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RECOMMENDED BOOKS TO READ: 

I AM THE GRAND CANYON

"I Am the Grand Canyon is the story of the Havasupai people. From their origins among the first group of Indians to arrive in North America some 20,000 years ago to their epic struggle to regain traditional lands taken from them in the nineteenth century, the Havasupai have a long and colorful history. The story of this tiny tribe once confined to a toosmall reservation depicts a people with deep cultural ties to the land, both on their former reservation below the rim of the Grand Canyon and on the surrounding plateaus.

In the spring of 1971, the federal government proposed incorporating still more Havasupai land into Grand Canyon National Park. At hearings that spring, Havasupai Tribal Chairman Lee Marshall rose to speak. “I heard all you people talking about the Grand Canyon,” he said. “Well, you’re looking at it. I am the Grand Canyon!” Marshall made it clear that Havasu Canyon and the surrounding plateau were critical to the survival of his people; his speech laid the foundation for the return of thousands of acres of Havasupai land in 1975.

I Am the Grand Canyon is the story of a heroic people who refused to back down when facing overwhelming odds. They won, and today the Havasupai way of life quietly continues in the Grand Canyon and on the surrounding plateaus."

--- copied from goodreads.com

The Mind In The Cave by David Lewis Williams

"Emerging from the narrow underground passages into the chambers of caves such as Lascaux, Chauvet, and Altamira, visitors are confronted with symbols, patterns, and depictions of bison, woolly mammoths, ibexes, and other animals.

Since its discovery, cave art has provoked great curiosity about why it appeared when and where it did, how it was made, and what it meant to the communities that created it. David Lewis-Williams proposes that the explanation for this lies in the evolution of the human mind. Cro-Magnons, unlike the Neanderthals, possessed a more advanced neurological makeup that enabled them to experience shamanistic trances and vivid mental imagery. It became important for people to "fix," or paint, these images on cave walls, which they perceived as the membrane between their world and the spirit world from which the visions came. Over time, new social distinctions developed as individuals exploited their hallucinations for personal advancement, and the first truly modern society emerged.

Illuminating glimpses into the ancient mind are skillfully interwoven here with the still-evolving story of modern-day cave discoveries and research. The Mind in the Cave is a superb piece of detective work, casting light on the darkest mysteries of our earliest ancestors while strengthening our wonder at their aesthetic achievements."

--- copied from goodreads.com

Arrowpoints, Spearheads, & Knives of Prehistoric Times by Thomas Wilson

"A thorough history of the weapons and tools our prehistoric ancestors used to survive, this book reveals a world that will fascinate anyone interested in outdoor skills, ancient weapons or anthropology.  Thomas Wilson explains the many types of arrowheads, spears and knives used by the people of the Paleolithic period across Western Europe and the early days of America.  He details the materials from which these were made, how and where they were manufactured, and the purposes for which they were crafted--from  hunting and cutting to scraping and grindings.  Lavishly illustrated with hundreds of drawings of these tools, including microscopic details of the flint and other stones from which they were crafted, this is a rare look into what seems like mankind's not so-distant past."

--- copied from goodreads.com

Primitive Technology: A Book of Earth Skills edited by David Wescott

"Have You Ever Longed To Return To A Past Where Humanity's Greatest Concern Was Survival, When Our Hands Created Life's Necessities, When The Land's Raw Provisions Were The Materials With Which We Created Warmth, Shelter, Food, and Tools--A Time Before We Lost Our Bond With The Wilderness? Primitive Technology Helps Build A Bridge Between The Ancient Past and Our Modern Lives, Putting Us In Touch Again With Nature and Ourselves. This Volume--A Selection of Articles Within The Bulletin of Primitive Technology--Portrays The History, Philosophise, and Personal Journeys of Authorities On Primitive Technology, Imparting Skills That Built The Success of Mankind. From Views On Primitive Technology and "New" Archaeology To Making Fire and Tools of Bone, This Book Is Informative and Enlightening"                                         --- copied from goodreads.com

House of Rain - Tracking a Vanished Civilization Across The American Southwest by Craig Childs

"KIRKUS REVIEW

Naturalist and NPR commentator Childs (Soul of Nowhere, 2002, etc.) chronicles his research trips following in the footsteps of a native population that flourished, then mysteriously disappeared, in pre-Columbian America.

His subject: the Anasazi, ancestors of today’s Hopi. These Southwestern hunters and farmers lived in some of North America’s most unforgiving terrain, blisteringly hot and dauntingly arid, yet they developed a rich culture that survived hundreds of years and multiple migrations. The author travels along those migratory routes, pursuing the Anasazi over a period of years with many different companions, including his wife, infant son and stepfather, as well as various archaeologists and a few modern-day desert-rats. He battles fire, infernal summer temperatures, brutal winter cold and wind. Water tends to be either absent or overabundant; at one point, he allows a flash flood to transport him, sans clothes, downstream to his destination. He begins at Chaco Canyon in northwest New Mexico and meanders through Colorado, Utah, Arizona and northwest Mexico, where his quest ends in a recently plowed field choked with potsherds hundreds of years old. The author has interviewed (and frequently traveled with) numerous authorities on the pottery, geology, architecture and agriculture of these enigmatic people. His text is rich in geographical and archaeological detail about raising corn, breeding macaws, beheading turkeys and more. Childs considers conventional thinking, then weighs in with his own theories, earned the old-fashioned way, by walking tough terrain to sites untouched for centuries. Evoking these places where people ground corn, procreated, celebrated and slaughtered one another, he displays surpassing curiosity and profound reverence.  "

Hidden Scholars:Women Anthropologists and the Native American Southwest by Dr. Nancy Parezo

Women scholars, writers, curators, and philanthropists have played important roles in the study of Native American cultures of the Southwest. For much of the twentieth century, however, their work has been overlooked. The essays in this book, which grew out of the landmark conference known as Daughters of the Desert, help to rectify the appropriation, erasure, disparagement, and invisibility that many women anthropologists have suffered.
A number of essays are biographical or intellectual histories, such as Parezo on Matilda Coxe Stevenson, Hieb on Elsie Clews Parsons, Babcock on Ruth Benedict, Lamphere on Gladys Reichard, and Lange on Esther Goldfrank. Others provide an overview of women archaeologists (Cordell), philanthropists (McGreevy), and popular writers (Tisdale). Still others assess the contributions of women to a particular subfield, such as Sand on the Yaquis and Hinton on women linguists. This volume goes beyond celebration, however, to provide a critical contribution to anthropological history.                                                                                           --- copied from amazon.com

The Lost World of the Old Ones by  David Roberts

"For more than 5,000 years the Ancestral Puebloans—Native Americans who flourished long before the first contact with Europeans—occupied the Four Corners region of the southwestern United States. Just before AD 1300, they abandoned their homeland in a migration that remains one of prehistory's greatest puzzles. Northern and southern neighbors of the Ancestral Puebloans, the Fremont and Mogollon likewise flourished for millennia before migrating or disappearing. Fortunately, the Old Ones, as some of their present-day descendants call them, left behind awe-inspiring ruins, dazzling rock art, and sophisticated artifacts ranging from painted pots to woven baskets. Some of their sites and relics had been seen by no one during the 700 years before David Roberts and his companions rediscovered them.

