Significance Standards for Prehistoric Cultural Resources: A Case Study From Fort Hood, Texas.

Abstract : Federal installations must comply with the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) which, in part, requires cultural resources to he evaluated in terms of their eligibility for the National Register of Historic Places. Currently, no generalized model exists to guide such evaluation. This study attempts to develop a generalized model of evaluation that will produce meaningful, replicable, and defensible evaluations of scientific significance for large numbers of cultural resource properties. A Cultural Resources Management (CRM) program needs a method to determine what sites merit protection under the NHPA. This study proposes prefacing any such determination effort with a complex, detailed research design specific to the archaeological data needs of the area. Site significance can then be determined in light of the data needed to answer regional research questions. The goal of the site inventory and testing phases is to find out whether a site has the needed data types. Alternative field tactics for inventory and testing are also discussed in this study. The study presents a detailed case study from Fort Hood, Texas, illustrating how a Federal CRM program can go awry, how to fix it, and more importantly, how to design a sound management program from the ground up.