http://www.seguinpaleosite1.com/

Hay there Rick!

I will be sure to put it on the front page for them later this month as well!

Please send that sort of information to me ! I hate when I am missing a event !!!

****Normally don't let ads in here like it says up there in da' rules.... This one I will let pass though because its you !!

Thanks!
Michelle

I am still unable to convert that garble into a readable message but I got the hang of it
from the event listing info. . . .

I hope this is NOT taken as an AD. . . .but.......

Sumpin REALLY big is going on. . . . .
Digger Teresa at digfest showed me the SATURDAY edition of the Waco newspaper. 3/4 of the entire front page was devoted to a new realse of the find of
a paleo cache found at the GAULT SITE. I couldn't read it all and didn't want to get it dirty,
They discovered. . .

60 or 600 OR 6,000 pieces { I cant remember how many }.
When I drove through Belton Sunday afternoon, The main street [ Rt 317 ] the light poles were festooned with museum signs saying " GAULT SITE FINDS "

Anybody got the scoop ? [ Or an extra paper ? ]

Hal,
Don't know if this is the article,but it mentions 600,000 clovis era artifacts...copy/paste in address bar

http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2009/10/10/10102009wacgault.html?imw=Y

I grew up around florence and the gault site, know a few people who dug there back in the day. Its always the same in the stories. Pot hole diggers and so on destro*** the top layer of the mound and mr collins came and saved the clovis layer before it could be dug. The archeologists wouldn't even know the gault site existed if it werent for the real men who put the work in too find the clovis points to begin with. That site is amazing and should be saved simply because it is so special and one of a kind. Otherwise its just a trash pit. And the professionals should stick too studying the boxes and boxes of artifacts they already have. Another million stored away for the few to look at. They should be thankful that the treasure looters put the time in too find sites like this for them to high-grade.

Thats it RH. I Googled and did not get the full 600,000 story but a 3 piece cache WAS found just Oct 1st.
Looks like the whole surrounding area communities are promoting the merits of the site.

As stupid as it sounds, just the simple way you laid out the instructions for garble converting made sense
to me, I understand the process now.

All I need now is to find out now is how to turn the words blue !

this site sits on a high bank overlooking the guadalupe river .. i dug with the university there last year quite a experience ... even screened with ellen sue turner .. we sorted all sorts of stuff .. we set up grids . located and used gps to plot locations of what was found .. weighed very snail , piece of flint and bone it was awesome ..

the site was found when the owners dug dirt from there back yard to fill holes in there yard after a rain they saw numerous points in there yard and explored further and found not only was this a indian encampment for years but a old slave plantation also .. pottery , parts to guns, tokens and other misc items were found there ..

after discovering this they took there property off the market and have been conducting digs there for educational purposes ..

they have been contacted by numerous people to lease there land for digging but they did not want to do that..

last years excavation got rained out maybe this year will be better .... i wont be able to attend due to inventory at work ...

RH. . . . I HAVE DONE IT !!!!!!!!!
Mlle was kind enough to tell me how to turn the letters blue, then followed through with your instructions.

Very interesting article. Maybe there is an upwelling of interest that will help
financially and indeed make proper tours routine.
The article did not specifically mention the 3 piece cache that included an inscribed stone. [ Google " GAULT SITE CACHE "] Found just this past OCT 1st.
Their talking the oldest Paleolithic artwork in the new world, , , 14,500 BP

I love that kind of talk

Lee, beautiful frame without words. . . are you indicating they are from the Gault site
before the paydigs stopped ?

Now, just like the picture posting, I'll have to see if I remember how to copy N paste come the morn !

hope everyone enjo*** the pics of the seguin site i posted wanted to share

nope Hal all of seguin mckee site old plantation and indian encampment lots of paleo also found occupied for quite awhile
just one frame of quite a few points found i saw about 10 plus others with alot of paleo and they have only scratched the surface

Scus me Lee, I created that last message while you & RH were actually sending YOURS.

Lee, those are excellent pics to follow up on the flint frame and a good report, thanks a lot.

Nate, Tks for your additional trouble but as you see . . . I DID IT !

Here's my random shots from the open house at the Mckee site



Latest working area is under the shade pavilion, old original digs & test trench in backround.



Little closer, squares are taken down 10 centimeters at a time



A piece of history and a metal detectors dream. The original blacksmiths shop on the property.
Finds are in the squares where they were found.
all very shallow



Long as your there, stop in the city museum where there are two cases full of ste finds before the
present scientific work started.



It's being described as a very rich and important site. Very intersting to see.
From an amature tourists point of view I was very impressed with two major observations.

1. The site location is absolutly non descript. No rock shelter near, no major creek intersection, certainly no " mound ". It's just plain
waterfront property.

2.There is very very little actual dug area for all the hundreds of complete arifacts already found.
They may as well build an air conditioned, acre square garage ove the area along with dorms..
They might be there for the next 200 years !