In The Lost World of the Old Ones, Roberts continues the hunt for answers begun in his classic book, In Search of the Old Ones. His new findings paint a different, fuller portrait of these enigmatic ancients—thanks to the breakthroughs of recent archaeologists. Roberts also recounts his last twenty years of far-flung exploits in the backcountry with the verve of a seasoned travel writer. His adventures range across Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and southwestern Colorado, illuminating the mysteries of the Old Ones as well as of the more recent Navajo and Comanche.

Roberts calls on his climbing and exploratory expertise to reach remote sanctuaries of the ancients hidden within nearly vertical cliffs, many of which are unknown to archaeologists and park rangers. This ongoing quest combines the shock of new discovery with a deeply felt connection to the landscape, and it will change the way readers experience, and imagine, the American Southwest.  "         --- copied from goodreads.com

Wolfkiller: Wisdom from a Nineteenth-Century Navajo Shepherd

recorded by Louisa Wade Wetherill / compiled by Harvey Leake

"Fascinating history and compelling storytelling make Wolfkiller, the memoir of a Navajo shepherd man who lived in the Monument Valley region of the Southwest, a page-turning epic. In these stories compiled by Harvey Leake, Wolfkiller shares the ancient wisdom of the Navajo elders that was passed to him while a boy growing up near the Utah/Arizona border. Wolfkiller's story was recorded and translated by pioneer trader Louisa Wade Wetherill, an unlikely pairing that came together when she moved to this remote area of southern Utah in 1906. Wetherill recognized that Wolfkiller was a man of exceptional character, with lessons and wisdom of the Navajo that deserved to be recorded and preserved for the benefit of future generations.

Over the course of many years, Wolfkiller told his stories to Wetherill who translated them into English. When the manuscript was completed in 1932, modern society was simply not ready for it. Rejected by publishers, the document languished in the family archives until today, long after Wolfkiller and Mrs. Wetherill were gone, it can now be recognized as a unique and profound book that speaks to modern culture's compulsive rush away from nature.

Included are photographs of Wolfkiller and the Wetherills, all taken from about 1906 to 1926. More than forty other historical photographs are also included.

"If Mrs. Wetherill could be persuaded to write on the mythology of the Navajos, and also on their present-day psychology-by which somewhat magniloquent term I mean their present ways and habits of thought-she would render an invaluable service. She not only knows their language; she knows their minds. . . ." Theodore Roosevelt, after visiting the Wetherill trading post in 1913 " --- copied from Amazon.com

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KNOWLEDGE BITES:

Native American Inventions

https://www.thoughtco.com/native-american-inventions-1991632

Projectile Point Analysis of American Southwest

http://arizonaarchaeologicalcouncil.org/resources/Documents/JAZA/JAzArch%204_2/JAzArchV4N2_2017_Full%20Issue.pdf

g%20techniques.pdf 

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WHAT'S OLD IS NEWS: ( source; various )

Archaeologist discovers Copper Arrowhead in the Yukon Territory

https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2018/01/lucky-find-gives-archaeologists-glimpse.html

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Speakers:

           The San Tan Chapter meetings are held at the San Tan Historical Society Museum at 20425 S Old Ellsworth Rd in Queen Creek                               

Upcoming Schedule:  September - December 2021

December 8, 2021 : DR. JAY FRANKLIN OF ECOPLAN WILL PRESENT

Topic:   "Hohokam and Salado Archaeology Along US 60 Near Superior, Arizona" ---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Presentation: Hohokam and Salado Archaeology Along US 60

Abstract

... an overview of archaeological investigations by EcoPlan Associates, Inc. for ADOT along a four mile stretch of US 60 just east of Superior. I will briefly discuss overall project chronology, culture history, and results of several kinds of analyses with particular attention to the pottery found. Previous work west of this area revealed mostly Hohokam sites. During this project we found both Hohokam and Salado sites – sometimes at the same location. We have the opportunity to examine the transition from the late pre-Classic to Classic periods (AD 900 – 1450) here along Queen Creek and to examine the social environments and interaction spheres of Hohokam and Salado populations in the early Classic Period. This work provides new information on the upper Queen Creek corridor between the more intensely investigated Phoenix Basin and Tonto Basin/Globe Highlands.

Jay Franklin is Director of Cultural Resources and a Principal Investigator for EcoPlan Associates, Inc. headquartered in Mesa, Arizona. Franklin works in EcoPlan’s Tucson office. He was

 awarded his PhD in Anthropology at the University of Tennessee in 2002. His primary research interests include prehistoric hunter gatherers, cave and rock art, and prehistoric stone tools and pottery. Franklin has more than 26 years of experience in archaeology and cultural resource management. He is certified by the Arizona State Museum as a principal investigator and project director. His archaeological experience spans the southeastern United States, Missouri, North Dakota, Texas, Arizona, and France. He has worked extensively in academia and cultural resource management to design and conduct large and small projects from archaeological surveys to large excavation projects. Franklin has been a professor, archaeology director, project manager. He taught courses in introductory archaeology, human osteology and paleontology, Native American cultures, prehistoric stone tool technologies, Paleolithic archaeology, cultural resource management, archaeological curation, and archaeological ceramics, among others, at East Tennessee State University, the University of Memphis, Pellissippi State Technical Community College, and the University of Tennessee. Franklin’s research has been presented at professional conferences and published in several leading archaeological and scientific journals from state to international levels.

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Schedule:  January - May 2022  

January:  22, 2022

In lieu of a presentation, the San Tan Chapter will host a Meet & Great " event at the San Tan Historical Museum.

Saturday from 12: to 2:00 pm. Snacks and beverages would be served so RSVPs will be encouraged.

February 9, 2022  TBD

March:     2022

No presentation ; mini expo scheduled for Saturday March 26, 2022

April 13, 2022 Zen Zoll and Arizona Humanities present:

Ken Zoll is the Executive Director of the Verde Valley Archaeology Center in Camp Verde, and the Regional Coordinator of the site steward program of Arizona State Parks and Trails, charged with the monitoring of several prehistoric sites in the Verde Valley. Ken is also a volunteer docent at the cultural heritage sites in the Coconino National Forest. His archaeology specialty is ancient astronomy practices and he has conducted many studies within the Coconino National Forest and for the City of Springerville Arizona. He is a certified instructor in ancient astronomical practices with the Arizona Archaeological Society. Ken has authored three books, Sinagua Sunwatcher and Understanding the Rock Art of Sedona and the Verde Valley. All proceeds from the sale of his books go to Verde Valley Archaeology Center. His latest book entitled Heart of the Sky: Ancient Astronomy Practices in Central Arizona describes his astronomy discoveries over the past eight years.

