Legend Rock exploration

by Amber Geis

More questions than answers. That's what retired archeologist Danny Walker has come up with after excavating an 12 by 12 foot hole last week at Legend Rock Petroglyph Site. The newest exploratory dig is a culmination of decades of research to uncover the puzzle left behind thousands of years ago by early inhabitants.

In 1988, a team from the Wyoming Archeological Office headed by Walker set out in search of artifacts at Legend Rock in order to preserve resources prior to development of the land. They dug a trench 12-14 feet deep beginning at the edge of Cottonwood Creek stretching to the cliff face of the petroglyphs. In this trench they unearthed two small fire hearths, approximately six feet deep. At the time the fire hearths were estimated to be as old as the petroglyphs.

Walker was brought back to Legend Rock in 2007 as the area was being worked for a walking trail to accommodate the increased visitation to the site. What they found in the process was another fire hearth that looked just like the two excavated in 1988. Walker said "The reason we really got excited was because the evidence from one hearth looked like they were processing red ochre to make paint to do pictographs on the walls." This discovery left the team wondering if there was the same evidence in the hearths found in the original trench dug in 1988.

On August 10, Walker returned with a team to Legend Rock once again determined to find out. As they began digging in the 1988 trench, instead of two fire heaths, they found four right in a line. According to Walker, three of the fire hearths were joined together into a basin considered to be significantly large "especially for this site". Containing only charcoal and ochre, the basin showed no evidence of the basin being a living structure. Walker said "There are no flakes. No tools. Nothing."

There is some evidence from another site that some of the petroglyphs have been painted with ochre but have faded out at the public site. Walker said "If they were in here making red pigment, the only reason for doing that is because they were painting something up here, so at one time there were painted pictures as well as depicted".

Ochre contains hematite and when it is roasted it breaks down and is easily crushed into a powder. Once processed, ochre turns to a slimy, red powder making it difficult to transport because once it sticks to something you cannot get it off. The possibility that ochre processed at this site would have been transported to be used elsewhere is unlikely, meaning the pigment was likely used where is was made.

The next step for Walker is carbon dating of the charcoal found in the fire hearths and ochre remnants to determine an approximate age, hopefully securing research grants that will allow for more exploration of the area. There is the possibility that the carbon dating could come back dating the samples to be as old as the samples taken from the cliff face that were dated at 10,500-11,000 years before present.