Nashoba Brook Stone Chamber Acton Massachusetts

Stone Chamber in Acton Massachusetts to be Reconstructed and Archeologically Investigated with Financial and Archeological Support of NEARA

The Acton Land Stewardship Committee has received funding from the town's community Preservation Fund for the restoration and concurrent archeological investigation of the Nashoba Brook Historical Stone chamber. (Acton Land Stewardship Committee)

NEARA has contributed $1000.00, and will also be providing the archeological expertise under NEARA President, Rick Lynch.

People interested in assisting with the restoration and archeological work should contact either Linda McElroy of the Acton Land Stewardship Committee at meadowpond@verizon.net, or Rick Lynch of NEARA at HstrclRsch@aol.com.

Nashoba Brook Stone Chamber Restoration Index:

About the Nashoba Brook Stone Chamber

Nashoba Brook Stone Chamber Events and Related Events

Nashoba Brook Chamber Progress Report Log

Updated 6 September 2006

Nashoba Brook Stone Chamber Photo Gallery

Boston Globe Article about the Acton chamber

Located on the Nashoba Brook Conservation area, the structure is an L-shaped, man-made room constructed of stones similar to those prevalent throughout New England’s forest landscapes. The chamber, 11’ x 6’ x 6’ (at its highest point), is built into the bottom of a small hillside, mounded over with earth and entered via a 17’ tunnel. A stone pillar supports the roof of the L-shaped room. Five 1-ton (or greater) stone slabs averaging 3” thick overlap to comprise the roof.

This chamber, the only such in Acton, is one of 350 to 400 similar structures scattered throughout New England, Putnam County NY, and eastern Canada that still stand. Many more have been destroyed for their stones and to make way for development.

The archaeological excavation that is part of the proposed project may provide answers to the questions of its age and purpose. The land (especially the area conservation parcels) around the chamber is fertile with mysterious stone structures of other types recognized by researchers also to be man-made.

Restoration is urgent to prevent the full collapse of the tunnel’s east wall and the threatening partial collapse of the west wall. One roof slab has fallen; another is precariously perched on the bulging west wall. The tunnel entrance is clogged with soil eroding from the mounded top, thereby de-stabilizing the entire structure. This erosion is due to soil disturbance caused by a tree felled from hurricane winds.

The Acton Chamber, situated on land where the Wheeler, Davis, and Harris family farms came together is not a habitation site. Its time of construction and purpose are unknown; the most favored theory is use for storage of agricultural products not subject to deterioration from rodents, insects, or freezing.

An alternative use theory is for ceremonial purposes by Native Americans before and during the period of European colonization. This location was near the Nashoba ‘Praying Village,’ centered in what is now Littleton. One of several similar villages established in the mid-1600s by John Eliot, a minister from Roxbury with authorization from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, it was a refuge for Native Americans, who were ruthlessly hunted and exploited by many Europeans

Whether accidental or intentional, astronomical alignment with the winter solstice sunrise through a tiny aperture has been documented.

1.	Deed research	$500
2.	Archaeology (est.)	$3,000
3.	Masonry (fixed)	$7,500
4.	Walling stones (2 cu. yds.)	$1,000
5.	Rental equipment (est.)	$1,000
6.	Educational panels	$3,000
	Less NEARA's contribution	$1,000
	Total Expense Requested	$15,000
	CPC's Recommendation	$20,000

It is the only structure of its type in this part of Middlesex County. Regardless of its purpose or origin, it has weathered at least a couple of centuries, is part of Acton’s historic past, and could become a substantial educational and sightseer resource if not demolished.

A mysterious stone chamber in Acton's Nashoba Brook conservation land that has long fascinated hikers and local history buffs was probably built for food storage by farmers in the late 18th or 19th centuries and not by Native Americans, an archeologist hired by the town said last week.

The view is archeologist Craig Chartier's preliminary conclusion based on incomplete findings in an archeological investigation of the structure.

The Nashoba Brook Chamber, commonly called the Potato Cave, is an underground room nestled into a hillside near the brook. It has a long, narrow entrance passageway, walls of piled rocks, and a roof of huge stone slabs covered with earth.

Late last month, stonemasons cut timbers and temporarily placed them inside the chamber to stabilize it. Then Chartier and volunteers dug into the earth around the structure and sifted for artifacts in search of clues about when the chamber was built, what it was used for, and, at the core of the mystery, who built it.

Some people have theorized that Colonial farmers built the structure as a root cellar, cider storage room, or animal shed. Others have speculated that the native peoples who lived in the area for thousands of years before the first Europeans arrived built the chamber for ceremonial purposes or as a sweat lodge.

Although the digging is not yet done, findings to date have caused Chartier to come down on the side of Colonial or post-Colonial construction.

