Before Highway Realignment, Investigations Reveal an Important Archaeological Site

Before Highway Realignment, Investigations Reveal an Important Archaeological Site
A large, extensive network of Native American ruins was recently discovered just outside Durango on top of Florida Mesa, and it’s kind of blowing archaeologists’ minds. “As an archaeologist with 30-plus years’ experience, I’m really excited by it,” said Dan Jepson, a cultural resource manager for the Colorado Department of Transportation. “This research is a wonderful opportunity.” Since beginning last fall, archaeological digs have turned up a vast expanse of ruins left behind from Native Americans who inhabited Durango around the year 800. Slowly, vast ceremonial sites, large pit houses and living quarters have been unearthed for the first time in hundreds of years. http://bit.ly/2U6C5AK – The Journal

Management Plan Opens Former National Monument Lands to Extraction
Hundreds of thousands of acres inside what used to be Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument will be opened to mining and drilling under a plan the Bureau of Land Management released Friday, renewing charges that President Donald Trump’s executive action reducing the 23-year-old preserve was engineered to promote energy extraction in some of America’s most scenic landscapes. http://bit.ly/2ZzAlku – Salt Lake Tribune

Commentary: Conservation Groups Decry Management Plan
Today, local and national groups, businesses and globally-respected scientist organizations, denounced the Department of the Interior’s (DOI) release of management plans for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument as another step toward undermining protections for Americans’ national monuments and other protected public lands. This reckless plan doesn’t protect Grand Staircase-Escalante or the businesses that depend on it, and sets an unacceptable precedent for national monuments across the country. Our irreplaceable public lands are the envy of the world, and the law requires that they be managed on behalf of all Americans. http://bit.ly/2ZtyZrr – Monuments for All

Continuing Coverage: Decision-Making at the Bureau of Land Management
A review team is consolidating major Bureau of Land Management decision-making at Interior headquarters in Washington at a time when department officials are saying public lands decisions should be made in the West, according to former BLM officials. Interior says it is moving BLM headquarters to Grand Junction, Colo., beginning in mid-September so that officials making decisions about federal lands, oil, gas, and coal can be close to the people and places those decisions affect. But the opposite is happening, said a former high-level BLM official who left the agency during the Trump administration and spoke on condition of anonymity. The new review team represents a consolidation of decision-making in Washington partly as a way to expedite decisions that implement the Trump administration’s agenda, the former official said. http://bit.ly/2L1hpXI – Bloomberg Environment

Commentary: BLM Move Is a Pretext
Moving BLM will similarly rob that department of institutional memory and weaken its ability to work with Congress and other agencies — which, in fact, may be the point for the Machiavellians in Trump’s White House who want to cede public lands that we, as Americans, all own to states and local governments anxious to turn it over to developers and extractive industries. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt recently appointed William Perry Pendley, who through the conservative Mountain States Legal Foundation has pushed for the federal government to turn public lands over to states, as acting BLM director. The petroglyph on the wall couldn’t be clearer. https://lat.ms/2ZxnSO4 – Los Angeles Times Editorial Board

PBS News Hour Reports on the Debate over Public Lands
A recent study published in the journal “Science” found that the Trump administration is responsible for the largest reduction of federally protected land in U.S. history. President Trump has moved to shrink national monuments such as Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante in Utah. Jeffrey Brown has a story of a fight over land in Central Montana. It’s about the tension between conservation and development and what it could mean for the future of all of America’s public lands. It’s part of our regular segment on the Leading Edge of science. https://to.pbs.org/2L11zMJ – PBS News Hour

Public Archaeology and Tribal Consultation in Colorado Springs
Cordova is part of the Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Resources office, tasked with managing the historical finds in 32 Colorado Springs parks — an area of almost 5,000 acres. She’s had the job since 2016, and has done everything from discovering General William Jackson Palmer’s trash pile to teaching kids. She’s also in charge of tribal consultations, the federally mandated process of informing Native American tribes whose ancestors were present in areas where construction is happening. She is working to create a better relationship between the city and the two Ute tribes with reservations in Colorado. Her work is set against the backdrop of a long history of theft of tribal artifacts by archeologists. http://bit.ly/2Zy3Enz – Colorado Sun

Video: Field School Crews from Fort Lewis College Learn from Vandalized Site
In the summer of 2019, FLC students led by Professor Jesse Tune excavated a severely damaged rock shelter in western Colorado at the request of the Colorado BLM. Through such work, FLC not only expands understanding of ancient peoples but helps highlight the extent of looting in the Four Corners region. FLC students gain invaluable hands-on experience from field schools. https://youtu.be/1MRSpKRf6FA – Fort Lewis College (opens at YouTube)

