Elliot Sugar Plantation Ruins

Artifacts retrieved from the ruins of Elliot Plantation on NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida show high-status fine dining wares imported from 18th century England. The white salt-glazed stoneware and creamware dining wares were found scattered near a large structure, determined by archeologists to be the dwelling of the plantation overseer. The dining wares have known dates of time for manufacturing and use during the 1760s through the 1770s and helped archeologists confirm the site was from the same period. The ruins of Elliot Plantation date from the 1760s and represent the largest, earliest, and southernmost British period sugar plantation in the U.S., as well as one of the most intact and best examples of a completely preserved enslaved landscape. In interagency cooperation between the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and NASA, and with the assistance of volunteers from the Indian River Anthropological Society, and historic preservation offices of Brevard and Volusia counties, approximately 200 shovel tests and 20 excavation units were completed in three areas of the plantation complex from 2008 to 2009.