G-town Digger:

The Gault site was dug (a trench) ca 1929 by UT, under a little grant Prof. Pearce had. Then, for
the next several decades, landowners day-leased the
site for digging. Even folks who are now well known
archaeologists once dug in Gault when they were in their teens. I first visited the site, when Elmer
Lindsay was day-leasing, and all I could see in the
field was churned up burned rock, and a guy from Louisiana digging in it.

No professional archaeologist ever interfered with
the landowners at the Gault site. Like the SW Edwards Plateau pay-digs these days, it was on
private property.

In 1991, a collector from Temple contacted Pete
Bostrom, the well known archaeological photographer in Illinois. Pete later called me at UT and said
this fellow wanted him to tell me about Clovis points and engraved cobbles he and friends found at the site.
So, Dr. Michael Collins and I drove up to Temple one
day, met with this very nice guy, and also with a number of friends, who went to the trouble to gather
up all their Gault stuff, and then lay it out for us
to examine...Paleo and Archaic, etc.

We then made arrangements with Mr. Lindsay to go to the site with the Temple collector, so that he could show us precisely where he had found the Clovis materials. Nobody made him do this; nobody made Mr.
Lindsay let us in. Indeed, while Collins and I were
waiting on these folks, we were sitting atop the backdirt pile from the Temple folks' diggings, and
picked up a half dozen or more of the Clovis engraved
stones that had been discarded and then washed off by recent rains!

Anyway, based on the spot he showed us, we raised some private funds and took a small group of UT
staff, students, and amateur archaeologists out there
for a week or so. And we found the Clovis zone just
where our informant told us it would be.

Between 1991-1997, there was no further work by professionals at Gault. Then, Mike and I were contacted by a part of the Lindsay family who had
bought/inherited most of the site, and who controlled
it. They invited us out to see some Clovis materials
they had found. It was impressive..from an in situ
juvenile mammoth jaw, and around the pit they had dug
more Clovis blades than had ever been found before in
North America. The two Lindsays offered the site for
professional excavation, no day-lease fees like Elmer
charged, and in 97-98, I was able to get a small grant from UT, so that Collins and I could start work at the site. To me, it was, and is, Collins' site, in terms of the Clovis work. That's his specialty
not mine! And in 2000, when I decided to take early
retirement and get the hell out of Austin, Mike continued and greatly expanded the excavations. What they have found, in conjunction with other field schools from A&M, and from out of state, have been
amazing...and this continues. Recently, Texas State
University made Mike and his staff an offer they couldn't refuse...and the Gault Project is moving there at present. The UT artifacts will be loaned to them for continuing analysis.

A few years ago, Collins, on his own, purchased much of the Clovis area of the site from the Lindsays. He
then donated it to the Archaeological Conservancy for
perpetual preservation -- and continuance of the
scientific work. It is still astounding to me that
there is such a huge area of Clovis at Gault, and it
is clearly the most important Clovis campsite in North America.

Sorry to ramble on so long, but I just wanted you to know that the professionals relationship with the landowners, with the collectors, with the Lindsays,
was always very smooth. We respected their landowner
rights and they made all sorts of things happen. The recent owners were delighted to have Collins buy the
Clovis acres, and Collins used his own personal savings to buy the site -- and then donate it to the
Archaeological Conservancy.

I think it is a good model of how archaeology ought to work. Mutual respect and cooperation, respecting
each others views, etc. It doesn't mean that the professionals like the techniques used by some collectors, and the collectors always think we dig
too slow and hoard the materials away from the public!
We probably do both sometimes,but the latter is because of no exhibition space and no funds for long term major exhibits. Mike and his staff have given many public lectures and demos of the artifacts across central Texas.

Tom Hester

Thanks for the details Tom. Inscribed Paleo just discarded, Wow.
Are you involved with the Mckee site at all?

The amature digger vs scientific digger will never be settled in my lifetime. I really feel a workable
plan is at least 40 years too late to rectify completly now. If for no other reason than there is little "stimulous" money while the more worthy goal of "cash for clunkers " is still around.

My MINIMUM suggestion is also 40 years too late. . .When a gas station is being built over a 5000 year old settlement, just install a brass plaque like the historical markers, just to let the kids waiting for the school bus there realise the history in their area.

I would certainly not suggest they destroy the McKee site as a pay dig BUT for land owners that ARE going to pursure the pay dig. . . wouldn't it benefit all parties to allow the professionals to be assigned a good area on a paydig site. Both factions could work at the same time in their own assigned areas. As the McKee site sits today, thats an excellent example.

There ARE avenues we are already 100% in accord with, Oh how I wish I had been wise enough to side with
the people more knowlegeable about these things than myself and "GET THE HELL OUT OF AUSTIN"

im at a loss here , too much reading for me lol . ok i was in seguin on sat before the advertised dig on sun , but i had to pull a house from that factory there on hwy 46 on sat and get it back to lubbock , so i didnt get to check it out , BUT we are going to be pulling more houses from there now so ill be in seguin often , someone tell me in trucker language , Is there going to be a pay dig site in seguin lol ?