The Memorial Park Site (designated
36CN164) is an
archaeological site located near the confluence of
Bald Eagle Creek and the
West Branch Susquehanna River in
Lock Haven in the
U.S. state of
Pennsylvania.
Research projects conducted at the site since 1979 have found prehistoric cultural deposits that collectively span 8,000 years.
Stratified
Stratification may refer to:
Mathematics
* Stratification (mathematics), any consistent assignment of numbers to predicate symbols
* Data stratification in statistics
Earth sciences
* Stable and unstable stratification
* Stratification, or st ...
in age-related sequence, the deposits represent every major prehistoric period from the
Middle Archaic to the
Late Woodland.
The site's dominant component holds the remains of an early Late Woodland (500–1000
CE) village inhabited by people of the
Clemson Island culture Clemson may refer to:
* Clemson, South Carolina, a city in the U.S. state of South Carolina
** Clemson University, a public university located in Clemson, South Carolina.
*** Clemson Tigers, the athletic programs of Clemson University.
* , a U.S. ...
.
The convergent streams and their two valleys made the site readily accessible to Pre-Columbian era, pre-Columbian people living in both drainage basins.
Among the components of the site are two strata, dating from 5000-6000 and c. 2600 Before Present, BP respectively. Both components were Radiocarbon dating, radiocarbon dated from fragments of ''Cucurbita pepo'', the squash plant; the absence of wild squash plants near the site and its distance from well-documented wild populations is evidence that the gourds were intentionally brought to the location by humans.
[Fritz, Gayle J. ]
Gender and the Early Cultivation of Gourds in Eastern North America
. ''American Antiquity'' 64.3 (1999): 417-429: 423.
Memorial Park contains the only area on the West Branch side of the point of land between the river and the creek that has not been disturbed by subsequent development. Alluvium, Alluvial deposits deep cover the site and have protected it from recent activity on the surface. The Veterans of Foreign Wars acquired the property in the 1920s and used it for a park.
Piper Aircraft bought the fields adjacent to the park in the 1960s to use for airport runways and airplane storage. In the 1970s, Conran A. Hay, a consultant, discovered the prehistoric site during an archeological survey conducted for the United States Army Corps of Engineers. Subsequent research sponsored by the Office of State Archeology and the Office of Historic Preservation of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission in 1980 helped determine the site boundaries.
See also
*List of archaeological periods (North America)
*List of Native American archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania
*National Register of Historic Places listings in Clinton County, Pennsylvania
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Memorial Park Site
Archaic period in North America
Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania
Lock Haven, Pennsylvania
National Register of Historic Places in Clinton County, Pennsylvania