Haliburton's curator wins archaeology award

News

Posted By Darren Lum

Posted 1 month ago

A Haliburton man was recently recognized for sharing his passion for unearthing the mystery of life with the public.

Tom Ballantine, a humble, bearded man with eyeglasses and a welcoming smile, was the 2009 recipient of the Peggi Armstrong Public Archaeology Award given out by the Ontario Archaeology Society (OAS) Ottawa chapter.

The award recognizes the commitment to greater public awareness of archaeology and is in remembrance of Peggi Armstrong, who was a driving force for the public archaeology component for the chapter. Armstrong died in a car accident in 1997 and the award has been given to 10 individuals and organizations since it was first created shortly after her death.

Through a mix of paid and unpaid projects, Ballantine was involved with several excavations co-sponsored by the Friends of Bonnechere Park in the Ottawa chapter. These digs offered the public an opportunity for hands-on archaeology and each participant was partnered with an experienced digger.

"It was really nice to be given the award and be recognized by people you work with," he said. "I remember how many different people have been involved with the projects over the years. It wasn't just me that was leading these projects. They were all group efforts. I happened to have an archaeological license and if you want to do archaeology you need a license … it was really easy to say yes, because people really appreciated what you were doing and I believe in spreading an interest in archaeology."

These digs helped with the understanding of pioneers and how they made a living from their environment, Ballantine said.

This award is not his first, but it has an added importance since it is named after a colleague who he respected and knew as the "all around artist" with an unwavering dedication and commitment to encouraging the public's interest in archaeology.

"She was really dedicated. She persevered at what she loved and she was able to communicate her interests to other people," he said, adding Armstrong was fun and had a constant desire to be better.

They worked together off and on for more than 15 years. Both of them got their first archaeological experience during a summer in Basin Depot Park in Algonquin Park in the late-1970s. He remembers he wasn't quite sure of the young woman with a camera and whether she would be able to continue in the archaeological field.

She proved otherwise.

"She really went after what she wanted to do and did it," he said. "There are a lot of people who do that on the weekends … she was always working at being better at what she did and learning more. She never stopped."

Knowledge should be shared, he said, and it was a belief he shared with Armstrong.

"All of the public archaeology, in my belief, if you really love something you should share it with people," he said. "I think that is where she was always coming from all the time."

He added if this award wasn't named after her, he could see Armstrong receiving it.

"Usually you think awards are named after people who didn't die in the prime of their life. What would she be now? She died in the prime of her life and it was a shame. She had so much to contribute," he said. "Public archaeology was her thing, taking archaeology to people."

Originally an archaeologist, Ballantine is the curator of the Haliburton Highlands Museum but he has never lost his passion for archaeology.

The first native artifact he discovered was where he spent his first childhood near Frenchmen's Bay; located on Lake Ontario in what is current day Pickering.

"I'm always wandering around looking at the ground," he said. "To me it's always been fascinating ever since I was a kid."

The award also recognized his work with the Land of the Spirits website with its virtual dig as a primary researcher and writer, a community television segment and an ongoing artifact display panel in the park.

"It's important to me to know how people lived and coped with their environment in the past," he said. "I think it has important lessons for us today."

He added it is amazing how little people had in the past and still managed, while today people possess an insatiable desire for more and more things.

The first archaeology license Ballantine earned was in 1978, permitting him to lead small digs.

Now he has the certification to lead as many as 70 people on a dig.

There are more than 6,000 archaeological specimens in the museum's collection.

The museum is always willing to accept artifacts and archaeological reports.