John Lambert Cotter (6 December 1911 – 5 February 1999) was an American archaeologist whose career spanned more than sixty years and included archaeological work with the Works Progress Administration, numerous posts with the National Park Service, and contributions to the development of historical archaeology in the United States.
As Cotter told an archeologist Daniel G. Roberts in an interview,I went to the Dean of Men, and said, "I find that I have actually come to a major in anthropology and I don't know whether I can make a living at it.
in Anthropology from the University of Denver, Cotter continued and earned an M.A., conducting research at a series of prehistoric sites in the western United States and writing a thesis under E.B.
[2] Cotter accepted a position with the University of Kentucky's Works Progress Administration (WPA)-funded Archaeological Survey in December 1937.
Cotter earned a Purple Heart for his service at the invasion of Normandy as well as the European and Combat Infantryman badges.
Cotter contributed, along with Edward B. Jelks, Georg Neumann, and Johnny Hack, to the 1958 report Archaeological Excavations at Jamestown.
[2] At the 1958 Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Washington, D.C., Cotter chaired a symposium on the role of archaeology in historical research.
He also developed a reputation as an authority on Paleoindians, based largely on his work at the Blackwater Draw site in the 1930s, where the first stratigraphical separation of Clovis and Folsom artifacts was reported.
In 1935–1954, his archeological research focused on prehistoric excavations in Colorado, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi; during 1954–1999, he shifted his attention to historic Euro-American sites and artifacts of the Atlantic seaboard of North America.
Yet the intelligent cooperation of the amateur archaeologist remains the best hope of nourishing the cause of conservation and reminding elected office-holders of the national duty to preserve the story of the past.