From Trash to Treasure: The Cistern at the Thomas Wolfe Memorial

Unlike wells, which are dug to tap into underground water supplies, cisterns were used to collect and store rainwater. The house at 48 Spruce Street had a cistern when it was constructed in 1883. With additions to the house, it now lies covered underneath the kitchen porch. By the turn of the century, the house was already connected to the city’s water supply and equipped with indoor plumbing. When Julia Wolfe purchased the property in 1906, the cistern was no longer needed for household water and its usage had been discontinued. The pit, roughly 10 feet deep and masonry-lined to keep it water-tight, became a place for residents to discard household garbage in the years surrounding the turn of the century.

After the State of North Carolina acquired the Thomas Wolfe Memorial, the Office of State Archaeology performed two excavations of the cistern, in 1975 and 1978, and uncovered over 45,000 artifacts in the process. Artifacts dating from the late 1890s to the 1920s provide us with significant information on how people lived their lives. For instance, lumps of coal are remnants of the boardinghouse’s main source of heating. Dice, marbles, and doll parts found in the cistern reflect the presence of children in the home. As archaeologists dug deeper into the cistern, they found examples of how household technology changed over time. In lower levels they found kerosene lantern pieces, and in the upper levels they found General Electric light bulbs. Other artifacts include food remains like animal bones and cherry pits, broken china, and several glass bottles for beverages like Coca-Cola and Gay-Ola. Ink bottles and postage stamps found in the cistern exemplify the importance of writing letters to family and friends. Although waterlogged, the sealed environment of the cistern protected and preserved paper items, like bottle labels and postage stamps.

Some of the recovered artifacts appear to directly correlate to members of the Wolfe family. Julia Wolfe owned several pieces of property in Florida, and we know that she and Thomas brought back coconuts and seashells from their journeys there. Julia may have discarded coconut shell fragments found in the cistern after she made coconut pies and cakes for boarders. Broken remains of seashells may have come from decoration used in the boardinghouse. Twelve Worcestershire sauce bottles and almost 90 other culinary sauce bottles were pulled from the cistern, and were likely used by Julia and Thomas’ sister Mabel, who often assisted Julia in the boardinghouse kitchen. Due to the era’s prohibition laws and Julia’s reputation as a teetotaler, it appears boarders and family members also used the cistern as a discrete place to dispose of their contraband liquor, wine, and beer bottles. Pharmaceutical bottles found from Baltimore were perhaps those of Thomas Wolfe’s father, W.O., who had received medical treatments periodically at John Hopkins. If someone could look through years of your trash, what might they learn about you and your family?