Topic: Ancient Snapshots: Verde Valley Family Life from the 11th to the 14th Centuries

The occurrence of meteorites on archaeological sites in North America has been known since the early 19th century. From the Hopewell culture in the eastern United States to the Indians in the American Southwest and northern Mexico, meteorites have been found on these ancient sites. Much like meteorite hunters of today, ancient Native American cultures actively engaged in meteorite collecting. Several meteorite fragments from Meteor Crater near Flagstaff have been discovered at ancient dwellings in Central Arizona. This talk will describe these meteorite locations, how they were associated with Meteor Crater and how one of the meteorites, using radiocarbon dating, established its location within a ruin and confirmed the date of the ruin’s destruction.

May 11, 2022        TBD

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January 13, 2021 @ 7pm (second Wednesday of the month): Annalisa Alvrus, Ph.D.. MESA COMMUNITY COLLEGE

Chair, Cultural Science Department; Residential Faculty, Anthropology---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Annalisa was born in another hot place (southwest Florida) and soon in life found out she couldn't figure out what she was most interested in studying. Given all that, she opted for anthropology, because of the breadth and depth of expanses of human knowledge that are covered in that field. While working full time as a legal secretary, she accumulated various credits in 3.5 years at community colleges in Florida and Maryland, then finally obtained her Bachelor's degree at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, graduating summa cum laude. She moved on to graduate study at Arizona State University, earning a Master's in Bioarchaeology, and in 2006, she earned a Ph.D. in Physical Anthropology. She became full time faculty in the Maricopa Community College District in 2005 and has tremendously enjoyed her many semesters spent sharing her love of anthropology with numerous students at the community college.

Topic: Vampires, Witches, and Zombies, Oh My!

For generations untold, humans have utilized religion to help us fathom things that are beyond our immediate understanding, such as death and why we die. One of the goals of anthropology is to "make the strange familiar and the familiar strange" by exploring how people in other cultures (including other cultures across time) have understood and experienced similar human events. This talk will look at the human experience of death and the immediate period after death, to analyze how humans have used belief systems, including religion, to explain phenomena common to all of us.

February 10,2021   :Dr. Michelle Turner    Crow Canyon Archaeological Center Cortez Colorado

                             Topic: Aztec Ruins National Monument---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

The Archaeology of the Aztec North Great House

Dr. Michelle I. Turner

In 2016, a team from Binghamton University conducted archaeological testing at the previously unexcavated Aztec North great house at Aztec Ruins National Monument. The fieldwork revealed architectural surprises, including unexpected construction methods and remodeling over time, as well as fascinating artifact patterns. I will discuss what we have learned about the site’s chronology, about the architecture, and about people’s daily lives at this site. I will also discuss my ongoing research into the great house’s place in the larger cultural landscape of Aztec Ruins and its relationship to Chaco Canyon and other regions.

Michelle Turner is a postdoctoral scholar at Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, where she works on the Northern Chacoan Outliers Project. She received her PhD in 2019 from the Department of Anthropology at Binghamton University (SUNY). This talk grows out of her dissertation research on the Aztec North great house.

March 10, 2021 : Dr. Chris Loendorf Senior Project Manager GRIC-----VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Topic: BLACKWATER VILLAGE AT THE TURN OF THE 2Oth CENTURY:

Akimel O’Odham Perseverance and Resiliency

Much of what is known regarding Historic period Native American communities is based on the interpretation of documents that were written by non-indigenous peoples. However, archaeological excavations in a portion of the Blackwater Village within the Gila River Indian Community provide another perspective on Native American life ways within south-central Arizona during the late 1800s. The latter 19th century was a pivotal time for the Akimel O’Odham (i.e., Pima) who have long lived within the Phoenix Basin, and they experienced dramatic changes in their subsistence strategies, settlement patterns, craft production, and other cultural practices during this time, which is referred to as the “years of famine” (1880-1920). These recent archaeological investigations demonstrate that the Akimel O’Odham were not passive recipients of Euroamerican culture, and instead they chose to adopt some aspects of non-native practices while at the same time retaining important traditions. As a result, the Akimel O’Odham have successfully maintained their society in the face of tremendous hardships, and Blackwater Village remains a vibrant settlement to this day.

April 14, 2021 : Niccole Villa Cerveny , Ph.D MESA COMMUNITY COLLEGE , Faculty | Geosciences & Topic: Rock Art Conservation: Lessons from the American Southwest and the Jordanian Holy Lands

--VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Brief Synopsis: Join us as we investigate both the natural and human causes of rock decay on cultural stone containing petroglyphs in the deserts of the American Southwest. Utilizing the Rock Art Stability Index, field researchers can quantify the threats to our cultural heritage. We will also explore the contrast between the challenges of our desert geoheritage and the Wadi Rum Desert in the Hisma Basin of Jordan, where similar rock types and climate impact 2000 year old petroglyphs and inscriptions. Lessons from both locations richly inform rock art mitigation decisions and cultural stone management for the sustainability of heritage resources.

Mini-Bio: Niccole Villa Cerveny is a professor of geosciences and sustainability at Mesa Community College who specializes in geomorphology, conservation of cultural resources, and undergraduate research. She obtained her doctorate from Arizona State University. Her research ranges from studying climatic relationships through quartz grain decay to conservation and preservation of rock art. Her work has been published in scholarly journals including Heritage Management, Journal of Geomorphology, Geoarchaeology, and Weatherwise. Although she enjoys engaging in indigenous weaving techniques and other outdoor activities, her current passion involves helping K-12 teachers and students explore impactful field research experiences.

May 12, 2021           : Richard Lange ---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

                                Topic: Homol'ov | Arizona Archaeologist #43

Homol’ovi II (H2) is one of the two largest ancestral Hopi villages just outside of Winslow in northeastern Arizona. HRP worked there in 1983‐84, from 1991‐1995, and finally in 2013 and 2014. H2, along with 6 other prehistoric villages, clustered along the Little Colorado River for water and intensive cotton production in the late 1200s through the 1300s. H2 was founded about 1360, and like the other villages, was closed as the populations moved to the Hopi Mesas about 1400. The talk will discuss the general history of the Homol’ovi area, what was there before and after the Homol’ovi villages, the founding and evolution of H2 village, and some details about the creation and exchange of Hopi yellow ware pottery that was found in abundance at the Homol’ovi sites.

Rich Lange got his undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois in 1974 and his MA from the University of Arizona in 1977. Upon completion of the MA degree, he walked across the street and was employed on a contract project for Arizona State Museum. Rich continue working there on other projects, doing state land surveys, and then becoming the Associate Director for ASM’s Homol’ovi Research Program (HRP). For the HRP, Rich directed surveys in the main park area and at Rock Art Ranch to the southeast, participated in excavations at the major Homol’ovi pueblos, and sometimes directed the excavations, such as at Homol’ovi I in the park (Homolovi State Park) and at the Multi‐Kiva Site south of Rock Art Ranch. He has recently completed the report for work done by the HRP at Homol’ovi II.   

Photo : Homol’ovi II near Winslow, of the large kiva there under excavation in 1993.

