{"id":14905,"date":"2014-04-22T18:32:55","date_gmt":"2014-04-22T23:32:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/?p=14905"},"modified":"2021-05-14T10:52:00","modified_gmt":"2021-05-14T15:52:00","slug":"riverboat-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/riverboat-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Riverboat Adventure, Part 2 (Original Inhabitants)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Long before Europeans and their descendants tagged the Lower Mississippi River valley with a cornucopia of artificial lines, forming states, and counties, and meridians and so forth, the area already had a remarkable human history. Native Americans left behind laboriously-constructed earthen mounds. Those served a variety of residential, ceremonial and funereal purposes all along the river and across the surrounding terrain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wickliffe Mounds<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Wickliffe<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We stopped first at Wickliffe Mounds near the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. It fell just barely on the Kentucky side of the border (map<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Historical Context<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The Middle Mississippian cultural group that selected this site didn’t choose it accidentally. They clustered on high ground well above the floodplain at the meeting of two mighty rivers. Thus they occupied their bluff from around 1100 to 1350 as noted by artifacts left behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wickliffe never became more than a small village with a few homes clustered around a central plaza. Inhabitants then added a burial mound and a ceremonial site. As noted<\/a> by Kentucky State Parks,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Peaceful farmers, they grew corn and squash, hunted in the neighboring forests and fished the river; they made pottery from shell-tempered clay with elaborate designs and decorations, they participated in a vast trade network up and down the rivers, they had stone, shell and bone tools, they had a complex chiefdom level society, they lived in permanent style houses made of wattle and daub, and they built flat topped platform style mounds.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Exploitation and an Eventual Appreciation<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Indian<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

An amateur archeologist purchased the site in the 1930’s. Then he turned it into a degrading roadside display called “Ancient Buried City.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He disinterred the remains of the original inhabitants from their burial mounds as an attraction for gawking tourists. It took the passage of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act in 1990 to compel the removal of these ancient skeletal remains from public view. Eventually the property passed to Murray State University. Only then did archaeologists conducted a proper archaeological reviews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The State of Kentucky became the next and final owner of the property. Fortunately the state reburied all bodies of original Mound Builders under the supervision of the Chickasaw Nation. However, that didn’t happen until 2011.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state removed every exploitative vestige of Ancient Buried City. Nonetheless, one could always visit the smoke shop and souvenir stand across the street, I suppose, if one were somehow nostalgic for those days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Winterville Mounds<\/h2>\n\n\n\n