The vacant lot, located in what is called the Ransom Place Historic District, is the site of what was from 1920 to 1960 a small, corner grocery store in a thriving, predominantly African-American community. The coin discovery catapulted the anthropology class project into the national spotlight among Cracker Jack prize collectors. Jeffrey Scott Maxwell, coordinator of the Cracker Jack Collectors Association's website, posted a web story on the archaeological dig shortly after association members helped Mullins identify the coin pulled from one of the pits. As a result, Mullins has received numerous e-mail messages from other Cracker Jack collectors across the country. They were surprised that archaeology reaches into the recent past.
Every good collector is an archaeologist at heart.
In an interesting twist of fate, an artifact discovered during a 1996-97 dig at 941 Camp Street unearthed an 1893 World's Fair souvenir coin. Cracker Jack first gained a popular following after its debut at that fair, which was held in Chicago. Children could collect a certain number of the coins and send them to the Cracker Jack Company to become members of the Cracker Jack Mystery Club. During the winter semester students will clean, catalogue and research the items, hoping to learn more about the lives of those who once lived there. The neighborhood, originally populated by European immigrants and white residents, became predominately African-American during the first decade of the twentieth century.