Archeological firm hired for new Nashville stadium

Fans of Pacific Coast League teams can look forward to two new stadiums in the next couple of seasons - one in El Paso (which will open in 2014) and one in Nashville, where the Sounds will play in 2015.

The stadium in Nashville is being built on the site of the old Sulphur Dell stadium (built in 1870), which means crews might find remnants of the old stadium. But that's not the only historic landmark that shared the land. In fact, this WTVF Channel 5 story says crews could find artifacts from the Civil War, Native Americans or even Mastodons. The Nashville Elite Giants from the Southern Negro League began playing there in 1920, so finding artifacts from that era is possible as well.

An archeological firm has been hired to monitor everything crews bring to the surface. Crews broke ground in January and have already come across debris from the old Andrew Jackson Hotel that was torn down in 1973.

"Any area near downtown is rich with archeological treasures," said Mark Tolley with the Tennessee Ancient Sites Conservancy. "Whether there are any left there is yet to be seen, but you can go back thousands of years."