Current Archaeology in Kansas

Current Archaeology in Kansas Number 3 2002 Contents Title and Author(s) Page Empty Quarter Archaeology — Donald J. Blakeslee and David T. Hughes 1 What Lies Beneath: Archeological Investigation of Two Deeply Buried Sites in the Whitewater River Basin — C. Tod Bevitt 5 Ongoing Investigations of the Plains Woodland in Central Kansas — Mark A. Latham 9 A High-Power Use-Wear Analysis of Stone Tools Recovered from 14DO417 — William E. Banks 14 Archaeological Investigation of the Scott Site House (14LV1082) Stranger Creek Valley, Northeastern Kansas, A Progress Report — Brad Logan 20 Kansas Archeology Training Program Field School, 2002 — Virginia A. Wulfkuhle 25 Spatial Variability in Central Plains Tradition Lodges — Donna C. Roper 27 Hit and Run: Preliminary Results of Phase III Test Excavations at 14HO308, a Stratified, Multicomponent, Late Prehistoric Site in Southwest Kansas — C. Tod Bevitt 35 Building a Regional Chronology for Southeast Kansas — H.C. Smith 39 Geoarchaeological Survey of Kirwin National Wildlife Refuge, Northwestern Kansas: Application of GIS Method — Brad Logan, William C. Johnson, and Joshua S. Campbell 44 An Update on the Museum of Anthropology — Mary J. Adair 50 Research Notes: Ceramic Sourcing Study Grant Received — Robert J. Hoard 51 Wallace County Research — Janice A. McLean 52 Another Pawnee Site in Kansas? — Donna C. Roper 53 1 2 Empty Quarter Archaeology Donald J. Blakeslee, Wichita State University David T. Hughes, Wichita State University covered most of the upper end. Furthermore, wind erosion has also created a zone around the When a small survey fails to reveal any lake in which it would be nearly impossible to archaeological sites, it is unusual for someone locate sites even if they were present. The to ask why. When larger surveys produce reservoir is located in a wide shallow valley, and negative results, however, some explanation is wind has blown sand from the beach into a called for. Some of Wichita State University’s more-or-less continuous dune at the edge of recent survey projects turned up very little, and the beach where trees and shrubs lower the for a variety of interesting reasons. wind velocity. Leaves and other litter Recently, for example, WSU has been accumulate on the shoreward side of this dune, conducting an archaeological survey of the creating a layer that is less permeable than the federal land around Cheney Reservoir, about sand. Since the land everywhere slopes down twenty miles west of Wichita, for the Bureau of toward the beach, water accumulates there and Reclamation. Two years of survey have yielded creates a swamp, the decaying plants and dust a variety of historic sites—farmsteads and in which thicken the clays, making the drainage schoolhouses—but very little in the way of problem even worse. As a result, the whole prehistoric remains. reservoir is surrounded by beaches and swamps In fact, all of the prehistoric sites and in which sites, if present, are invisible. isolated finds reflect a single phenomenon, the Another factor in the relative lack of occasional testing of lag gravels for chippable sites has to do with more ancient stone. There are spots scattered around the geomorphology. When two other, much reservoir, on ridgetops and elsewhere that smaller surveys in the vicinity of Cheney erosion has exposed gravels, where an Reservoir failed to reveal sites in what seemed occasional tested nodule or isolated flake are like prime locations, we asked Rolfe Mandel found. The gravels are from isolated remnants about what his geomorphological survey of the for the Ogalalla formation, and are common on state had revealed. He told us that an episode ridges and hilltops in the region. Where there of erosion had stripped Holocene sediments are extensive gravels, close survey reveals from the whole upper end of the Ninnescah relatively numerous tested nodules and flakes basin, and that sedimentation had begun again, all across the exposure. Smaller exposures may perhaps less than a thousand years ago. Thus yield only a single item. Indeed, we have there has been relatively little time for sites to questioned whether or not it is appropriate to accumulate. designate even the larger spots as sites, given A third factor may have been operating the tenuous nature of the evidence. as well. When we checked the General Land Why were no other sites found? Part of Office survey maps for the area, we found the reason has to do with the effects of the record of a single Indian trail through the reservoir itself. It covers most of the ground general area, but it was located several miles near the river and creeks that were likely west of the reservoir. Thus native traffic camping spots. What is more, the reservoir was through the general area may have been not surveyed when first constructed, before channeled just far enough away from the