I have found this discussion extremely interesting.
 
While many of the comments have presented valid points, I think the
discussion has missed the essential point of why historical archaeology
is worth doing.  Historical archaeology does not so much tell us things
we did not already "know" about the past, as provide new ways by which
we know that they are "true". Much of that "truth" is of "the small
things forgotten" variety, but also it also includes reflections of much
broader social and cultural trends and processes (the industrial
revolution comes to mind <g!>) as experienced in the everyday
sociocultural realities of the actors, the men, women, and children, who
populate the past we seek to understand.
 
I will now relinquish the soap box.
 
John
 
John P. McCarthy, SOPA
Institute for Minnesota Archaeology/
IMA Consulting, Inc.
Minneapolis