Dan Franklin Morse (March 10, 1935 – September 26, 2024) was an American archaeologist specializing in the prehistory of the midwestern United States and the central Mississippi Valley, research summarized in a number of books, monographs, and technical articles.
He is best known for his 1983 synthesis of the "Archaeology of the Central Mississippi Valley" with Phyllis A. Morse,[1] and for his 1997 volume issued by the Smithsonian Institution Press on "Sloan: A Paleoindian Dalton Cemetery in Arkansas.
He met his wife to be, Phyllis Anderson (Morse), on the Etowah site in 1958, both having been recruited by Dr James B. Griffin, their mentor at the University of Michigan where they were both conducting graduate studies.
Morse has a reputation as a great excavator, with an ability to distinguish minute variations in soil deposits based on subtle differences in texture ('feel') and color.
He and his wife Phyllis conducted work on sites in northeast Arkansas associated with the De Soto's Expedition, which spent significant time in the region in the early 1540s.
Dan was the major professor overseeing the MA research of three students at the University of Arkansas, each of whom subsequently went on to have productive careers in southeastern archaeology, David G. Anderson, J. Christopher Gillam, and Albert Goodyear.
Additionally, on retirement, the Quapaw tribe presented the Morses with colorful tribal blankets in honor of the sensitive work that had been undertaken on their ancestors’ burial mounds.