"It really seems like probably a late 18th- to 19th-century structure, and probably built by someone on the farms in that area," he said. "It was probably used for some kind of food storage." He didn't specify the type of food.

He said his assessment could change if contrary evidence is found. He said he based his current opinion on artifacts found at the site and a comparison with stone chambers in other parts of New England, especially Vermont, that researchers have determined were built by early farmers of European descent.

Chartier said there are hundreds of stone chambers around the country, including 50 or 60 in one county in Vermont. Locally, residents have reported chambers of unknown origin in Concord, Harvard, Littleton, and Stow.

In the Acton chamber, Chartier said, he found nails from three different periods: a modern nail; a 19th-century nail; and a handmade nail from the 17th, 18th, or early 19th century. "Someone could have reused old nails," Chartier observed. He said he also found some modern glass, a modern bullet, and a piece of black-glazed red pottery from the 18th or 19th century.

"Anything we find here is significant because it will give us a better understanding of what the structure was used for," Chartier said. "We'll come up with a best guess at the end. . . . . We'll never know the most complete story, just the best guess we can get."

Chartier also found a Native American spear point, but it was in dirt that had been backfilled and couldn't be used to date the structure. "It appears Native Americans were using that area 6,000 to 8,000 years ago based on the point we found," he said. He added that artifacts from Native Americans of the same period have been found across town.

This week, a stonemason found some charcoal that could be carbon-dated, helping to pinpoint when the structure was built.

Linda McElroy of the town's Land Stewardship Committee is coordinating the stone chamber project, which will include taking apart and reconstructing wall sections that have partly collapsed. The public is not currently allowed to enter the structure.

The structure is L-shaped, with a low entrance passage leading to a room that is tall enough for most people to stand in. The entrance passage is 3 feet 6 inches wide by 17 feet 5 inches long. The main room measures 11 feet 5 inches by 6 feet 10 inches. Within this room, there is a 2-foot-square pillar made of stacked flat stones.

The project will also include researching the historical ownership of the property, creating informational panels for the site, and putting the artifacts on display, probably at Town Hall.

"I'm happy to have the structure here in Acton and being worked on, whether it is Colonial or pre-Colonial," said Kimberley Connors, a member of Acton's Historical Commission and a trained archeologist who is helping with the project. "I am happy that Acton is spending the time and money to have it restored. I think it's a great project."

The town is paying for the project with $20,000 in Community Preservation Act funds. The nonprofit New England Antiquities Research Association, which has questioned traditional archeology's attribution of stone structures throughout New England to farmers, is contributing $1,000.

Suzanne Carlson, a preservation architect from Maine, has been involved in the association for years. "There's an interesting myth . . . that Indians never built anything in stone," she said. "That myth has become a dogma of sort."

Carlson said she has visited the Nashoba Brook stone chamber several times and has seen hundreds of stone chambers of various designs in New England and New York state.

"This doesn't make sense for food storage," she said, citing the long passage to get to the main chamber. "I'm not convinced it's Colonial at all. I see absolutely no reason whatsoever that native people could not have built it."

McElroy agreed that there are some puzzling things about the structure. While deferring to Chartier's professional opinion of its origin, she asked, "Would a European farmer have spent a lot of time moving those gigantic roof slabs? I think he would have been much more likely to cut a few slabs of wood."

Tom Tidman, director of natural resources for the town, said that, regardless of who built it, the chamber "is historically significant to Acton." He added that people have gone to look at the chamber and been inquisitive about it for generations.

"I must admit, I have been totally in awe of it," said Connors of the Historical Commission. "It's an impressive structure. Someone spent a lot of time to construct it."

April 26, Wednesday, April 26, 7:30pm, Room 204, Acton Memorial Library, 484 Main Street. For more info call: Philip Keyes 978-263-0459.

The forests of Acton and surrounding communities have many secrets and untold histories.

Frequently going unnoticed, clusters of rock piles riddle the woods of Acton and beyond.

Some are obviously the results of field clearing. However, others are possibly Native American graves or ceremonial structures.

This talk will describe the variety of these rock structures and their historic origin and distribution throughout Acton in order to provide a context for what is increasingly believed to be an outstanding historic and pre-historic resource.

The stump at the chamber's entrance has been removed by some of the Land Stewards under the direction of Bob Guba. One stone at the bottom of the west(?) wall was slightly moved as the roots came out. It has been shored up apparently with another small stone. This perhaps should be checked out by the masons when/if they come to the site again.

The grading away from the chamber entrance was also finished with soil that had earlier been removed around the stump and sifted. A few additional artifacts, deemed inconsequential I believe, were bagged. This work was supervised by Kimberley Connors.

