PURPOSE & PROCESS OF DOCUMENTATION

The purpose of documentation is to collect a variety of detailed information about a resource based on it's physical shape, material remains, and cultural relevance in order to understand it. Ultimately, documentation gathers the evidence required to interpret a resource's significance on a number of levels. Different methods of documentation reveal different kinds of information, and the methods applied depend on the resource itself, the purpose and focus of the documentation project, and the data sources available. Industrial sites, for example, often have significant above ground remains such as structures, machinery, and artifact scatters that can be easily measured, drawn, mapped, photographed, and described. Written historic records and even oral histories gathered from community members often exist. When possible or necessary, archaeology can be used to reveal unseen material evidence that goes beyond historic records and memories. On the most basic level, a documentation project defines what remains as well as what is missing. On a larger level, these projects inform academic research, produce a cultural / historic record, and give an agency such as the National Park Service the information needed to assess, preserve, and present the resource. HAER documentation follows a standard procedure with definitive guidelines that call for three methods of documentation to be applied to any given site. The products of this procedure are geared toward fulfilling HAER's mandate to specifically document engineering and industrial structures. Identifying technological processes and equipment, structural components, building materials, and spatial relationships between features is the main objective of HAER's photographic and architectural drawing components. The third component is conducting documentary research to establish specific site and contextual historical explanations of the engineering project or industry at hand. Very rarely does HAER use archaeological excavation as part of its methodology, primarily due to time and funding constraints.

Detail of two stamp batteries at Skidoo (HAER photographs by G. Archimede)