September 8,2021: Dr. Vance T. Holliday Professor  School of Anthropology & Department of Geosciences University of Arizona

Director, Argonaut Archaeological Research Fund

Topic:  "In Search of the First Americans Across the Greater Southwest" ---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Vance Holliday attended The University of Texas to study archaeology (BA in Anthropology,1972). By the time he was at Texas Tech for an MA in Museum Science (1977) and to work on the Lubbock Lake archaeological project his interests expanded to soils, landscapes, and geology. At the same time, his work at Lubbock Lake was bringing him into contact with research into the earliest (Paleoindian) populations on the Great Plains. The result of these interests was a PhD in Geology from the University of Colorado (1982). His professional career, which started at the University of Wisconsin (1986-2002), is largely devoted to reconstructing and interpreting the landscapes and environments in which Paleoindians lived, and how these conditions evolved, initially on the Great Plains. This interest culminated in his joining the University of Arizona faculty (2002) to direct the Argonaut Archaeological Research Fund (AARF), which is devoted to research on the geoarchaeology of the Paleoindian people of the Southwest. Since 2002 he has been a professor in both the Departments of Anthropology and Geosciences at the University of Arizona, and Adjunct Professor in Geography & Regional Development. Outside of the Plains and the Southwest his field work has included early sites in Alaska, Argentina, and Chile, and Paleolithic sites in Russia and Ukraine.

Honors include the Archaeological Geology Award of the Geological Society of America, the Kirk Bryan Award of the G.S.A., and in 2018 the Fryxell Award for Interdisciplinary Research from the Society for American Archaeology. He authored three books, including Paleoindian Geoarchaeology of the Southern High Plains, and co-edited four others, including the Encyclopedia of Geoarchaeology and Plainview: Enigmatic Paleoindian Artifact Style of the Great Plains. He also published numerous journal articles and book chapters on Pleistocene and Holocene geology and soils, on geoarchaeology, and on Paleoindian archaeology.

Vance T. Holliday, University of Arizona

The First Americans, the so-called “Paleoindians” were the earliest hunters and gatherers to settle in the southwestern U.S. and northwestern Mexico. They lived at a time when the climate was substantially different than today; generally cooler and wetter. Rivers carried more water and there were more, and larger lakes scattered across the region. Another significant characteristic of this time was presence of now extinct “megafauna” – large mammals such as mammoth, mastodon, horse, camel, dire wolf, and several big cats and bears. The best-known characteristic of the Paleoindian foragers is their stone tool technology.

Archaeological research shows that the earliest Paleoindian group were makers of Clovis projectile points. Clovis foragers (13,500 – 13,000 cal years B.P.) were not common in the region, but chance discoveries revealed several Clovis kill sites with the remains of mammoth and other extinct megafauna. The presence of younger Paleoindian sites varies considerably across the region. There are few such sites in southern Arizona and Sonora, but they are relatively common on the Colorado Plateau of northern Arizona and northwestern New Mexico. They are locally quite dense along the greater Rio Grande valley of New Mexico and southern Colorado. The artifacts of Folsom foragers (13,000-12,000 cal years B.P.), who followed the Clovis people are particularly common in basins of the Rio Grande. By Folsom time most of the megafauna were extinct. The best know survivor was bison, and Folsom people apparently became expert bison hunters. Folsom bison kills are well documented on the Great Plains. None are known in the southwest because buried, intact Folsom sites are very rare and poorly preserved. Younger “Late Paleoindian” sites (12,500-11,000 cal years B.P.) are also known from the Rio Grande region, but they seem to be fewer than Folsom. By late Paleoindian times the climate was significantly warmer and drier than Clovis or Folsom times and human adaptive behavior was likely shifting toward more sedentary “Archaic” lifestyles with increased focus on plant gathering and use of local resources.

October 13, 2021 : Dr. Aaron Wright Southwest Archaeology---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Aaron Wright Preservation Anthropologist, Archaeology Southwest

Aaron Wright is a Preservation Anthropologist with Archaeology Southwest, a Tucson-based non-profit organization dedicated to studying, protecting, and respecting the Southwest’s rich archaeological landscape. He is author of Religion on the Rocks: Hohokam Rock Art, Ritual Practice, and Social Transformation (University of Utah Press, 2014) and editor of the forthcoming Sacred Southwestern Landscapes: Archaeologies of Religious Ecology.

Topic:

“Hohokam, Patayan, or ?”—Unmixing the Archaeology of the Lower Gila River

With its varied topography and stark contrast between riverine and desert environs, western Arizona witnessed the flourishing of multiple cultural traditions that followed related yet unique historic trajectories. Archaeologists learned long ago that, in places, the material remains of these distinct traditions overlap on the landscape. This scenario is quite evident along the lower Gila River, where elements of Patayan and Hohokam material culture are often found together or in close proximity. How to explain the “mixing”? In this presentation, Aaron Wright reviews preliminary findings of a four-year survey and documentation of over 150 archaeological sites in the Dendora Valley and surrounding area that show what the archaeological record looks like when worlds collide.

source : Archaeology Southwest.org

November 10, 2021  : Dr. Michelle Rae Bebber ---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Kent State University, Kent, Ohio

Dr. Michelle Bebber is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio. She has degrees in Biological Anthropology (Ph.D.), Experimental Archaeology (M.A.), Interdisciplinary Anthropology (B.A.), and Studio Art (B.A.) with a focus in ceramics. Michelle specializes in experimental archaeology and co-directs the Kent State University Experimental Archaeology Laboratory. Her research has been featured on the Discovery Channel, NPR, and Gizmodo, as well as several other media outlets, including Science and Archaeology magazine. Her research involves early metal technologies, ceramic production and function, and projectile weaponry. Michelle’s current projects are focused on North American copper use and the human aesthetic experience. Her diverse background, which merges the fine arts and hard sciences, gives her a strong replicative skillset and a unique perspective on past tool production processes, tool innovation, modification, and general usage.

Topic: The End of North America’s Copper Age: What Can Experimental Ballistics and Mechanics Tell Us?

North America’s Old Copper Culture (6000-3000 B.P.) is a unique event in archaeologists’ global understanding of ancient metallurgy. For millennia, Middle and Late Archaic hunter-gatherers around the North American Upper Great Lakes region regularly made utilitarian implements out of copper, only for these items to decline in prominence and frequency during the Archaic to Woodland Transition. This decline in copper tools has generally been explained as a result of population growth and increasing social complexity seen in the subsequent Woodland Period. However, could it be that other factors—such as overall tool function—may have contributed to the end of North America’s “Copper Age”? Dr. Bebber will discuss the results of her experimental program, which addresses this question via the functional comparison of replicated tools made from native copper versus those made of stone and bone.

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 Schedule: 2020

December 9: Dr. Barbara Stark Professor Emerita ASU---VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Barbara L. Stark specializes in Mesoamerican archaeology, especially the Gulf lowlands. She received her Ph.D. from Yale University in 1974. Now Professor Emeritus at ASU, she continues her research on settlement patterns, ancient economy, state organization, and ceramics. National Science Foundation-supported excavations and regional survey in the Papaloapan basin have provided new data. She has a monograph in press about settlement patterns and political organization. A new paper about the cotton textile craft provides grist for her San Tan Chapter talk. She has published nine books, 95 chapters or articles, and varied other publications.

