The Coolidge examiner., 1930-06-06
EXCAVATINC
At RUINS
(By IRWIN HAYDEN
Continued from last week.

The director Of the museum, the
associate in anthropology and the
curator Of history for the museum,
stood at the edge of the cremation
burial area They were e&pectant
and they did not wait in vain.
The trowel man was industrious.
Soon he grinned the grin which he
affects when he is hot on the trail
os a real find. Happy Jack, the
Horizon Chaser" looked the direc-
tor OF the museum in the eve and
said: Gentlemen. DO you mind if |
laugh ?" The curator of history re
piled that he himself would laugh.
Happy Jack wanted to laugh be
cause he knew he had found a large
vessel. As its form developed from
the surrounding earth. he laughed
in glee; finally he asked if he had
not better photograph it. lie was
advised to dig further. Than the
director of the museum and the as
sociate in anthropology had to
leave; for Happy Jack crowed:
Wow 1t has a raised design!
Hooray." Then he took it from
the earth and held it up and gloat-
ed, until he saw that what be had
was the remains, the relic. of a
very ornate and somewhat used
cuspidor, made of earthenware.
Some little boys had brought it
4ho ovvopipu hofo,.a onJ coma
one had undertaken to plant it /
where the associate in anthrOpol, /
ogy was digging, but he got wise.
Happy Jack enjoyed the lark as
much as any of us.
Desert Is Beautiful
We all live at a hotel and eat in
a restaurant. The result is that we
are spared the inconvenience of
camp life, but we lose the joys of /
camp life. Arizona is especially .
lovely just now in the early morn /
ing. in the evening and in the I
night We get none Of that. There .
is little to inspire anyone in a hotel !
tel or restaurant, but there is in
spiration in the dawn and the close
of day in the desert when the des-
ert is trimmed with mountains and /
buttes as is the desert hereabouts
OF morning the mountains have /
a habit of changing form and po-
sition; the Indians say that the /
mountains are playing around"
wish | knew the Pimas and Papa
gos and their legends Russell of
Harvard studied the Pima and
wrote a book about them, which l
must read one day.
We found the elk antlers over
the fire-pit in House 1, Site ?, and
we wondered whence they came
Those who take the trouble to re-
fer to the proper books will find, l
think, that there are five species of
elk in North America. One of them
if | do not mistake, is, or was, the
swamp elk, very numerous in the
central valley of California. in
early days, | wish l knew just how
near the elk range came to this
central Gila river valley, and what
species OF elk wore the antlers
which we found The question will
sooner or later be answered by able
biologists.
Pottery CoIorful
The cremation burial which was
found yesterday in what we call the
shrine area, contains a number o.
very beautifully carved shells. One
represents, or has on it the repre-
sentation of a horned toad, in low |
relief. Another has on it in low
relief the figure of a man. Other
shells are carved to represent birds /
one of which has its beak thrust
through the body of rattlesnake |
| have never seen or heard of such /
objects as we are finding in these
cremation burials.
The pottery marks the culture as /
an early phase of the canal builder .
culture which occupied the dis |
trict. 1t is red-on-buff, and some
of the sherds. especially those from
the deep layers where wood ashes
are plentiful, are astonishingly bril- /
liant
One of the sherds which | picked |
up has a most life-like pelican, in |
red paint on a buff background; |
there is a bowl, | am told, in the
possession of H. S. Gladwin. of Gila |
Pueblo, near Globe, which has II |
of these pelicans in a border paint |
ed around the inside of the bowl.
This particular bowl is in form an
invered bell, which is an early type
OF pottery in this region.
All of this pottery was made by
women, all of the designs painted /
by them; at least that is the sup
position, based on the practice of /
historical and present tribes.
Dave, the man who navigates our |
scraper for us, called me to see
what he had found in a trench he /
was making through a trash mound I
Trash mounds are trenched and the |
sides of the trenches carefully not |
ed, in case Of stratification. There |
are several ways of trenching them, I
he