Photo credit: 9/11 Memorial staff
Accession Number: C.2013.28.140
Dimensions: 3 ⅞ in X 1 13/16 in X 1/2 in
Dimensions (Metric): 7.62 cm X 2.54 cm X 2.54 cm
Credit Line: Recovered from the World Trade Center site after September 11, 2001, Courtesy of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey
Description
Recovered metal figure of a sailor. The legs of the figure are bent and concrete and dirt have collected in the crevices.
Historical Notes
Much of lower Manhattan is built atop landfill, evidence of the city’s growth and changing demographics. Buttons, keys, pottery shards, and other artifacts predating the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) were unearthed in 2006 by forensic archaeologists searching near the World Trade Center site for remains of 9/11 victims. During a subsequent dig in 2010, they found the remains of an 18th-century ship. When the archaeologists uncovered these premodern artifacts, they knew they had reached the colonial strata of the site.