[Source: Katie Nelson, Arizona Republic] -- The Hayden Flour Mill could become closer to becoming a usable historical site this month, after years of holdups that have blocked redevelopment of downtown Tempe's most recognizable icon. A Tempe company, Archaeological Consulting Services Ltd., will begin digging May 22 around the mill and silos to search for artifacts. Its archaeologists expect to find remnants from the years the site was actively used as a flour mill, along with traces from when the area was a settlement for the ancient Hohokam tribe. City leaders said they view the eventual development of the mill as a crucial step to linking the downtown shopping and business districts with the recreation and housing being built along Town Lake.The city has heard a range of proposals for the site that include outdoor recreation stores, a historical museum and converting the silos into condos or a hotel. It's possible that the city-owned land could have some combination of those components. But before anything can happen to the mill, the archaeological dig hopefully will unearth a piece of land's past. The dig is the first tangible movement toward renovating the historical site in years. The land has been tangled up in a yet-to-be-settled lawsuit and a fight between the city and a local developer over who and what can be built on the property.
On Thursday, an open door into the mill's main building let its musty smell into the open air. Archaeologists will use backhoes, shovels, and trowels to probe the mill and silos property. They'll start the digging at the southeastern corner of the Mill Avenue and Rio Salado Parkway intersection. Using old fire insurance maps as their guide, a team of eight people will search for a two-story adobe jail building. They'll keep an especially careful look out for the structure's outhouse, or whatever is left of it. It sounds strange, said Bob Stokes, who is in charge of the project's field work, but the garbage and trash tossed into the privy's hole might tell the archaeologists the most about what people ate, bought and used during that time period. "It's not only a bathroom, it's a convenient trash can," Stokes said. "We might be able to learn what the inmates were eating, the kinds of utensils they were given . . . whether they got poorer cuts of meat, vs. better cuts of meat, or if there are few bones, if they got very little meat at all."
The archaeologists will remove strips of concrete around and in between the other sides of the mill building to search for other artifacts and building remains. But while doing so, the team will take special care to keep its digging away from the buildings so the mill and silos will stay structurally sound for renovation. This "exploratory" or "testing" digging phase will last five or six weeks. This phase will determine if there is more detailed work to be done, Stokes said. The $340,000 archaeological probe is being paid for by a grant from the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community from casino profits. Staff support is coming from the city, the Tempe Historical Museum, and the Tempe Historic Preservation Office.
