Dear Friends,
Today let’s start with two short words that rhyme and two consecutive numbers. Chaco and Naco. 10 and 11.
Chaco—actually the Greater Chaco Cultural Landscape—is threatened by oil and gas extraction. I sincerely hope that you will take two actions as soon as possible. First, watch the powerful short film we released on Monday. Second, please tell the Bureau of Land Management and the Department of the Interior that you support a 10-mile protection zone around Chaco Culture National Historical Park. (Resources for commenting are here and here.)
By now, most of you have heard about the need for a 10-mile protection zone around Chaco. But have you heard about Naco? (Archaeologists, you are correct that Naco is important in the pantheon of places that have revealed Clovis points in association with extinct megafauna.)
Camp Naco is in southeastern Arizona just 600 yards south of those Paleoindian sites in Greenbush Draw, and just 600 yards north of the international border.
This morning, the National Trust for Historic Preservation listed Camp Naco as one of the 11 Most Endangered Historic Places in the United States.
Take a look at my blog post that sketches Archaeology Southwest’s two decades of advocacy to help save Camp Naco. Archaeology Southwest manages online donations for the Naco Heritage Alliance, a small nonprofit that partners directly with the City of Bisbee, which owns Camp Naco. Archaeology Southwest ensures that 100 percent of every donation goes directly to the Camp Naco preservation effort.
I hope you’ll consider making a donation to support this incredible opportunity to protect a place that embodies African American military history—that of the Buffalo Soldiers.
Thank you,
President & CEO, Archaeology Southwest
Short Documentary: Protecting Chaco’s 10-Mile Zone
The threat of oil and gas drilling continues to loom over Chaco Canyon, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and ancestral home to Pueblo and Navajo peoples. Tribal communities have fought for decades to protect the Greater Chaco Landscape and its cultural resources and to safeguard the health of their families from nearby drilling. At the start of 2022, the Department of the Interior initiated a process to withdraw roughly 351,000 acres of federal lands and minerals surrounding Chaco Culture National Historical Park from future oil and gas leasing for a period of 20 years. Now, the Bureau of Land Management is accepting public comments on the withdrawal until May 6, 2022. Leaders and representatives from the Acoma Pueblo, Hopi Tribe, Navajo Nation, Santa Clara Pueblo, Tesuque Pueblo, and Zuni Pueblo, who are featured in this film, underscore the broad support for the Biden administration to protect Chaco by finalizing its proposal to withdraw federal lands surrounding Chaco from oil and gas leasing. Archaeology Southwest | Watch Now and Share >>
Commentary: Buffer Zone Is Necessary for Tribal Communities
The Greater Chaco region in northwest New Mexico is unlike anywhere else on Earth. As a special gathering place where our ancestors once shared their ceremonies, traditions and knowledge, Chaco is truly irreplaceable. In our Hopi language, Chaco is known as Yupp’koii’ vii, translated as “the place beyond the mountains.” Many Hopi clans journeyed through Chaco and we still perform ceremonies that came from our time in Chaco. Sadly, over the years, oil and gas companies have leased more than 90% of federal lands surrounding Chaco Canyon for—some 2,800 square miles—and companies have built more than 37,000 wells on the landscape. Clark Tenakhongva in the Arizona Republic (azcentral) | Read More >>
Discover America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places for 2022
With its wide range of cultures, histories, and geographies, the 2022 list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places illustrates the expansiveness of our country’s history and helps tell the full American story. But many of the sites on this year’s list also reflect communities that have been historically underrepresented in what we collectively preserve and interpret, which means society has often devalued or deemphasized the places connected to those stories. And without sustained recognition, preservation, interpretation, and funding, places like these are often at greater risk of loss and erasure—losses that would diminish us all. … Representing the multi-layered and complicated history of the American Southwest, Camp Naco, Arizona, is a touchstone for the history of Buffalo Soldiers and the contributions of Black regiments who served in the then-segregated Army in the years following the Civil War, specifically in the western United States. National Trust for Historic Preservation | Read More >>
“This is our library”
Australia’s First Nations people have been saying, quite clearly, repeatedly, and for some time, that they do have archives. For many reasons, colonial archives have not been welcoming or accessible to many Indigenous people (although they are now being reclaimed and repatriated by Indigenous communities). But First Nations people have their own vast repositories of knowledge of the past, if only more historians cared to listen and understand them as such. One such record is rock art. Laura Rademaker, Gabriel Maralngurra, Joakim Goldhahn, Kenneth Mangiru, Paul S.C. Taçon, and Sally K. May in SAPIENS and The Conversation | Read More >>
Video: O’odham Language Preservation and Revitalization
What happens when your language is in critical danger of dying out? This is true for the majority of Indigenous tribal languages in the United States. Meet Ofelia Zepeda, a UA linguistics professor who has spent her life’s work preserving the Tohono O’odham language. She, along with two parents, share their efforts to preserve this important heritage for future generations. Arizona Public Media | Watch Now >>
Podcast: SAPIENS Talk Back—A Companion to Season 4 of the SAPIENS Podcast
The Archaeology Centers Coalition and RadioCIAMS present “SAPIENS Talks Back”: eight conversations with students and scholars that expand upon the insights of Season 4 of the SAPIENS podcast entitled “Our Past is the Future.” In extended discussions released every two weeks, we explore new perspectives on how Black and Indigenous voices are changing how archaeology tells its stories, and just as importantly, who tells them. RadioCIAMS | Listen Now >>
