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More News from IncHan Country
P^ge 9 Spily^y Tymoo November 16, 2011
Rock circles linked to ancient site
BLUEMONT, Va. (AP) -
Rock circles on a spit of moun
tain land along Spout Run may
be the oldest above-ground
Paleoindian site in N orth
America, according to Alexan
dria archaeologist Jack Hranicky.
He will deliver an address
about the site — which he dates
to 10,000 B.C. — to the Society
for American Archaeology next
April in Memphis, Tenn.
The site could put Clarke
County “on the Paleo map,”
Hranicky said.
The set of concentric circles
drew the attention of landown
ers Chris and Rene White as they
were planning to create a medi
cine wheel on their 20 acres
south of Va. 7 on Blue Ridge
Mountain.
After talks with his spiritual
elder in Utah, Chris, a descen
dant of the Cherokee people,
and his wife, from the Lumbee
tribe of North Carolina, decided
to open their property to spiri
tual leaders of Native American
peoples who have business in
the Washington area.
The area including the rock
circles was the location that
drew Chris White in.
When he was building his
house, White said, he would of
ten walk by the creek to take a
break.
There, “a still, small voice
said, ‘This land is important.’ I
didn’t know what it meant, but
I took it to heart,” he said.
As White prepared to put his
medicine wheel on the site, he
realized that a circle of stones
was there — actually, several con
centric circles.
“From my experience as a
contractor, I knew that was not
natural,” he said. “I realized
something was already here.”
Som eone suggested that
White contact Hranicky, who
had studied five other
Paleoindian sites in Virginia.
He said he saw the pattern
in the rocks as soon as he ar
rived at the site, noting three
concentric circles at the western
edge, which he believes was a
cerem onial area. The inner
circle could outline a bonfire
space, he said, while the outer
ring may have been an area for
participants in the ritual to sit
or stand.
To the east, touching this
area, is another circle that
Hranicky calls the observatory.
Here, rocks on the edge of
the circle align with features on
Blue Ridge Mountain to the
east.
From a center rock, over a
boundary rock, a line would in
tersect the feature called Bears
Den Rocks on the mountain.
Standing on that center rock,
looking toward Bears Den, a
viewer can see the sun rise on
the day of the summer solstice,
Hranicky said.
To prove that point, White
and his wife took pictures of the
sunrise last June 21, he said.
To the right o f this rock
around the circle, another lines
up to Eagle Rock on the Blue
The Thunderbird
site is dated to
10,000 B.C.
Ridge, and with sunrise at the
fall equinox (around Sept. 22-
23), he said.
Yet a third points to a saddle
on the mountain where the sun
makes its appearance at the win
ter solstice (around Dec. 21-22).
“These are true solar posi
tions,” he said.
A dozen feet east o f the
summer solstice rock is a mound
of boulders, piled up, which
Hranicky designates as “the al
tar.”
Hranicky, 69, a registered
professional archaeologist who
taught anthropology at North
ern Virginia community College
and St. Johns High School Col
lege, has been working in the
field o f archaeology, for 40
years. “I had to wait 70 years
to find a site like this,” he said.
Dating the site took some
digging.
Hranicky was convinced that
it was a Paleoindian site, based
on the configuration of the con
centric circles, the solstice align
ment and the altar he has seen
at other such sites. But he
wanted an artifact.
He picked a five-foot-square
area to dig, carefully number
ing every rock and setting it
aside, to be replaced later.
The reason for that,
Hranicky said, is that in the fu
Tribe requires
tenants to prove
immigration status
ture better methods may be
available for dating sites, and he
wanted to disturb as little as
possible.
His test pit turned up three
artifacts. One was a thin blade
of quartzite. The second was a
small piece of jasper, a type of
quartz rock and an important
find, Hranicky said.
Jasper was prized by
Paleoindians for making tools.
It was hard and durable, but
could still be worked by Stone
Age methods. They traveled
miles to find sites where jasper
nodules protruded from native
rock, and quarried the stone to
make projectile points and tools.
The third artifact was the
most important. It was a tiny
piece of jasper, no bigger than
the end of a thumb, but this rock
had been worked, Hranicky said.
It was a tool, a mini-scraper.
“You don’t know how thrilled
I was when we found that little
bitty tool,” he said.
Jasper on the site ties what
Hranicky believes was a ceremo
nial and heavenly observation
site to another proven
Paleoindian site just tQ the south
of Clarke County in Warren
County - the Thunderbird site.'
William Gardiner of Catho
lic University excavated that site
for several years. Indians
camped on the east bank of the
South Fork of the Shenandoah
River and quarried jasper for
tool making from bluffs on the
west bank. The Thunderbird
site is dated to 10,000 B.C.
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) -
A New Mexico mobile home
community operated by a
Native American tribe is re
quiring that all residents
show proof they are living in
the United States legally.
Tesuque Pueblo notified
residents o f the Tesuque
Trailer Village in a letter
dated Oct. 17 that all tenants
must sign new rental con
tracts and show officials U.S.
birth certificates, passports or
immigration documents.
