ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, August 28, 1996 TAG: 9608280058
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: JAMESTOWN
SOURCE: Associated Press
Gov. George Allen will announce next month that archaeologists have found remains of the first fort built by English settlers who landed on Jamestown Island in 1607, a newspaper reported Tuesday.
The Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities has invited 580 guests to join Allen on the island ``for a global announcement of extraordinary archaeological finds'' on Sept. 12.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch cited anonymous sources as saying the event will be an announcement that the fort has been found.
Scientists and historians had believed for more than 100 years that the fort had been washed away by James River erosion.
The announcement comes as the preservation association, the National Park Service and other private and government organizations are beginning to prepare for celebrating the 400th anniversary of the Jamestown settlement in 2007. Jamestown was the first permanent English settlement in North America.
In April 1994, the association stated its hope of finding the fort and proving the traditional erosion theory wrong. It has spent about $700,000 in the endeavor.
William Kelso, a prominent archaeologist who signed on as project director, and Ivor Noel Hume, for years the resident archaeologist at Colonial Williamsburg, said in 1994 that documents had convinced them the original fort sat on high ground and was simply missed in earlier excavations.
They began the new dig as part of a 10-year archaeological project on 22 1/2 acres owned by the association since 1893. The rest of the island is owned by the National Park Service, which oversaw archaeological projects there in the 1930s and 1950s.
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