Florida’s Underwater Archaeological Preserves

Abstract

Florida’s numerous and varied waterways, including seas, bays, rivers, lakes, and springs, have been used for centuries for commerce, warfare, settlement, and travel. The result of this use is the deposition of cultural material, often wrecked and abandoned ships and boats, which can provide fascinating and important information about past cultures and lifeways. However, from the early days of hard-hat diving some of Florida’s shipwrecks were mined for the artifacts they contained, resulting in a limited and superficial view of the value of submerged cultural resources. Florida’s system of Underwater Archaeological Preserves represents an innovative method of public interpretation of shipwrecks and of submerged cultural resource management (Figure 1).