Neither federal nor state
law prohibits renting to ille
gal immigrants. However,
Tesuque Pueblo is a sover
eign nation and is entitled to
change policies with the ap
proval of its Tribal Council
and governor, according to
several city, state and federal
officials.
Tesuque Pueblo officials
did not immediately return a
phone message from The
Associated Press.
The tribe also is raising
residents’ rent. For years, ten
ants of the Tesuque Trailer
Village near Santa Fe paid
$300 a month to rent space.
As of November, the rent
will be $400 plus $26.50 of
gross-receipts tax, an official
notice showed.
The new rules present
com plications for some
households, such as that of
Alicia Olivas. She is in the
process of obtaining her le
gal residency card, and her
youngest daughter was born
in the U.S. However, her hus
band and older daughter are
SMILE Club
illegal immigrants.
At a meeting with nearly
two dozen tenants Friday in
a Santa Fe apartment com
plex, Olivas said property
manager Dan Clavio told her
the two illegal immigrants
had to leave.
“If he doesn’t accept my
husband and my daughter,
I’m going to have to leave
because I’m not splitting my
family,” Olivas said.
Several residents said
they are speaking with local
lawyers to see what legal op
tions they have.
Adonias Mendez, who has
become the unofficial tenant
leader, said he was collecting
statements from residents
and is hoping they can per
sonally speak with Tesuque
Pueblo Gov. Frederick Vigil.
Many residents have lived
in the community for five to
10 years, Mendez said, and
they've never had such prob
lems before.
Tesuque Pueblo receives
money from several federal
agencies, including a U.S. De
partment of Housing and Ur
ban Development grant pro
gram. But a HUD spokes
woman said the department
does not ask that landlords
verify residency documents.
Under New Mexico law,
illegal immigrants do not
have to show they are legally
in the U.S. to rent housing —
or attend public schools and
get basic utilities such as wa
ter and sewer.
Tesuque Trailer Village is
10 miles north of Santa Fe.
Toys-Tools-Housewares-Clothing-Crafts-Gifts-
A ll N e w A ll T h e T i m e ! ST
71 7 S.W. 5 th St. M a d ra s Or.
Yvonne Iverson/Spilyay
Students enjoyed all of the experiment stations set up for the annual Family Math and
Science Night at Warm Springs Elementary. Cara James examines a sponge through
the microscope as Amaya Bisland and Atoria James patiently wait for their turn.
,
Cherokee chief takes up ‘ffeedmeri question
support of untold hundreds of
freedmen, who were allowed to
vote in the Sept.,24 special elec
tion because of a last-minute
deal brokered before a federal
judge. Baker beat Smith by
nearly 1,600 votes.
The citizenship issue has
landed back in Tulsa federal
court and the stakes couldn’t be
higher for the 300,000-member
tribe, which is based at
Tahlequah. In the weeks leading
up to a Sept. 24 special election,
the government demonstrated
what could happen if the freed
men are excluded from the tribe:
nearly $40 million in federal
housing funds was frozen and
the assistant secretary for Indian
affairs warned that any election
the Cherokees held w ithout
granting suffrage to the freed
men would be illegal.
“We’re going to have to do a
balancing act,” Baker said as his
ceremonial inauguration ap
proached. “I’ve taken an oath
to p ro tec t and defend the
TULSA, Okla. (AP) - After
a bitter, drawn-out election that
lasted almost four months longer
than it should have, new Chero
kee N ation C hief Bill John
Baker treads into yet another
political minefield after his in
auguration ceremony: squarely,
should descendants of slaves
some Cherokees once owned
retain their tribal membership?
The protracted struggle of
the 2,800 or so descendants,
known as freedmen, became a
major issue on the campaign
trail. Baker’s opponent, former
Cherokee Chief Chad Smith,
was among the major support
ers of a 2007 vote by tribal citi
zens to kick the freedmen out
of the tribe and cut off benefits
such as health care, grocery sti
pends and housing assistance.
Baker, a longtime tribal council
man, also backed the measure,
but appeared far less vocal
about it while he was campaign
ing.
That strategy likely won the
am
Cherokee Nation, and we’re go
ing to have to protect and de
fend the $500 million we get in
federal funding. It’s a tightrope,”
he said.
Baker is keenly aware of the
risk. About 12 years ago, when
the Seminole Nation voted to
oust freedm en descendants
from its tribe, the government
cut off federal programs and
refused to recognize its elec
tions. Their freedmen were later
allowed back in, but the tribe is
still paying the price for its deci
sion.
“To this day, they still haven’t
gotten all their funding back,
some of it has been lost for
ever,” Baker said. “That’s why
when we sit here and talk about
if they cut our funding, that’s
not just something we’re pick
ing off a shelf. We’ve got a
roadmap of what could happen
in the Seminole case.
“It’s no pie in the sky that
could happen; we’re sitting there
looking at what did,” he said.
wyvvu
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