I'm proud to be one of the more than 100 individuals from across Ohio, ranging from Governor DeWine to Chief Glenna Wallace of the Eastern Shawnee to newly naturalized U.S. citizens, to participate in this reading of the Declaration of Independence: www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJ-r...

"Chief Wallace offers insight about Serpent Mound’s very existence. Why would a people whose days were consumed by farming, hunting, and sustaining communities invest such enormous labor in building a huge earthwork? 'Native American people are spiritual people,' she said. 'We feed our souls.' ...”

The Great Serpent Mound is not just featured in the latest Archaeology magazine -- it's the centerfold.

"Archeology isn't just about digging holes and finding cool stuff, it's about answering questions and solving problems."

"Barnes and Lepper’s [re]interpretation [of] five engraved spheres from the Seip-Pricer Mound are the earliest direct evidence for a drum in eastern North America. This new interpretation also suggests that there is cultural continuity between those who built the mound and tribal peoples of today."

One of my professors from my undergrad days at UNM: "Through this project, I have been able to watch the profession and discipline evolve in absolutely surprising ways.” news.unm.edu/news/unm-ant...

Four million fewer tourists came here and eight billion dollars gone. We were the only major destination in the world moving in the wrong direction.

Why 'The Odyssey' still matters, 3,000 years later | Iowa Now - The University of Iowa now.uiowa.edu/news/2026/06...

“How do you tell the story of all this incredible stuff?” Soderberg said. “Granville has a lot of history that’s put forward, but there’s literally 10,000 years of history right behind it that doesn’t get talked about.” www.thereportingproject.org/archaeologis...

The U.S. just had its worst year for international tourism since the pandemic and it wasn’t even close. While the rest of the world broke records in 2025, America was the only country out of 184 to see a drop in foreign visitor spending.

"Equally spectacular is the Newark Octagon – east of Columbus -- a half-mile-long pairing of a geometrically precise circular earthwork and octagon. ..."

"In Arizona, construction crews ran heavy machinery through and destroyed a roughly 60-to-70-foot swath of an intaglio, a more than 200-foot-long ground etching that looks like a fish..."

A trust-worthy resource for anyone interested in visiting Ohio's ancient Indigenous earthworks -- the UNESCO World Heritage sites, for sure, but also a number of less well known, but still extraordinary mounds and enclosures.

A paper I co-authored with OSU mollusc shell expert Nate Shoobs, on Ohio's Alligator Mound was just published in the Ohio Archaeological Council's online open access journal 'Current Research.' Link to the (relatively) short paper in the comments.

Please vote for the Octagon Earthworks UNESCO World Heritage Site as the USA Today's Best New Attraction! And you can cast a vote every day! (Pretend you did't notice that the image they've chosen is actually Mound City.)

incredible photo that's definitely worth at least 1,000 words from Andrew Harnik of Getty

On this hour of All Sides, we will learn more about the stories written on this land. Guests include Logan York, tribal historic preservation officer, Miami Tribe of Oklahoma and Jennifer Aultman, director of historic sites & museums, Ohio History Connection

"In this segment of How It’s Math, join Caroline and the Math Chicken as we explore the hidden math inside these giant earthworks with archaeologist Brad Lepper..."

"Why are museums filled with artifacts from the past and stories about the past? Why don’t museums include things from the future? These are normal questions that everyone has about museums, not just me, Donald J. Trump. ..."

"Today, as in the past, one group—people classified as white men—is overrepresented in the sciences, whereas other groups are underrepresented in nearly every scientific field..." www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

This was videotaped in March, but only recently posted. It's the short version of the discovery, excavation and analysis of the Burning Tree Mastodon.

"It once was the cultural and spiritual center of eastern North America—the Jerusalem or Mecca of the Hopewell world. ..."

"The arc of history is long and it bends towards justice, but it doesn't bend by itself! It's not efing gravity. People have to bend it. YOU have to bend it!"

Carl Sagan on how humanity can create its purpose and make its existence meaningful.

“They worked in huge numbers completely cooperatively without an authoritarian leader. In that sense, they’re smarter than us because we haven’t figured out how to do that."

Working with Milo is all kinds of fun!

In the latest issue of the Journal of Ohio Archaeology, Rob Cook and I review the history of the amazing Serpent Mound, and address how this history has been ignored or distorted by people with varying agendas that are all tied to the racist Moundbuilder Myth. ohioarchaeology.org/file_downloa...

Octagon Earthworks UNESCO World Heritage Site

"We are not interested in joining your theater of compliance. We are not interested in gutting equity programs that serve actual children in exchange for your political approval. ...."

"America is a shocking place — shockingly beautiful and shockingly violent. And the people in it will make you weep with every emotion that can prompt tears. Jubilant, sad, ridiculous, sublime. It’s America, after all."

"The quest for truth—the mission of science—requires that scientists freely explore new questions and report their findings honestly, independent of special interests. The administration is engaging in censorship, destroying this independence."

“We see real danger in this moment. We hold diverse political beliefs, but we are united as researchers in wanting to protect independent scientific inquiry. We are sending this SOS to sound a clear warning: the nation’s scientific enterprise is being decimated.”

It was great fun working with Milo to share the story of the Great Circle Earthworks UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Come on down to the White House Tesla Auto Mall!

"There may be even more moons around Saturn awaiting discovery, potentially in the thousands." It seems like this situation is getting out of hand.

"Expecting scientists to refrain from political discourse ... undermines the societal impact of their work and neglects the ethical responsibilities inherent in their scientific endeavours."

“Morale has been stricken hard and maliciously. Those still in uniform and working will have to dig very deep to keep the faith that America’s best idea will continue. That America’s best idea is worth fighting for today and every day.”

"Cambridge PhD student Dr Ally Louks went viral last year when she posted a photo of her thesis on the politics of smell in modern and contemporary prose. Here's her story about what happened next ..."

It's an old column, but it has some important lessons about the Hopewell culture and why archaeologists do what they do.

"These earthwork complexes were ceremonial landscapes used for feasts, funerals, rituals, and rites of passage associated with a Native American religious movement that swept over half the continent for almost 400 years. Come walk among the earthworks and experience the past."

From 'Echoes of Ohio's Indigenous Legacy: Bridging Past and Present' at the Denison Museum

"In my 25 years of experience, public universities simply do not discourage and suppress conservative opinions. Or any opinions that are based on sound reasoning and persuasive evidence."

The Geometry of the Newark Earthworks by John Volker In which he shows how the builders of the Newark Earthworks were able to create gigantic circles and squares with the same areas -- among other things. Link to paper: ohioarchaeology.org/file_downloa...

"No executive order, no political edict is going to undermine or end our efforts ... If anything, it is giving us more encouragement to continue to do this work, because it is the morally, philosophically and politically right thing to do."

"History does not repeat, and Donald Trump’s United States is not Hitler’s Germany. But the point is surely to learn from it anyway. In Germany in the 1930s, scientific institutions and societies failed at every level to offer any significant resistance to Nazism."

"For those of us who instinctively tilt towards subtlety and gradation, it’s time to stop nuance mongering and call Nazi salutes, purges and forced removal of people for what they are."