Page 6 - ImmenseJourney

Prehistoric Sampler

The Loess Hills National Scenic Byway follows called the Loess Hills home. Transportation corridors The area’s prehistoric archaeology includes over
the Missouri valley traversing some 220 miles over land and along waterways, breath- 1,500 known sites found across seven counties and
from Plymouth County in the north to Fremont taking vistas, diverse biological com- spanning more than 12,000 years of human history.
County in the south. As a boundary region between munities, narrow canyons, well-drained Highlights include the earliest stone weapons lost or
the short grass plains and tall grass prairies and po- slopes, springs, and rich agricultural soil discarded by Paleoindian hunters, the oldest known
sitioned along a major interior river corridor, the re- explain why people have been coming Native American cemetery in Iowa, multitudes of late
gion is a place of deep history and rich archaeology. to the region for as long as humans have prehistoric agricultural communities, and the ephem-
Since the end of the last great Ice Age, people have inhabited North America. eral settlements of displaced tribes. It is the late pre-

Excavation of the Turin site, Monona County, Iowa’s
oldest known cemetery.

4 University of Iowa Office of the State Archaeologist