This activity finishes up work at the site except for the remaining mounding and landscaping. This work, which involves bringing in between 20 and 30 cu yds of fill and loam will be carried out by Tom Tidman's town crew at some time in the future after a substantial dry spell. We agree that there is no danger of erosion as long as the areas of disturbed soil continue to be tarped. Most likely, some kind of conservation mix will be put down when the mounding is finished, and next spring some more substantial woody plants, such as low bush blueberry, will be planted. We have an excellent source within the town for advice and suitable plants.

Tom plans at the same time to take down a few of the smaller trees that shade the site, and to move the woody debris and grade the area to the south of the staging area in front of the chamber. With cooperating weather, these activities should all take place this fall.

June Miller has submitted her report of the title chain back to Moses Woods in ~1770. Exactly how Moses came by the property is not clear, but June has suggested clues to how this information might be established or at least inferred. She has asked whether or not to pursue this line of inquiry further. I would appreciate inputs from any of you, knowledgeable about the historical issues, on her question. There are funds to support further research.

I reported on July15th to the NEARA Board chronologically on the various phases and steps within phases of this project from the submission of the application for funding to the CPC in November 2005 up to the present. I am awaiting reports concerning specific portions of the project from other professionals. NEARA will hold a joint fall conference with ESAF, a similar organization, at which time the archaeological report may be presented by Craig. Any non-NEARA members of the Chamber Team and affiliated groups who would like to attend the conference should contact me. The full report of the project will be presented at the NEARA Spring 2007 conference by myself.

Linda Schymik, one of the more diligent of our local volunteers and who lives at the top of the hillside into which the chamber is built, has offered to "steward" the site. This offer would solve most of the potential problems with oversight of the restored site. It will be discussed when the full LSCom resumes its meetings in the fall.

Volunteer hours for the site work, research, and logistics are impressive. I'll report on those later when I have them added up.

Finally, deliberations about the educational panels will await the final report from Craig. Based on invoices to date, there should be sufficient funding remaining to cover this cost.

Many thanks to all who supported, encouraged, contributed, and sweated on this project. The restored structure in its new guise is breath-taking.

Craig has finished all the excavation units and test pits that can be done at this time. Kimberley will supervise the soil lifting from the slabs on Wed, 31st, material that will also be sifted and then saved.

Friday was worked by NEARA volunteers Rick Lynch, Dan Lorraine, and Bruce McAleer. Ally Schymik, from the neighbor family at the top of the hill, helped out quite a lot too.

Craig has one more task to do: to dig out the floor of the tunnel area to determine the original floor depth if possible and look for artifacts there. As the tunnel is now full of cribbing, that task will wait until the masons are finished.

So far, several eras of nails, charcoal, and one slightly damaged Neville point (8,000 to 6,000 BP) have been found. The point was in backfill so it does not date the chamber, but the time frame of the culture that produced it is consistent with findings from the Pine Hawk Site (another Acton site excavated several years ago on the other side of town).

The original soil level (determined by color) at the bottom of all the Ex Units is of the same color and under roughly the same series of layers of fill in each of the pits. So the original contour of the hill at the time of construction shows up across the 6 EUs and shows that the hillside was dug into in order to build the chamber. The original natural contour of the hill may have been a fairly constant gradient from the top of the hill today down to the level land where the trail junction is. Craig observed that the hill was probably a drumlin. The digging has been easy with very soft silty material with very few stones of any significant size, nor ledge. If the hill was dug into in order to build the chamber, then much of the soil that has been used for backfill and top mounding most likely would have come out of that excavation, which is consistent with the seeming lack of a borrow pit of size equal to the amount of fill.

Trish Bertucci and Sally Heaney both have said that their respective newspapers (Beacon and Globe) will publish the first article on Thursday, June 1st. [Note, the Globe has moved it publish date to June 8th.]

Everything went splendidly yesterday, the day was beautiful and the bugs non-existent..

David was pleased with the timbers quality. As he and Peter worked, first at the back corner, then forwards into the tunnel way, they found that by cutting small wedges placed along the topmost courses of timbers, the roofslabs would move up slightly. They are now thinking that it may not be necessary to slide the slabs all the way off the wall, but just to remove the wall from underneath. In which case there may be an excess of timbers.

If they do move slabs then all the timbers will get used. They will recommence on June 5 as previously scheduled. They were done by 3 PM.

Craig is a great worker, moving right along, doing 3 test pits in the pen, which yielded nails from different time periods, making it clear that at some time a wooden superstructure existed. Another test pit in the doorway yielded a small bit of pottery. A small scraping within the chamber before the cribbing began suggests that the level of the interior floor was not much below what it is now. Tunnel is another matter.