Topic : "King Cotton: It's History in Ancient Mesoamerica"

Cotton is one of the five famous Arizona “Cs” for which the state is known. Cotton fiber and cotton textiles became vital products in ancient Mesoamerica long before. Wild cotton was a plant adapted to the coastal littoral, and the Gulf coast of Mesoamerica is one area where cotton and the cotton textile craft became regionally important and entered into interregional exchanges with regions where cotton could not be grown. This perishable product can be studied indirectly via archaeological ceramic spindle whorls. It’s history in the Papaloapan region of Veracruz involves craft extensification, both geographically and socially. Eventually cotton fiber and textiles were “big business” in Postclassic Mesoamerica.

November 11:  Ramona Klein  ----VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Topic: Indian Boarding Schools --- "Hear My Voice"

Dr. Ramona Charette Klein is an enrolled member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa in Belcourt, ND. Dr. Klein has earned the following degrees from the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND:

Bachelor of Science- Elementary Education K-8 ,Master of Education- Special Education SLD, Doctorate of Education- School Leadership with a Cognate of Studies in Special Education.

Ramona is the first woman from her tribe, the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, to earn a doctorate degree. Since Ramona earned a doctorate many others have followed in her footsteps earning college degrees at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Ramona has taught students from Kindergarten through Post Graduate work. She has worked in Bureau of Indian Education, public, private and Tribal education in k-12 schools and higher education. She has served on local, state, regional, national and international boards that educate and support children and youth. Ramona continues to work in education through her business, Eagle Consulting, Inc. She has worked in all fifty states. Ramona enjoys meeting people and learning about their cultures.

Ramona is the fifth of eight children of john and Stella Charette. At the age of six (6) Ramona attended A Bureau of Indian Education Boarding School in Fort Totten, North Dakota. Ramona’s father, John Charette also attended Indian Boarding School as a young child. Ramona will share her story of the Indian Boarding School experience.

October 14: Dr. Chris Loendorf Senior Project Manager GRIC-----VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Gila River Indian Community (GRIC)

Topic: "Arrow Point Reworking: An Experimental Study of Projectile Point Use Life"

This paper reports the results of controlled experiments in which flaked stone arrow points were fired at four different uniform target media with varying elasticity. The points were made from four materials that varied substantially in impact toughness. Our results show that when impacting inelastic materials such as bone, damage to arrow points was generally catastrophic, especially for low fracture toughness materials including obsidian. Furthermore, in those rare instances when broken arrow tips could be reworked, they did not perform as well as the initial artifact. Our results suggest that contrary to a common assumption, conditions of use are such that fired points can only occasionally be reworked, and reworked arrow points in archaeological collections are more likely artifacts that were damaged in the quiver or otherwise accidentally broken. This conclusion is supported by multiple lines of data including physical constraints that indicate why used arrow points were rarely reworked.

Our work has many implications for understanding lithic assemblages, and it shows that a number of common assumptions are incorrect.

September 9:  M. Kyle Woodson, Ph.D., ------------VIDEO CONFERENCE PRESENTATION

Topic : The Impact of Flooding on Hohokam Irrigation Agriculture

Kyle Woodson has served the past eight years as the Director of the Gila River Indian Community’s Cultural Resource Management Program in Sacaton, Arizona. Kyle received his Ph.D. in Anthropology at Arizona State University in 2010. His research focuses on southern Arizona and includes Hohokam canal irrigation agriculture, community organization, and ceramic production and technology, as well as Ancestral Puebloan migrations and other topics. Kyle has authored or co-authored a number of recent publications including: an article on granary pedestals in Classic Period Hohokam platform mound sites (with Brian Medchill and Chris Loendorf) in the Journal of Arizona Archaeology (2019); an article on the sourcing of hematite paints oh Hohokam red-on-buff ceramics (with Sunday Eiselt, John Dudgeon, Andy Darling, E.N. Paucar, and Michael Glascock) in Archaeometry (2019); an article on an experimental study of projectile point reworking (with Chris Loendorf, Thatcher Rogers, Theodore J. Oliver, Brian R. Huttick, and Allen Denoyer) in American Antiquity (2019); an article on Blackwater Village at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (with Chris Loendorf, Craig Fertelmes, David H. DeJong, and Barnaby V. Lewis) in Kiva (2018); an article on the development of prehistoric irrigation studies in Arizona under the National Historic Preservation Act (with Jerry Howard) in the Journal of Arizona Archaeology (2018); an article on reconstructing ancient Hohokam irrigation systems in the Middle Gila River Valley (with Tian Zhu and Maurits Ertsen) in Human Ecology: An Interdisciplinary Journal (2018); a book chapter titled “Preclassic Hohokam” (with Doug Craig) in The Oxford Handbook of Southwest Archaeology (2017); a book entitled The Social Organization of Hohokam Irrigation in the Middle Gila River Valley, Arizona (2016) published as part of the Gila River Indian Community Anthropological Papers series; an article on the formation of irrigated soils in Hohokam canal irrigated fields (with Jon Sandor, Colleen Strawhacker, and Wesley Miles) in Geoarchaeology: An International Journal (2015); a book chapter titled “The Impact of Flooding on Hohokam Canal Irrigation Agriculture” in Traditional Arid Lands Agriculture: Understanding the Past for the Future (edited by Scott Ingram and Robert Hunt, 2015); an article on ritual drinks in the pre-hispanic US Southwest and Mexican Northwest (with Patricia Crow, Jiyan Gu, W. Jeffrey Hurst, Timothy J. Ward, Ardith D. Bravenec, Syed Ali, Laura Kebert, Marlaina Berch, Erin Redman, Patrick D. Lyons, Jamie Merewether, David A. Phillips, and Lori S. Reed) in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (2015); and an article on flaked-stone point design for warfare and big game hunting (with Chris Loendorf, Lynn Simon, Daniel Dybowski, R. Scott Plumlee, Shari Tiedens, and Michael Withrow) in Antiquity (2015).

Kyle will present a lecture entitled, “The Impact of Flooding on Hohokam Irrigation Agriculture.” In this talk, I examine the impact of flooding on Hohokam canal irrigation agriculture, with a focus on the large riverine floodplain of the middle Gila River Valley in south-central Arizona. I examine our assumptions about what we know about floods, their effects on floodplains and canal irrigation agriculture, and the human responses to flood impacts. My objective is to expose the weak points in our chain of reasoning and to identify gaps in our knowledge of floods and flood impacts. I describe why we need to know more about flooding and flood impacts on prehistoric irrigators. I make suggestions about how we can know more about these topics, including re-thinking some of our current concepts and building upon the strongest foundations in future research. Lastly, I describe the signatures of flooding and flood impacts that might occur in the archaeological record and provide examples.

May 13: Dr. Aaron Wright Southwest Archaeology ------------CANCELLED

Topic: "Life of the Gila: The Patayan World

AARON WRIGHT, Ph.D., is a Preservation Archaeologist at Archaeology Southwest. His research is focused on the Hohokam and Patayan traditions across southwestern Arizona. He is specifically interested in the cultural landscape of the lower Gila River, which is renowned for a unique mixture of Patayan and Hohokam settlements, dense galleries of world-class rock art, and numerous enigmatic geoglyphs. Wright is the lead researcher on Archaeology Southwest's long-term goal of establishing a Great Bend of the Gila National Monument. In that effort, Aaron has collaborated on a cultural resource study of the area's significance, as well as a cultural affiliation study outlining the ethnohistory and contemporary tribal connections to this remarkable landscape.

