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National Park Service grant funded GPR, metal detecting and targeted excavation at Camp Security
Summary
A National Park Service American Battlefield Protection Program grant funded a three-phase project: full-field GPR of the lower field, a metal-detecting survey across both fields, and excavation units to ground-truth anomalies identified by geophysics.
John outlined the grant-funded three-phase research design: (1) a full-field ground-penetrating radar (GPR) survey of the lower field, (2) a metal-detecting survey of the lower and upper fields, and (3) excavation to confirm or deny anomalies. He said Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) collected nearly 4,000 GPR lines across 20x20 m blocks in summer 2025 and produced complex results that require targeted excavation for interpretation.
John explained that GPR and LiDAR are valuable but imperfect: plow scars, rocks and mowing can produce noisy signatures, and many anomalies remain ambiguous without excavation. He emphasized that the team uses GPR to prioritize small, targeted test units rather than expose an entire feature because excavation is inherently destructive. "The data itself just on its face is very very messy and we kind of expect that for this field," he said.
