Page 3 - RAGBRAI2012

THE CHEROKEE SEWER SITE DAY 1 - SIOUX CENTER TO CHEROKEE
The Cherokee Sewer Site (13CK405) and 7000 years ago. Here families
at the south end of the town of Chero- butchered and processed bison—ex-
kee, Iowa, is the oldest extensively tracting the nutritious bone marrow
excavated archaeological site in the and grease—prepared and sewed hides,
state. In the early 1970s, construction of and manufactured bone and stone tools
a new sewage treatment plant prompt- including the weapons used in hunting
ed an investigation which revealed bison ambushed and killed not far from
layered deposits containing a series of the site. Later occupants left behind one
ancient campgrounds within an alluvial of the oldest musical instruments ever
fan in the valley of the Little Sioux River. found in North America, a bone flute
Work conducted by an interdisciplinary made from a swan bone.
team of archaeologists, soil
scientists, geologists, paleon-
tologists, and paleobotanists
demonstrated that small bands
of Native Americans, perhaps
15-30 in a group, camped at
this location between 9500

OCTOBER 12–14—NATIONAL ARCHAEOLOGY “DAY” (UNIVERSITY OF IOWA,
IOWA CITY)

• Public lectures by visiting archaeologists
• Lab and Repository tours at OSA, Museum of Natural History, Departments of Classics

and Anthropology
• Tent exhibit outside Museum of Natural History, atlatl dart throwing, flint-knapping dem-

onstrations, and interactive Native American children’s games.
• Johnson County Historical Society Museum:

»Gilbert’s Trading Post exhibit and presentation on new UI research at the Patterson
Trading Post (Iowa County); local Hurt Artifact Collection display and presentation
on artifact care; tour/open house at Plum Grove; interactive tour of the Oakdale
Cemetery.