Department of Anthropology
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis 14, Minnesota
Number 2, Spring 1962
Elden Johnson, Editor
[5 pages, 1 figure]
In early October of 1960 the University of Minnesota's Department of Anthropology was informed that the construction of a new right of way for State Highway #13 would endanger a group of effigy mounds near Prior Lake. On October 11, 1960, after having talked with the highway department's project engineer, Donald How, the area was visited by the department.
T. H. Lewis described the mounds and located them in the SE 1/4 of Section 3 and the SW 1/4 of Section 2 of T 114, R 22W. This group of five bird effigies and four lineal mounds was between 1-1/2 and 2-1/4 feet high when surveyed by Lewis in 1883. The present owner, the son of the original owner, said that the land had been under almost continuous cultivation since that time. It was found that there is not surface indication as to where the mounds had been originally nor their relationship to the highway right of way. However, the project engineer agreed to call the department when the contractor was ready to remove the topsoil from the area in the spring of 1961.
On April 19, 1961, Mr. How called to say that the Berghius Construction Company of Prinsburg, Minnesota, would begin work on Monday if the weather remained good. Rain and cold weather delayed the start of the project until April 25, when a three man crew from the University dug several test pits in order to examine the subsoil so that when the archaeological crew began stripping operations they would be able to distinguish between the natural soil color and the changes which could have been caused by human activities. It was found that the topsoil extended down to a depth of 24 cm.; below this was a horizon of reddish-yellow sand about 16 cm. thick, which overlaid a light yellow gravel and sand of an undetermined depth.
Prior to the actual excavation, the Department of Anthropology, with the help of Mr. How, secured a set of plans of the new right of way. We were then able
to locate the mounds precisely in relation to the right of way. Using these plans with T. H. Lewis' original field notes, in which all distances and compass bearings were recorded, it was found that only one of the nine mounds would be destroyed by the new highway. This was Mound #5, a bird effigy, which fell in the right of way between stations 777 and 778.
Mound #5 ran roughly NW-SE (the head toward the southeast) and crossed the highway diagonally. The body of the "bird" was 52 feet long and 15 feet wide. The wings, at right angles to the body, were 69 feet long and 12 feet wide (north wing) and 72 feet long and 12 feet wide (south wing). The head of the bird was 18 feet by 15 feet and was roughly elliptical in shape. The body of the bird was straight, but the wings, as in all the bird effigies of this group, were crescent-shaped like the wings of a swallow.
A crew of five men from the University went to the site on May 2 after the topsoil had been removed. The morning was spent scraping the area between the stations in question. A pit was encountered 2.2 meters southwest of station 778 in the area which could have been the head of the bird. Bits of charcoal and a tooth of a young deer were found during the morning's work, though there can be no assurance that the tooth and charcoal were not surface materials which had been disturbed and rediposited [sic] during the stripping of the topsoil. The pit was clearly intrusive but was sterile, and there was no indication of cultural materials having been there and since disappeared. The pit was approximately 1 meter deep as measured from the original ground surface. It was roughly over, being 2 meters long in a NW-SE direction and 1 m., 10 cm. wide in a NE-SW direction. In cross section it was basin-shaped with .80 x .60 m. dimensions at the base. The pit was clearly definable, as the black soil of the pit contrasted with the reddish-yellow subsoil. During the afternoon the Berghius Construction people permitted us to use a road grader and operator form some time to scrape the remaining loose dirt away between the two stations. The area was completely sterile.
Although no cultural material was found, the project accomplished several things. First, it showed that if given advance notice of highway construction projects, the Anthropology Department can make arrangements to inspect the area before work has started. Secondly, it showed that if a site is found, it can be examined with no loss of time to the contractor. Thirdly, the Anthropology Department, the Highway Department and the contractor now know that something of historical interest to the people of Minnesota has not been destroyed through ignorance or lack of interest.
We wish to thank Mr. Donald How, the Minnesota Highway Department, and the Berghius Construction Company of Prinsburg, Minnesota, for their cooperation and generous assistance. We also wish to acknowledge, with gratitude, a special grant of funds from the Graduate School, University of Minnesota, which made this salvage operation possible.
[Figure] Prior Lake Effigy Mound Group as surveyed by T. H. Lewis on August 30, 1883.
[Figure] Mound No. 5 according to the Lewis survey
The annual Department of Anthropology field course in archeological techniques was offered over the five week period beginning July 15 and ending August 20. Fourteen students participated in the excavation of four sites in the northern Red River Valley as a part of the continuing archeological survey of the Glacial Lake Agassiz basin sponsored by the National Science Foundation.