Help Utah’s Public Archaeologist by Taking This Survey
Public archaeology – archaeology education and outreach performed for the benefit of the public – is a core value of archaeology and Utah Public Archaeology Network (UtahPAN) seeks to expand public archaeology opportunities within the state. With the inception of UtahPAN, Utah’s Division of State History would like to know what needs exist for public archaeology. This survey will take no more than 5 minutes of your time and will provide invaluable feedback for designing the future of UtahPAN. Thank you! http://bit.ly/2UbWLao – Utah Division of State History

Podcast: Anthropology of the U.S.–Mexico Border
On today’s episode Jessica hosts Dr. Jason De León, professor of Anthropology and Chicana/o Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. De León talks about how he found himself at a crossroads with traditional archaeology and completely changed his career to better match his values. We discuss his work with the Undocumented Migration Project, conducting archaeological, ethnographic, and forensic anthropology methods to better understand the U.S.-Mexico border, as well as his Hostile Terrain exhibition. We talk about the complicated ethics involved, civil disobedience in the face of injustice, representation, and what we can all do in the face of this structural violence. A fascinating look into how to use anthropology to address current issues in a new way. http://bit.ly/2ZAKq0p – Heritage Voices

Funding Opportunity, Canyonlands Natural History Association
The Discovery Pool program of Canyonlands Natural History Association (CNHA) encourages research partnerships between qualified scientists and our Federal NPS, BLM, and USFS partners in Southeast Utah and Southwestern Colorado. Projects are selected that contribute to agency interpretive and educational programs, including archaeology and ethnography. Stipends of up to $25,000 are competitively awarded each year. Application deadline is November 15, 2019. Forms and instructions available at CNHA website. http://www.cnha.org

Lecture Opportunity, Santa Fe NM
Southwest Seminars Presents Dr. Eric Blinman, Archaeologist and Director, Office of Archaeological Studies, Center for New Mexico Archaeology, Museum of New Mexico, Department of Cultural Affairs; Researcher in Paleo-Climate studies, Archaeomagnetic dating, Pueblo social history, Pottery and Textiles; Presenter, 2007 Greenland World Colloquium on Human Adaptation Strategies, who will give a lecture “Pueblos of the Galisteo Basin Across the Threshold of Spanish Colonization” on September 2 at 6:00 p.m. at Santa Fe Woman’s Club, 1616 Old Pecos Trail as part of the annual Native Culture Matters Lecture Series. Admission is by subscription or $15 at the door. No reservations are necessary. Refreshments are served. Seating is limited. Contact Connie Eichstaedt at 505 466-2775; email: southwestseminar@aol.com; website: southwestseminars.org

Lecture Opportunity, Winslow AZ
On September 11, at 7:00 p.m., the Homolovi Chapter of AAS welcomes Dr. E. Charles Adams, speaking on “The Origins of the Katsinas.” In 2019 Adams celebrates 50 years as an archaeologist in the Four Corners region; this talk is an update on his research and how his work in the Homol’ovi/Chevelon pueblos contributed to new understandings. Winslow Chamber of Commerce Visitor Center (Historic Lorenzo Hubbell Trading Post), 523 W. Second St.

Lecture Opportunity, Cave Creek AZ
On September 12 at 7:00 p.m., the Desert Foothills Chapter of the Arizona Archaeological Society will host Arron Wright, who will present “A Renewed Study of a Patayan Walk-In Well on the Ranegras Plain in Far-Western Arizona.” The Patayan cultural tradition is one of the least understood archaeological constructs in the Greater Southwest. While recognized nearly 90 years ago as a distinct assemblage of material culture traits centered on the lower Colorado River, research has always been hampered by poor chronological control. Few Patayan archaeological sites have been excavated, and of those even fewer have yielded contexts amenable to absolute dating (i.e., radiocarbon or archaeomagnetic). A dearth of stratified contexts compounds the problem. Community Building (Maitland Hall) at The Good Shepherd of the Hills Episcopal Church, 6502 East Cave Creek Road. https://www.azarchsoc.org/DesertFoothills/

Lecture Opportunity, Albuquerque NM
The University of New Mexico’s Maxwell Museum of Anthropology hosts “Chocolate in Chaco,” a lecture and fund-raising reception featuring anthropologist Patricia L. Crown on Friday, September 27, from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. Crown uncovered the first evidence of chocolate consumption in North America—north of Mexico—in 2009 and her research has received national and international attention. Crown and colleague Jeffery Hurst—at the time a senior chemist for the Hershey Company—have analyzed the identified chemical signature of cacao in three sherds of distinctive cylinder jars from Chaco Canyon, expanding knowledge of trade relationships between Mesoamerica and the US Southwest. The lecture is free and open to the public. The lecture will be followed by a fund-raising reception with Crown at the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology. The reception will feature cacao elixirs, wine and chocolate. Tickets are $40. http://bit.ly/2L29BVH – University of New Mexico Newsroom

Editors’ note: As we went to press, we learned that archaeologist Bernhart “Boma” Johnson passed away on August 23.

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Questions? sat-editor@archaeologysouthwest.org