Indian Artifacts

[Eugene]

Couple of years after purchasing the acreage in Missouri, had some grading conducted. Following spring I found an arrow head and a stone knife.

Folks hunt the streams every year finding artifacts. Some very valuable.

Still have a mortar grinder and a few other Indian artifacts found on the grandparents farm in Iowa.

Use to date a girl whos father and uncle use to hunt Hopewell artifacts. Had a nice collection.

When we purchased the acreage there was a huge oak tree, grown horizontal to the ground. Some indication by Indians. Died, fell over, cut into fire wood.

Memories.

[T-Mo]

A friend of mine is into hunting and saving artifacts. He also makes things from them, i.e. necklaces, bracelets and knife handles.

[John *.?-!.* cub owner]

We used to find a lot of arrow heads and broken points in the garden on our farm, which was above a 50ft bluff in a valley. Many of the points were broken and only partially finished and I figured where our house and garden were was a summer location for the Indian camps. One of the members of our church was an avid artifact hunter and one day I told him I had found an artifact that appeared to be some kind of tool he might be interested in. He was real excited until I showed it to him (monkey wrench rusted into a solid lump), and he asked me why I called it an Indian artifact. I told him I figured Mr. Snelson (previous owner of the farm) had lost it, and he was 1/2 Native American.

[Jackman]

Hopewell artifacts , had to google that very surprised to learn that the indians worked with copper , thought it was just stone and animals ... I always look for arrow heads in fresh turn dirt for the last 40 years at least and to date I have found just one arrow head , the area of NY supposedly had a very large indian population thousands of years ago ,I have two stones that look almost exactly the same, they were found by area people on the same street just several hundred yard a part, the stones fit the palm of your hand with an indent for your thrumb and another for your middle finger, a perfect hand tool I guess for tanning or grinding grain. A cool fact about indian artifacts is that when you find one the odds are very high that the last human to touch the artifact was likely the indian that lost it thousands of years ago

[Eugene]

Red Secoy, individual who loaned part of his Indian artifact accumulation to Boys Town, Nebraska, was a neighbor in west central Iowa. He stopped by our way out in the sticks house one day, about 65 years ago. Told me that there was an Indian village on the top of the hill behind the house. Being 6 or 7 years old, I didn't believe him. I hadn't seen any Indians. Of course I didn't believe my 70 plus year old grandmother when she told me about traveling by covered wagon from eastern Illinois to Nebraska and then back a few years later. I had never seen any covered wagons around.

Was an adult leader when son was in Boy Scouts. One camp out was on an overgrown farm recently obtained by the Iowa Conservation Office. Our job was to clear brush from around small mounds adjacent to a stream. Turned out that the small mounds were slowly built up over time from fresh water clam shells discarded by Indians.

Missouri Conservation Dept holds a one day event in Linn. You can take your Indian artifacts to be evaluated. They also have a large display.

Locally, popular place to look for artifacts is on stream and river sand bars after the high water has passed.

[outdoors4evr]

I have a small collection of arrow heads made from Flint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint. I found them in central Arkansas exposed by the red river bottoms - an area that floods every spring and dries out during the summer.
There are many different designs - some so small and detailed that it is difficult to imagine their use even on an arrow. One I have is less than 1/4" square. There are so many different designs, I would love to learn how each design was to be used (applied to an arrow, spear, and used to hunt which game)

The "art" of making an arrow is fascinating. The stones would be heated up slowly and then fractured by dripping water droplets onto the hot stone. The stone would fracture and leave behind a divot like a droplet shaped bowl. Some had very planned out jagged edges and some were smooth. None that I have look like they were sharpened with a stone or scrubbed against a harder material. I am certain the century or two of weathering has dulled the edges a bit, but the skill and craftsmanship is top notch.

Heat or cool Flint too quickly and it will shatter (explode).

[Eugene]

Flint Knapping, Internet and YouTube articles on how to make arrow heads.

I use to do that when I was in the 5th or 6th grade. There are a lot of fake arrow heads out there. The experts can tell the difference between real and fake.

[Jackman]

The "art" of making an arrow is fascinating. The stones would be heated up slowly and then fractured by dripping water droplets onto the hot stone. The stone would fracture and leave behind a divot like a droplet shaped bowl. Some had very planned out jagged edges and some were smooth. None that I have look like they were sharpened with a stone or scrubbed against a harder material. I am certain the century or two of weathering has dulled the edges a bit, but the skill and craftsmanship is top notch.

Heat or cool Flint too quickly and it will shatter (explode).

Interesting always assumed they chipped rock into arrowheads , the one and only arrowhead that I found came from my hometown is a light tan and does not look like any type of stone in the area it was found, its all granite and blue and lime stone around here .

[Scrivet]

Interesting always assumed they chipped rock into arrowheads , the one and only arrowhead that I found came from my hometown is a light tan and does not look like any type of stone in the area it was found, its all granite and blue and lime stone around here .

Well I guess we now know the answer to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's opening line of poetry; I shot an arrow into the air, It fell to earth, I knew not where........