April 8:  Chris Reid   ------------CANCELLED 

Topic : Pearl Hart, The Lady Bandit: Victim or Vixen... or Both?                                                                      Separating fact from fiction is no easy matter regarding flamboyant stage coach robber Pearl Hart.  Many conflicting stories abound thanks, in no small part, to Peal herself.  Using historic photographs and newspaper articles, Reid will follow Pearl's modest beginnings in Canada to her notorious Arizona crime, trial, and questionable release from prison.  Why does a woman who committed a fairly insignificant crime still garner so much interest that even a Broadway show was created to created to highlight her life?  Reid will explore Peal's life as both victim & vixen to help shed some light on an Arizona figure surrounded by mystery.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    March

March 11: Jacob Butler Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Commuity (SRPMIC)

Mr. Butler is from SRPMIC's Cultural Resources Department (CRD ) Community Garden Program.

Topic:     “The SaltRiver Pima Maricopa Indian Community Garden”

The power point will describe what we do and how we work with our people within the SRPMIC, to reintroduce traditional foods through home gardens and garden related activities. I will have some examples of the traditional seeds we are keeping in our seed bank and a few other material examples to show during the presentation. Our garden is a little different from most community gardens. The garden was created and managed by the community and utilized as a venue to promote traditional activities with an emphasis on growing food.

Jacob Butler is a member of the Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Community, he is Onk Akimel O’odham.

Mr. Butler works in many art mediums, ranging from traditional art forms like Paddle and Anvil Pottery and Shell etching to more contemporary forms of expression like Painting and sculpture. Jacob’s most notable works are in Shell and Pottery. His creations represent traditions that have been practiced for time immemorial.

Jacob continuously strives to improve, incorporating new dimensions to his work to create pieces that are contemporary and original, with reflections of the rich cultural heritage of his people.

A few notable projects Jacob has completed are:

• Jacob was selected as an N.M.A.I. artist leadership Program Awardee by the Smithsonian Institution in 2014-2015
• Two clay murals at the Casa Grande National Monument Visitor Orientation Center in partnership with a fellow community artist
• Shell work ornamentation was also commissioned for the Casa Grande Visitor Orientation video and can be seen in the short film
• The Odysea Aquarium in Scottsdale showcases twelve super graphics Jacob created, they were commissioned to reflect the beautiful culture of the community, people and the waters ways we are associated with.
• Currently Jacob is working with the Tonto National Monument on a series of new visitor interpretive videos. Jacob was filmed constructing a paddle and anvil pot, showing how to create ornamentation from shell and will be seen implementing and explaining briefly the agricultural traditions of the ancient southwest.
• In 2018 Jacob was commissioned to create etched shell and traditional tools of the O’odham and their Ancestors for display at Gateway airport in Mesa Arizona
• 2019 Jacob was part of “Team Continuum” three O’odham artist to receive a Water Public Art Challenge prize to install “Waters story” a temporary art installment at the Hayden Flour Mill
• Jacob has designed the exterior of a future Holiday Inn and supplied Graphics for use at the future Great Wolf Lodge in Scottsdale
• Jacob is currently working with the Pueblo Grande Museum on a number of signage and other art projects for the Museum

Jacobs work can be found on display or in collections throughout the southwest, like the inlayed firebird on display at Montezuma’s Castle National Monument. His work has also traveled as far away as Sweden in the Kiva Gallery.

February 12: Monica King Gila River Indian Community (GRIC ) -Huhugam Heritage Center (HHC) Education Curator 

Topic:  Gardening project revitalizes traditional plants for basket weavers" , 'Akimel O'otham Basket Weaving'

January 8 : Wendy Hodgson Herbarium Curator Emerita Senior Research Botanist from the Desert Botanical Garden

Topic: Pre-Columbian Agaves in the Southwest United States:Discovering Lost Crops among the Hohokam and other Arizona Cultures.        Wendy C. Hodgson and Andrew Salywon

Researchers have long recognized the importance of agaves to Mesoamerica and its cultures, the plants providing food, fiber and beverage. However, their significance to these cultures has overshadowed and distorted the plants’ role for indigenous peoples north of the U.S. – Mexico border. Pre-Columbian farmers grew no less than six and possibly as many as eight or more domesticated agaves in Arizona dating to at least A.D. 600. Because of their longevity and primarily asexual reproduction, relict agave clones have persisted in the landscape to the present, providing an opportunity to study pre-Columbian nutrition, trade, migration and agricultural practices. Additionally, the remnant clones present a rare opportunity to examine domesticates virtually unchanged since they were last cultivated within a prehistoric cultural context. DNA sequence data, in addition to plant morphology, suggests that at least three may have originated in Arizona, suggesting this state as a secondary center of domestication. These discoveries underscore the necessity of viewing landscapes and some plant species from a cultural, rather than “natural,” perspective that may help discern potential cryptic species veiled by traditional taxonomic treatments. Understanding these plants and their ecological/cultural roles requires interdisciplinary collaboration between botanists and archaeologists.

Wendy Hodgson is herbarium curator emerita and senior research botanist at the Desert Botanical Garden. She has personally collected some 32,000 of the DBG herbarium’s 92,500 specimens. Initially hired as an illustrator, Wendy first came to the DBG in 1974, with a ASU bachelor’s degree in wildlife biology. Early in her career at the DBG Wendy was encouraged to go out into the field and collect plants for the herbarium. These adventures led to her pursuing and receiving a master’s degree in botany in 1982. Presently she is also an adjunct professor of conservation biology at ASU and has authored “Food Plants of the Sonoran Desert” (2001, University of Arizona Press) which won a Klinger Book Award given by the Society of Economic Botany. More recently in conjunction with fellow curator and researcher Andrew Salywon, she has been instrumental in discovering several new species of domesticated agaves in Arizona cultivated and domesticated by early Native American cultures. Wendy also studies and documents Grand Canyon’s diversity of plants as well as Southwest’s cacti, yuccas and plants important to Sonoran Desert’s indigenous people.

         

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Fall Schedule:  2019 

LAST MEETING OF THE YEAR.   PLEASE TAKE NOTE MEETING LOCATION CHANGED : MEETING TO BE HELD AT FOUNDERS ROOM THE QUEEN CREEK OLD TOWN HALL 22350 S. ELLSWORTH ROAD. STARTS AT 6:30 PM)

December 11:  Dr. Chris Loendorf Senior Project Manager GRIC

Topic: " Rock Art Conservation Efforts in the Gila River Indian Community "

The Gila River Indian Community Cultural Research Management Program (GRIC-CRMP) is actively involved in the protection and management of the many rock art sites within the community. These locations play a role in ongoing traditions and remain culturally significant to members of the modern community. Because of the sacred and sensitive nature of the extensive prehistoric and historic rock images in the community, GRIC-CRMP efforts have focused on the documentation of areas that are undergoing active vandalism and efforts to stop this destruction. This includes recent and extensive cleaning efforts at several large petroglyph sites within the GRIC. As part of this work, GRIC-CRMP has conducted Energy Dispersive X-Ray Florescence Spectroscopy (EDXRF) analyses of rock art both within the community and in other locations. This research includes both documentation of vandalism for conservation efforts, as well as analyses of prehistoric and historic pigments employed to produce pictographs. For example, one study of livestock brand petroglyphs and pictographs in the GRIC documented evidence for previously unrecognized animal husbandry practices, as well as long term continuity in cultural traditions from the prehistoric to the historic periods. Another example is provided by an EDXRF study of pictographs from Picture Cave in Fort Bliss, Texas. This analysis documented variation in pigments that may be associated with different episodes of painting at the site.