He then finished the first west side meter square going through 3 distinct soil layers, which were in reverse order due to having been dug out of a borrow pit and backfilled around the wall so that the separate layers have remained largely intact I don't know whether this is usual or not..

All the reporters and photographers showed up and were fascinated. Sally Heaney of the Globe seems to be really into the project. And Trish, the new Beacon reporter, is first rate (judging by interview questions and breadth of topics covered). Bobb Burgess, new Beacon editor, hopes to make the paper more comprehensive and into a truly community newspaper. I'm sure we will get coverage good coverage whenever we need it. Articles to appear post Memorial Day, Beacon; Globe, not sure yet.

Allie Schymik sifted for three hours and her mother, Linda, came down for a while too. All in all it was a barrel of fun with no hitches.

First, I should inform you of another member of our team: Kimberley Connors, who is a member of the local Hist Comm, will be working with us as liaison to us from that committee to ensure that all state regulations are observed. She and I will meet this weekend, visit the site, and discuss matters of mutual interest and concern.

Yesterday, the chief mason, David, and his colleague, Peter Wiggin, and I met at the chamber. They scoped out the separate stages of the project that they will be involved in. Later, we checked out the Town's supply of walling stones and tailings, both of which are exactly what is needed.

Later, we met with Tom to coordinate issues that he would need to follow up on, and discussed equipment needed, including tarps, ties for the cribbing, pallets, winches, block and tackle, and vehicular access to bring in the stones down the railway easement. It is likely that the Town will bring the stones as far as where the trail begins at the back of the monument co. or possibly all the way down the track to where the path to the chamber leaves the track. From there it is a short distance to the site. Some heavy work will be required to get the stones to the site from there. Possibly, David will supply his UTV for this work.

Present strategy and chronology of stages of work: (Subject to review by Craig Chartier, archaeologist, and constructive criticism from others).

We need several large tarps, onto one of which soil removed from the mounded top can be piled, somewhat away from the chamber, later to be sifted for any possible artifacts, although this soil, having come from a borrow pit to begin with, will not yield any chronological evidence from strata. The removed soil will also need to be covered, so that rain will not erode it until the time when it will be placed back onto the top of the reconstructed chamber. Acton will provide volunteers (mostly Land Stewards?) for this work, which could begin fairly soon, under my direction. Anyone with large tarps that could be lent for a few weeks, please contact me.

2.) Archaeologist does test pits on the right (east) side of chamber, and possibly in the stone enclosure.

3.) Masons crib that interior portion of the chamber where the reconstruction is to be done and create a level dirt platform (called a yard) in the area outside where the excavation work to the right of the chamber has been completed. Next they remove two of the roof slabs (in addition to removal of the slanting slab). No excavation work should be going on while this step is being done. It will be dangerous and the fewer people on site at the time the stones are moved the better.

4.) When the walls have been stabilized from inside and the capstones removed, then the archaeology can be performed and onsite work completed. Tentatively, the volunteers for the working of the meter squares, removing soil, sifting it, and piling the sifted soil on (more) tarps will be provided by NEARA under Rick Lynch's supervision, although a few interested Land Stewards could be included in that work crew. The work will take about a week and require several shifts.

During this phase, all the work pertaining to the archaeology field work should be completed. Provisions for thorough recording of the work is still to be planned for. But volunteers from both the Land Stewards and those supplied by NEARA could do this work in shifts.

5.) When archaeology is finished, the remaining soil from the outside of the west wall will need to be removed and piled up (more tarps) (Land Stewards and other Acton volunteers). The masons will then deconstruct most of the west wall, reconstruct it, entirely reconstruct the east wall, and replace the capstones.

6.) Masons will supervise the backfilling around the walls, the work to be done by more volunteers, and remounding the top of the chamber, which will complete the active work associated with the reconstruction process.

Ongoing activity, which has already begun, is the deed research (title chain) and gathering of historical background from other historical sources within the Town. I still need volunteers to help with this work.

Work on the test pits could begin as soon as the permit is obtained from Mass Hist Comm. Presently, Kimberley Connors, the liaison between our team and the local Hist Comm is reviewing the draft that Craig Chartier wrote up a couple of months ago. With her approval that document will be submitted as soon as possible to Mass Hist Comm.

Ideally, the soil removal from the top could be done any time, but not too long (issue of safety and erosion) before the start of the excavation work. Again, subject to the permitting process and Craig's availability, we could do that work in mid-May, the preliminary excavation (on the right side) could be done in the latter half of May, the masons would remove the capstones in early June, and the full excavation take place during the second week in June, to be followed by the reconstructive masonry. The masons have specified from the beginning that, although their total time for the job would be about 10 days, these would not necessarily be consecutive days. Weather and unexpected engineering issues might require some periods of thoughtful musing.