Journey to the Ice Age: Discovering an Ancient World

John Stanley is a senior policy advisor in the Corporate Policy Branch
Management Board Secretariat, Government of Ontario.

This book combines two elements: the intellectual autobiography of a
professional archaeologist and the story of the search for
Paleo-Indians, primarily along the beach line of glacial Lake Algonquin,
which covered much of Southern Ontario from 11,500 to 10,400 years ago.
Both stories involve the period 1969–98 in which the author, now the
senior curator emeritus at the Royal Ontario Museum, was actively
engaged in work for that museum.

The book has much to recommend it. Storck combines well the local and
the big picture. The black-and-white pictures are straightforward and
illuminating, particularly the excellent John Pemberton drawings of tool
manufacture. The reader does not need to have taken a course in
archaeology or anthropology in order to become engaged in the
intertwined stories. The book’s diary-like “Archaeological
Newsletter” entries, initially printed up by the ROM for its members,
provide a strong sense of the youthful enthusiasm that Storck continues
to maintain for his work, despite his current emeritus status.

Ontario archaeologists will want to read this book, both for its
content and to see whether they are mentioned. The author is generous in
his references to most of the main players in Ontario archaeology, and
treats everyone he mentions with respect. This respect is particularly
evident in his treatment of one of the most controversial figures in
Canadian archaeology, Thomas Lee, whose deep dating of the Sheguiandah
site in the northeast corner of Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron was
instrumental in the downfall of his reputation. Storck painstakingly
unearths the story, settles the difficulties of the date, and then puts
the story to rest, leaving Lee’s dignity intact.