Key Marco

A small pond on Key Marco, now known as the "Court of the Pile Dwellers" (8CR49),[a] was excavated in 1896 by the Smithsonian Institution's Pepper-Hearst Expedition, led by Frank Hamilton Cushing.

Another source of confusion arises from the fact that in the 1980s a development company renamed the former Horr's Island as "Key Marco".

[2][3] The "Court of the Pile Dwellers"[b] at Key Marco was a small muck pond, covering less than an acre.

The conditions in the muck preserved the wood and other objects, including those made with bone, fiber, gum, rawhide and gut.

[7] At the time the pond was excavated, techniques for preserving wood and other fragile materials removed from the muck had not been developed.

But, a photographer with the excavation party recorded all the objects soon after they were removed from the pond, thus preserving evidence of their appearance.

Radiocarbon dating of objects which have been handled and stored away from their original environment for long periods may not be reliable.

[10][11] In 1995 the Collier County Historical Society commissioned an archaeological salvage project on an undeveloped portion of Key Marco, supervised by archaeologists Randolph J. Widmer and Rebecca Storey, who trained and led a volunteer labor effort, in association with related organizations.

A stratigraphic analysis found 55 discrete layers, indicated by changes in shell and sand mixture.

They found evidence of numerous postholes, which indicated a large structure built on pilings to raise it above the surface of the mound.