Carol,
I am not willing to join archeoseek at the moment, but if you want to email 
me a couple photographs, I am a conservator who works on mostly early 
polymer materials and some later ones and I could take a look to see if 
anything rings a bell. I am always curious about the varying plastics and 
their state of preservation from excavations, as there is not much research 
into their degradation-being so "modern" and all.  I am not sure of the date 
of your site, context, feature or strata--sorry, I wasn't following all 
this, but that should give you an idea of whether or not you have 
"rubberized" cloth which can date as early as 1842 and thereabouts. It was 
used extensively in the civil war and was marked and painted often.

Best,
Lisa Young
Alexandria Conservation Services,ltd.
[log in to unmask]


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Meli Diamanti" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, August 17, 2007 2:21 PM
Subject: Re: rubber items on Archaeoseek Artifact ID Help group page


> Carol,
> As an Archaeoseek member, I can go straight to your specific posting.  But 
> the problem is that the url is so long it is broken into two text lines in 
> your Histarch email, and my computer only recognizes the first line as the 
> address.  So I can't go just by clicking on it.  I have to copy and paste 
> the first line into the address box on my internet browser, then copy and 
> paste the section that fell on the second line onto the end of the 
> address.  Is there a way to get rid of the line break that is causing 
> this, either at your sending end or my receiving end?
> Meli Diamanti
>
>
>
> Carol Serr wrote:
>> I just posted more odd stuff I need help IDing (but the link may not
>> work until Anita OKs the posting/photos).
>> http://archaeoseek.ning.com/group/artifactidhelp/forum/topic/show?id=578
>> 807%3ATopic%3A9426
>> <http://archaeoseek.ning.com/group/artifactidhelp/forum/topic/show?id=57
>> 8807%3ATopic%3A9426> Sorry about the poor image quality.     Hard to get 
>> the true colors to
>> show, also.
>>  We have numerous pieces of what appear to be dessicated/curled
>> rubberized cloth??  Note 'weave' texture on piece in upper right (turned
>> over).
>>  The outer surface was painted with bright colors in geometric forms;
>> solid pink in some portions, but then diamonds and bands of mottled
>> (leopard skin like?) yellow, brown, and some white...then other larger
>> diamond patches of tan background with white dots (mottled), with dark
>> green leaves (?) outlined in black in the center (?).  Sound familiar to 
>> anyone?  Any ideas?
>> - - -
>>  Were there rubber doll heads?  Or, rubber balls with faces on them?  We
>> have a dessicated, squished fragment of a face - that looks like it had
>> a 'bonnet' on...since there is a line bordering the face...rather than
>> hair.  ??  Sort of eerie to find this Looking at you when cleaning
>> artifacts.
>>  Thanks for your help.
>>
>>
>>
>