 

            Prehistoric petroglyph panel with similar designs (e.g. circles) as historic sheep                                brand rock art found in the same area.

November 13: MOVIE NITE

Topic: Native America - PBS (NOTE: MEETING AT THE QUEEN CREEK LIBRARY. STARTS AT 6:30 PM)

Episode 1 : From Caves to Cosmos

" From Caves to Cosmos focuses on the deep roots of Native America. Who are America's First Peoples and how did they create their unique world? Answers emerge from Hopi Elders on pilgrimage at sacred Chaco Canyon in the New Mexico desert, scientists examining ancient cave painting in the Amazon jungle, Chumash boat builders exploring their tribe's ancient migration legacy off California'a coast, and an archaeologist digging deep below a towering pyramid near Mexico City."

October 9:  Steve Hoza

Topic:  German POW Camp

A Phoenix native, Steve attended Glendale Community College before double-majoring in History and German at ASU. After graduation Steve worked for 4 years as assistant conservator at the Arizona State Archives in the Arizona State Capitol complex. Later he was a curator, exhibit technician and conservator for 13 years at the Arizona Historical Society Museum in Papago Park. For the past 11 years, Steve has worked at the Huhugam Ki Museum as an archivist and paper, photograph, and book conservator. In his spare time he also runs the official website of the Wallace and Ladmo Show, WallaceWatchers.com

September 11:  Jim Britton   

Topic:  Tonto Basin

Jim Britton will give a presentation entitled "Tonto Basin Archaeology".  In 1989 the Bureau of Land Reclamation funded an 8 year archaeology research project in the Tonto Basin.  The research was made necessary by plans to raise Roosevelt Dam 77 feet.  Archaeological sites that might be impacted by the rising waters were to be studied.  Jim will show some detail of four of the sites.  One of the sites is Cline Terrace which the San Tan Chapter is schedule to visit on a field trip in October.

Jim Britton :  Received the AAS Avocational Archaeologist Award In 2016. Joining AAS in 1988, Jim has completed many AAS certification classes. His area of expertise is adobe and lime mortar preservation and stabilization. He organized and presented stabilization workshops during 1997 for the Phoenix chapter. From 1994 to the present day he has coordinated and supervised the monthly mud-slinging at Pueblo Grande Museum with both AAS and SWAT member participation. For the Q Ranch Pueblo Project (1991-2008), he assisted with excavation in the early years and supervised stabilization with Dr. John Hohmann. In 2010-2011, Jim worked as Crew Chief with Dr. Charles Adams on the AAS project for stabilization of Homolovi I and II.  Jim has organized and supervised the on-going stabilization of the Rim Country Chapter’s Risser Ranch Ruin and Goat Camp Ruin projects in Payson. He is also currently coordinating the stabilization and restoration of the Desert Wells Stage Stop in Queen Creek, Arizona.

May 8: Dr. John Welch Professor of Applied Science Simon Fraser University

Former Head of Fort Apache Heritage Foundation

Topic: "Ancient Forts of the Upper Salt River"

John Welch is a social archaeologist with research interests grounded in broad questions about how culture- and place-based communities define, protect, use, and sustain their biophysical and cultural heritage: How do cultural and historical factors influence whether and how we carry forward places, objects, and traditions? How do heritage-related values and preferences influence governance in general and indigenous sovereignty(s) in particular? What lessons about sustainability and other forms of recommended policy and practice emerge from collaborations with indigenous and place-based communities?

Dr. Welch employs community partnerships as the bases for research, training, and outreach initiatives. The diverse collaborations formalize and advance community agendas to explore what archaeology can do—how archaeological sites, methods, perspectives, and data can enhance land and place histories, stewardship practices, indigenous community capacities, and intercultural reconciliation. The ultimate goal of the work is to harmonize local community, academic, and societal interests relating to landscapes, places, objects, and intangible associations that provide people with orientation, identity, and vitality, as well as food, shelter, and other ecosystem services.

Dr. Welch has worked for and with the White Mountain Apache Tribe in Arizona for three decades and continues to serve as an adviser on the protection of sacred sites and the redevelopment of the Fort Apache and Theodore Roosevelt School National Historic Landmark. Dr. Welch is a member of the Steering Committee for the SFU-based Intellectual Property Issues in Cultural Heritage Project. Research and outreach partners in British Columbia include the Tla’amin, Katzie, and Stó:lō First Nations.

Apr 10: Charles "Butch" Farabee Retired National Park Service Superintendent

"Charles R. "Butch" Farabee grew up in Tucson, was very active in Scouting and the out-of-doors, graduated from Tucson High School and then the University of Arizona, in 1965. He has a Bachelor of Science in Zoology and a Master of Arts in Public Administration and is a graduate of the FBI Academy. He spent 3 years with the Tucson Police Department and then 35 years with the National Park Service as a field ranger and then superintendent in 10 different national park areas including, Sequoia, Grand Canyon, Glen Canyon, Lake Mead, Death Valley, Yosemite and Washington, DC. He has had five books published about 'park ranger stuff,' but is mostly just the proud father of two sons and their families. Butch has driven this remote, four-wheel-drive road seven times, and will give us a part-history, part-travelogue, and part-informational overview of this fascinating but humbling area."

Topic: "El Camino Del Diablo, The Devil's Highway"

"Early travelers on El Camino, on foot, horseback, and wagon until the first automobile in 1915, often began in Caborca, Sonora, forty miles south of the border. Leaving this then-frontier village and its permanent little river, they encountered only one more certain source of water between there and the Colorado River. If lucky, however, they could find water further on, standing in a handful of granite and volcanic rock tanks, hidden at the base of nondescript mountains along the next 125 miles. The most important of these life-sustaining pools was the Tinajas Altas. Hundreds of bedrock mortars, as well as numerous petroglyphs, pictographs and related evidence, testify to the long use of this area. Graves, possibly numbering in the hundreds, were once scattered along the El Camino but are now mostly gone, obliterated by time, wind, sand, and often, man. In Arizona, The Devil's Highway, now used mainly by U.S. Border Patrol, traverses Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge, and the Barry M. Goldwater Bombing Range, with little sections of land owned by the State of Arizona and the U. S. Bureau of Land Management, thrown in."

