author
Charles H. (Charles Herron) Fairbanks
1913–1985
A pioneering American archaeologist and anthropologist, he helped shape the study of the American Southeast and brought careful, field-based methods to historical archaeology. His work also reached general readers through books on Florida’s Indigenous peoples and archaeology.
1 Audiobook
Hawkins-Davison Houses, Frederica, St. Simons Island, Georgia
by Margaret Davis Cate, Charles H. (Charles Herron) Fairbanks
About the author
Born in 1913, Charles H. Fairbanks became one of the important early figures in historical archaeology in the United States. He is especially remembered for work in the Southeast, where he built a reputation for rigorous excavation methods and for studying sites that could reveal everyday life, including communities often left out of written history.
Fairbanks taught at the University of Florida and chaired its Anthropology Department from 1963 to 1970. During that period, the department launched its graduate programs, and his influence extended through both his fieldwork and his teaching.
He also wrote and edited books for a wider audience, including works on Florida archaeology and the Seminole people. Fairbanks died in 1984, but he is still recognized as a pioneer whose research helped expand what archaeologists looked for, and whose teaching shaped later generations of scholars.