erosion could destroy evidence. Indeed, wave present-day reservoir so that campsites erosion has cut down to bedrock along a large normally would have been located elsewhere. portion of the shoreline, and sedimentation has 1 We have found a similar lack of travelers away from the Smoky Hill River in prehistoric sites around Cedar Bluff Reservoir this region is the presence of outcrops of west of Hays. Here again, there are historic excellent quality Smoky Hill jasper along the sites, many of them associated with the state Saline River but not along the Smoky Hill park, which has had to shift the location of its River. facilities repeatedly in order to adapt to the Cheney Reservoir and Cedar Bluff changing water levels in the reservoir. Reservoir provide examples of explaining lack Prehistoric sites are the same as at Cheney of finding archaeological sites by demonstrating Reservoir, gravel exposures that contain an a possible settlement system that did not occasional flake or tested nodule. Cedar Bluff include the area examined. The Cimarron River Reservoir is in a much deeper valley than in southwest Kansas was a major access point Cheney, so it does not have the continuous to the Rio Grande valley from the Plains. Such shoreline dune and swamps, but during much sites as Middle Springs and Point of Rocks are of our survey, there were large areas covered still known among Santa Fe Trail buffs and with dense growths of salt cedar and other local legends about these sites are common. A brush that grew on old shorelines. survey of the area in the 1970s turned up Nevertheless, we found the occasional flake on hundreds of archaeological sites in a relatively them, and the sandy soil provided relatively small sample survey of the Cimarron National good visibility, given the density of the Grasslands. However, in 2002 WSU conducted vegetation. a complete survey of more than 20 160-acre Only one prehistoric site seemed to be quadrats on the Cimarron National Grasslands, different from the rest. It consisted of a small and found very little. A survey of much of the lithic scatter located around the upper end of a same area in the 1970s by Kenneth Brown ravine that cut into the upland. Similar sites produced information on several large exist across much of the Midwest and seem to prehistoric lithic scatters. We relocated only reflect a hunting pattern in which one or more three of the more than 15 sites Brown had beaters walked up a ravine to drive game to reported within our survey blocks. Our field men waiting at the top. In the few cases where technique was sufficient to conditions with 30 we have seen diagnostic artifacts in such sites, meter spacing between parallel traverses for they have been Archaic in age, but modern thorough coverage of the entire quarter section. pheasant and deer hunters sometimes use the Because of the drought conditions and same strategy. abundant rodent activity surface exposure of Cedar Bluff Reservoir is also associated soils was not a problem. Clearly, there had with a trail. The Smoky Hill trail, used by the been prehistoric archaeological sites here but Butterfield Overland Dispatch during the they were not observable in 2002. Colorado gold rush, ran across federal property That raises new questions for the lack on the north side of the reservoir. We have of materials. This was not a case of no sites: found no prehistoric materials on this trail, and sites were present. It was not a case of the records of archaeological sites kept at the inappropriate technique or method: the method Kansas State Historical Society hint at the was more intensive than that used by Brown. presence of a prehistoric trail in a different Why then were so few archaeological sites location. Most of the sites in Trego County lie being found? along the divide between the Smoky Hill and To answer that question, we began to Saline Rivers, and they may mark the presence examine the details of the site settings more of a trail that followed the divide. Such trails completely. The first thought was that aeolian offered potential campsites at the headwater deposition during the past 25 years might have springs of the creeks that flowed down from obscured the sites. The Cimarron National the divide. Another factor drawing prehistoric Grasslands is not a farming area: only well- 2 controlled grazing for pasture management is location in the bottom of a narrow swale where allowed. Therefore, any potential for silt rock is exposed next to softer sediments, accumulation would not be reversed by tillage. surrounded by shrubs and with some grass After consideration of the survey data, we remaining in the shelter of the shrubs, a pile of found evidence of moderate to heavy trash and over 50 artifacts, most larger than 5cm, was debris dating from the 1930s into recent times.

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