Mar 13: Leslie Aragon - Graduate Student from the University of Arizona

Preservation Fellow of Archaeology Southwest

Leslie D. Aragon is a Preservation Archaeology Fellow at Archaeology Southwest and a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Arizona. She has worked as a professional archaeologist for over 10 years and has experience across the Southwest, the Northeast, and the Near East. Leslie’s primary research interest is looking at long-term dynamic human social networks and group identities through material culture.

Topic: Hohokam Ballcourts

The Hohokam Ballcourt World encompassed much of the middle Gila River watershed from around A.D. 800 to 1100. The widespread ideology that many archaeologists associate with the use of ballcourts correlates with an expression of group identity that manifests itself in the archaeological record as the suite of traits that mark the Hohokam pre-Classic period. Despite the fact that archaeologists commonly define groups based on their material culture, these groups are not static. Parts of identity within them are often fluid, changing with the prevailing socioeconomic tides, while other parts of identity are more persistent. My current research combines several material classes to look at multiple scales of identity during an important period in the Hohokam pre-Classic, when a new religious ideology —the Hohokam Ballcourt World— developed, spread, and eventually declined.

Feb 13: Eric Cox -- Principal Investigator for Northland Resources

Topic: Traditions and Community: Hornos and Communal Feasting among the Hohokam

Mr. Cox joined Northland in November of 2008 after several years of working for another cultural resource management firm in Arizona, and for the San Juan National Forest in Colorado prior to that. Mr. Cox has been doing archaeological work in the American Southwest since 1995 and is a permitted Principal Investigator for the states of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, California and Texas. He has directed numerous archaeological projects in Arizona, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, California, Texas and on the Navajo Nation, The Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community, The Ak-Chin Indian Community, The Tohono O'odham Nation, and The Chemehuevi Indian Reservation. Mr. Cox has served as a Principal Investigator or Project Director for over 200 different archaeological projects including multiple large-scale cultural resources surveys and numerous testing and data recovery projects. Mr. Cox is a member of the Arizona Archaeological Council, the Society for American Archaeology, the Arizona Archaeological and Historical Society and is a past professional advisor for the San Tan chapter of the Arizona Archaeological Society. He is also a Registered Professional Archaeologist and meets the Secretary of the Interior’s Professional Standards for archaeology.

Earth ovens (hornos) have been documented at many sites across the Hohokam region of south-central Arizona. These features were commonly used to cook large amounts of food at public gatherings. They were part of a long-standing tradition of communal feasting that served, among other things, to promote social solidarity. Excavations by Northland Research at two Hohokam village sites in the Phoenix Basin contribute to a fuller understanding of the role of communal feasting in the emergence of the regional ballcourt system. I will examine horno usage at the two sites just before the appearance of ballcourts, ca. A.D. 700-800, and just after, ca. A.D. 800-900. Similarities between Hohokam communal feasting and the living tradition of communal feasting among members of the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community are also discussed.

Jan 9 : Scott Wood -- Archaeologist

Topic: Perry Mesa

"J. Scott Wood worked for Tonto National Forest for 40 years, retiring as Forest Archaeologist in 2015.  During that time he worked extensively with volunters promoting public archaeology and the importance of incorportating citizen scientists in archaeological research.  Scott held found the Arizona Archaeological Council and the Arizona Site Stewards Program Foundation.  Scott continues to pursue research interest in central Arizona through volunteer projects in association with FOTNF, Arizona State Universtity, the Arizona Archaeology Society, including the excavation and interpretive development of Goat Camp Ruin for the Town of Payson which he has been directing for nearly 10 years"        --- source Arizona State Historic Preservation Office

Perry Mesa a Vistor Guide written by Scott Wood National Tonto Forest, 1999

www.archaeologysouthwest.org/pdf/perry_mesa_overview_scott_wood.pdf

The talk is called " Perry Mesa Antecedents Archaeological Survey Project."

Perry Mesa, an hour north of Phoenix, was a densely populated area in the AD 1300s. Today it is a desolate, treeless, and windswept plateau with little to recommend settlement, but at that time it was home to several thousand people. The talk will discuss recent and ongoing work on and around Perry Mesa to determine when people settled up there, where they came from, and what factors may have been in play to draw them to such an unusual landscape.

A large part of the project, a joint professional and volunteer effort by ASU, Friends of the Tonto, Friends of the Agua Fria, and AAS, is focused on the identification and distribution of phyllite tempered Wingfield plain pottery as a temporal marker and locator of potential geographic origins for migrant populations that contributed to the Perry Mesa population boom.

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Fall Schedule:  2018  

December 12:          Dr. Chris Loendorf Senior Project Manager GRIC

THE HOHOKAM TO AKIMEL O’ODHAM CONTINUUM: The Transition from Prehistory to History in Phoenix Basin of Southern Arizona

By the time Spanish missionaries arrived in the 18th century, the middle Gila River was one of the few places in southern Arizona where sedentary irrigation farmers still lived. Agricultural societies were much more widely distributed prior to AD 1500, and the relationship between the prehistoric populations (Hohokam) and the Historic people (Akimel O’odham or Pima) has long been debated. Despite centuries of argument, this issue remains unresolved. However, ethnographic and archaeological research completed in the Gila River Indian Community has provided ample evidence for continuity in cultural practices over time. Although the Akimel O’odham have lived in the Hohokam core area since the first visit by Europeans, their stories about the past have been extensively ignored or misunderstood. While many changes occurred between prehistory and history in southern Arizona, these changes are part of a much longer cycle of episodic variation that is described in Akimel O’odham traditions. The many close parallels between their stories and the archaeological record indicate they are the direct cultural descendants of the Hohokam.

SACATON BASKET MAKERS

Image of Akimel O’Odham (Pima) basket makers that were commissioned from Rob Ciaccio. It is a reconstruction that uses a variety of techniques, and the people in the foreground are members who are all Akimel O’Odham.

November 14:    Dr. Karen Schollmeyer Preservation Archaeologist at Archaeology Southwest -- topic Archaeology and Hunting in Southwest New Mexico    

Karen Schollmeyer grew up in Phoenix, Arizona, and earned her undergraduate degree at Stanford University and her Master’s and Doctoral degrees from Arizona State University. She has worked on archaeological projects in the Peruvian highlands, the Ethiopian desert, and throughout the American Southwest.

Karen’s research interests include zooarchaeology, long-term human-environment interactions, and food security and landscape use. She is also interested in how archaeologists’ long-term insights can be applied to contemporary issues in conservation and development. She has done research and fieldwork (including teaching multiple field schools) in southwest New Mexico for 15 years, and is especially interested in the “edges” of the Mimbres-Mogollon area along the Rio Grande and the Upper Gila.

Archaeology and Hunting in Southwest New Mexico

Karen Gust Schollmeyer, Archaeology Southwest

Understanding how people maintain long-term access to animals for food and other uses is important to archaeology and may also have implications for contemporary societies’ access to animal resources. I examined animal bone data from over 70 archaeological assemblages in the Mimbres area over the centuries from AD 200 to 1450. Although many important animal species were negatively impacted by the altered environments associated with increasing human populations and less frequent movement over time, some species were quite resilient, and many were able to recover during periods of lower human population. Ancient farming strategies in the Southwest helped this recovery in some ways, as do aspects of traditional farming in areas where wild game remains an important food source today.