SHA 2004 Conference: St. Louis, Missouri, USA

7-11 January 2004

The 2004 Conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology will be held at St. Louis, Missouri, USA, January 7-11, 2004. In commemoration of the departure of the celebrated Corps of Discovery from St. Louis on March 14, 1804, the general conference theme will be “Lewis and Clark: Legacy and Consequences.” A distinguished keynote speaker will kick off the conference on Wednesday night, and a thematic plenary session will follow on Thursday morning.

Hosted by the Midwest Archeological Center, National Park Service, in cooperation with several local agencies, institutions, and companies, the conference venue is the Hyatt Regency Hotel at Union Station. Conference room rates are $108 per night, plus tax, for single and double rooms; triples are $128, and quads are $148. Erected in 1892-1895, Union Station is the finest surviving example of the High Victorian railroad stations in America. The adjacent covered railroad yard protects modern hotel rooms, a huge shopping mall, and enough restaurants to satisfy most tastes and budgets.

Union Station is a downtown stop on the Metro light-rail line, providing convenient connections to many St. Louis attractions, as well as affordable ground transportation to and from Lambert International Airport for those traveling without a lot of baggage. St. Louis is a hub city for American Airlines, making it easily accessible from most major airports. Amtrak and four Interstate highways also serve the city.

Several half-day tours are planned for Wednesday afternoon, and a day trip is planned through the French Colonial District of southern Illinois and Missouri, featuring stops at Fort des Chartres State Historic Site and historic Ste. Genevieve. In addition, evening receptions at the Missouri Historical Society and the Museum of Westward Expansion beneath the famous Gateway Arch are planned.

Those wishing additional advance information on SHA 2004 should contact the SHA Headquarters (hq@sha.org) or the principal conference organizers Vergil E. Noble (vergil_noble@nps.gov) and Douglas D. Scott (doug_d_scott@nps.gov); Doug Scott will also be organizing the featured plenary session. An advisory committee, consisting of Michael K. (Sonny) Trimble, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Nicola Longford, Missouri Historical Society, and Steve Dasovich, SCI Engineering, will be assisting with local arrangements, tours, and receptions.

Program chairs for the conference are Annalies Corbin (corbina@mail.ecu.edu), East Carolina University and the P.A.S.T. Foundation, for papers on underwater archaeology, and Timothy Baumann (), University of Missouri-St. Louis, for terrestrial research. Those wanting to host a topical roundtable luncheon should contact program coordinator Paul Demers (pdemers2@unl.edu), University of Nebraska. A preliminary program and pre-registration packet will be prepared for distribution in late September.