre-Columbian history of the island.
One way the society educates others about the pre-Columbian cultures is by collecting artifacts used in the day-today lives of those ancient people. A wide array of those artifacts are on display at the St. Croix Archeology Museum, off the Luncheria Courtyard in Christiansted. The museum is manned by Hayes and John Farchette. The building holding the museum is owned by Hayes and is a bit of a historical piece itself. It was part of the Danish period Apothecary complex dating back to 1832.
The museum is open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday and admission is by donation.
Hayes, current treasurer and former president of the society, has used his experience as a professional archaeologist to put the society on the right track. Information on membership, events, tours and activities can be found at its web page at http://stcroixarchaeology.org/.
He has held office and been a member of more than a dozen local, national and international archaeological, preservation and museum associations and societies. He is in the planning stages of hosting the annual conference for the International Association for Caribbean Archeology on St. Croix in 2017.
Hayes said people who believe they have a historic site on their land can call him before doing anything. Hayes says there are a lot of sites on St. Croix that are best left alone and undisturbed, because once you dig you may destroy the site.
“I’m an archaeologist for the fun and love of it,” Hayes said. "I’m not in it to make money. The 10 seconds of excitement when you find something makes it worth it.”