May Subscription Lectures (In-Person, Santa Fe)
May 9, Matthew Barbour, Native American Conquistadors: Mesoamerican Conquest of the New World. May 16, Harriet “Rae” Beaubien, Surprising Finds from a Classic Maya Site: Recovery and Rediscovery. May 23, Linda A. Brown, Dream Bundles: Cultural Preservation & Contemporary Maya Ritual Practitioners. May 30, Steven H. Lekson, Azteques, Cliff-Dwellers, Anasazi, Ancestral Pueblo…What’s in a Name? Southwest Seminars | Learn More >>
May 5 and 11: Hands-On Archaeology at Sabino Canyon
Through a partnership agreement with Archaeology Southwest to improve public outreach and interpretation of cultural resources, Coronado National Forest is proud to offer a series of public presentations that will explore the significance and sensitivity of cultural resources, including archaeological and historical sites and artifacts in scenic Sabino Canyon. Allen Denoyer is the Ancient Technologies Expert for Archaeology Southwest’s Hands-On Archaeology program. His work reveals how replicating ancient technologies helps us meaningfully connect with the past. Visitors will have opportunities to actively engage with ancient tools and techniques, gaining insight into how people survived and thrived in the landscapes of the Southwest. Coronado National Forest and Archaeology Southwest | Learn More >>
REMINDER: May 4 Webinar: Lost Oasis: The Ice Age Archaeology of Utah’s Western Desert
With Daron Duke. 12,000 years ago, the most desolate place in the United States—the Great Salt Lake Desert–was quite the contrary. Vast wetlands drew Utah’s first inhabitants, gave refuge to its last Ice Age megafauna, and anchored a key waterfowl flyway. From the largest spear points on the continent to the earliest evidence for tobacco use, archaeologists can now highlight the unique contribution of this place to the story of human settlement of the Americas. Utah State Historic Preservation Office | More Information and Registration >>
REMINDER: May 5 Webinar: Lunar Twins: Cahokia’s Emerald Acropolis and Chaco’s Chimney Rock in the 11th Century
With Timothy Pauketat. Lunar alignments characterize a series of 9th through 12th century North American Indigenous civilizations. Ancestral Puebloans, Caddos, and Cahokians were involved, among others, hinting at a thick continent-wide history if not also a series of long-distance communications. In this talk, Dr. Pauketat will focus on comparing two Cahokian lunar shrine complexes in Illinois—Pfeffer and the Emerald Acropolis—to Chimney Rock in Colorado. Both Cahokian examples have been the focus of salvage archaeological investigations in recent years, pointing to some surprising similarities with Chimney Rock. What explains these widely separated, intensive 11th century ceremonial constructions atop remote elevated landforms? Crow Canyon Archaeological Center | More Information and Zoom Registration >>
REMINDER: May 7 Event (In-Person, Blanding UT): Archaeology Day
Pottery making, weaving, flintknapping, basket making, wood carving, atlatl throwing, and other hands-on activities. Edge of the Cedars State Park Museum | Learn More >>
REMINDER: May 10 Webinar: Mapping Yaqui History
With Anabel Galindo. Dr. Galindo explores Yaqui mobility from the Spanish colonial period to the early 20th century in a theoretical framework emphasizing the importance of moving away from misconstrued notions about Indigenous peoples and their histories. Indigenous Interests series (Old Pueblo Archaeology Center) | More Information and Zoom Registration >>
REMINDER: May 11 Webinar (and In-Person, Durango CO): Ancient Basketry Shields of the Northern Southwest
With Edward Jolie. Indigenous American shield-making traditions are best attested among the peoples of the Plains and Southwest cultural provinces where shields were used in martial and ceremonial contexts. In these regions, shields are frequently represented in images cross cutting a range of visual media including rock and mural paintings, and pictographs and petroglyphs, some of which exhibit considerable antiquity. Actual shields, however, are almost unknown archaeologically. This presentation discusses new data resulting from the analysis of the five known coiled basketry shields recovered from archaeological sites in the northern Southwest. San Juan Basin Archaeological Society | More Information and Zoom Link >>
May 12 Webinar: Dog Life and Death in an Ancestral Pueblo Landscape
With Victoria Monagle. In this study, Victoria uses a framework incorporating Indigenous beliefs alongside paleopathological analysis of the 5MTUMR 2347 canids to make a link between the role of dogs in past and present Puebloan populations. Variation in the life histories of dogs despite similar burial contexts suggests dogs filled multiple roles during their lives. Crow Canyon Archaeological Center and Four Corners Lecture Series | More Information and Zoom Registration >>
May 19 Webinar: The Point Great House
With Linda Wheelbarger. The Point Great House sits on an isolated terrace directly above the San Juan River and at the base of the Shannon Bluffs overlooking the city of Farmington with La Plata Mountains in the distance. The site is on property owned by B-Square Ranch owner and manager Tommy Bolack. San Juan College archaeological field school excavations have been conducted at the site since 2006. Those efforts have revealed occupation dating to the entire sequence of Ancestral Puebloan occupation of the Four Corners. Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, Four Corners Lecture Series, and Colorado Archaeological Society, Hisatsinom Chapter | More Information and Zoom Registration >>
Video Channel Roundup
Find out which webinars and videos you missed and get caught up at the YouTube channels of our partners and friends:
Amerind Foundation
Archaeology Southwest
Arizona Archaeological and Historical Society
Arizona State Museum
Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA
Crow Canyon Archaeological Center
Grand Canyon Trust
Grand Staircase Escalante Partners
Mesa Prieta Petroglyphs Project
Museum of Indian Arts and Cultures
Museum of Northern Arizona
Old Pueblo Archaeology Center
School for Advanced Research
The Archaeological Conservancy
Remember to send us notice of upcoming webinars and Zoom lectures, tours and workshops, and anything else you’d like to share with the friends.