PREFACE


 During the winters of 1956 and 1957 while Ripley P. Bullen,
Curator of Social Sciences at The Florida State Museum at Gaines-
ville, and Frederick W. Sleight, Director of The Central Florida
Museum at Orlando, were studying the Eastern Florida shell mid-
dens, Castle Windy and Green Mound, which led to the William L.
Bryant Foundation publications, American Series Nos. One and
Two, it seemed quite natural to speculate on the relationships of
these early cultures of Florida with those of The Antilles-which
directions influences flowed and just how and when they developed.
 Mr. Sleight had for some years had an eye on a large site near
Camaguey, Cuba and he suggested we undertake an investigation
in collaboration with the local museum in Camaguey. As our in-
terest in this area grew, Mr. Sleight and I began to visualize the
development of a West Indian Cultural Center at The Central
Florida Museum. It would have a research library as a foundation
and would propose the initiating of archaeological surveys of the
numerous islands.
 Thwarted by the revolution in carrying out the Cuban study,
 we began to explore other possibilities. Mr. Sleight had some
 friends, Mr. and Mrs. Hugh N. Davis, both with some archaeo-
 logical background, living in Charlotte Amalie in the American
 Virgin Islands. We invited them to make a survey of St. Thomas
 and in the winter of 1958 this work was carried out.
 The following year John W. Griffin, in his role as Regional
 Archaeologist of the Southeastern Region of The National Park
 Service, asked the Bryant Foundation if it would make an appraisal
 of the archaeological resources of the island of St. John, site of a
 new national park on land given to the United States by Lawrence
 S. Rockefeller in 1956.
 To consider this proposition Messrs. Griffin, Sleight, Bullen and
 myself met at Charlotte Amalie in May 1959 and the decision was
 made to undertake the job. Mr. Sleight, as Director of the West
 Indian Center, assumed the responsibility of organizing the work.
 Mr. Bullen was concerned with various archaeological aspects of
 the study while Robert H. Steinbach, then of Florida State Uni-
 versity, was invited to assist in the survey.
 During this visit the Krum Bay site on St. Thomas, which had