Two small conical mounds excavated at the Boyle site (21 RL 2) two miles south of Dorothy proved to be sterile, though Mound 1 did contain the outline of a shallow, basin-shaped pit.
The Skurdahl site (21 MA 8) was tested and proved to be a late prehistoric Blackduck Focus campsite. The site lies three miles east of Warren and is on the north bank of the Snake River in the valley basin. The site is in the prairie zone, and the faunal remains found were primarily bison.
The majority of time during the field session was spent in excavating the Crookston Mound (21 PL 9) located in the town of Crookston. This mound, located on the south bank of the Red Lake River, was surveyed by Theodore H. Lewis in 1885 and at that time was described as being 120 feet in diameter and 8 feet in height. Lewis noted then that the mound was located in a cultivated field, and it seems certain that the field has been continuously cultivated since that early date. As a result, the mound has been reduced to a barely perceptible knoll. Excavation of the mound fill produced only a single secondary bundle burial, unaccompanied by grave goods. How many more such burials may have been located in the fill and thus destroyed during the 80 years of cultivation is, of course, impossible to say. Fortunately, the major original burials lay in shallow, oval pits dug into the yellow clay subsoil below the original earth surface and below the depth of the modern plow zone. A central burial pit, approximately 15 feet in diameter, was encircled by a series of smaller circular burial pits within a radius of approximately 20 feet from the center of the large pit. The smaller pits contained individual or paired secondary bundle burials without grave goods; the larger central pit contained pats of 16 individuals interred in secondary bundle form. No grave goods were associated with the burials in the central pit. One of the smaller encircling pits contained an articulated skeleton of an adult badger. The mound fill contained Blackduck pottery sherds and projectile points, and preliminary analysis of the mound excavation would indicate that the mound is of Kathio rather than Blackduck origin.
The final few days were spent beginning excavation at the Sather site (21 PL 8), nine miles northeast of Fertile. Students participating included Don Aamadt, Sharon Casper, Tim Fiske, Gary Granzberg, Craig Henrikson, Sue Hood, Gary Hume, Camilla Kotabra, Rita Kroska, Martin Peterson, Creighton Shay, and Anne Weiss. Judy Strupp of Minneapolis, now a graduate student in anthropology at Tulane University, acted as field assistant.
The final two weeks of August and the first three weeks of September were spent in continuing the excavation program in the Glacial Lake Agassiz basin. Excavation centered in the Sheyenne Delta area, east of Lisbon, North Dakota, and at Roseau, Minnesota. The Lisbon excavations were conducted with the generous cooperation of the North Dakota Historical Society and its Superintendent, Russel Reid.
The excavated materials, after the laboratory analysis, will be sent to the Society. The Johnson and Lins Archaic sites at Roseau were mapped and excavations begun. Both the Lisbon area and the Roseau sites will receive further excavation in 1961.
Excavations during the period from June 12 through July 14 will be conducted at the Grand Portage National Monument for the Minnesota Historical Society with the National Park Service. Students will participate in a training and research program. Later in the summer, a third year of excavation in the Glacial Lake Agassiz basin will continue.
A grant of funds from the National Science Foundation will allow Professor Leland Cooper of Hamline University of initiate a program of archeological research in northwestern Wisconsin and northeastern Minnesota this summer. Professor Cooper will begin work on Madelaine Island June 15 with a crew composed of Hamline students. Wilda Anderson and Dean Snow of this department will assist in the excavation.
An archeological permit has been issued to Dr. E. W. Davis of Silver Bay, Minnesota, for underwater archeological explorations at Grand Portage and along historic fur trade routes in northern Minnesota. Dr. Davis and his divers will work in cooperation with the Minnesota Historical Society and will concentrate their efforts toward locating evidences of French, English, and American fur trade activities.
The Society is an organization of individuals with an interest in the archeology, ethnology, and history of Minnesota. Their publication, the Minnesota Archaeologist, is issued quarterly to members of the society, and meetings are held monthly during the period of September through May. Recent issues of the Archaeologist have dealt with the peyote cult among the Ojibwa of Minnesota and Ojibwa Mide Cambria Focus mounds. It is hoped that many readers of this Newsletter will be interested in joining the Society. This will strengthen its membership and help assure continuation of its programs and publications. The membership form below can be clipped and sent directly to the Society.
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