After lunch, I headed to Lubbock Lake Landmark.
“Lubbock Lake is located in a meander of an ancient valley, Yellowhouse Draw, near ancient springs. For thousands of years, people on the Southern High Plains used the water resources in the draw until those resources went dry in the early 1930s. Years of sediment covered the traces of human activity from the surface until 1936 when the city of Lubbock dredged the meander in an effort to revitalize the underground springs.
The first explorations of the site were conducted in 1939 by the West Texas Museum (now the Museum of Texas Tech University). By the late 1940s, several Folsom Period (10,800-10,300 years ago) bison kills were discovered. In a location of an ancient bison kill from a then unidentified Paleoindian group, charred bison bones produced the first ever radiocarbon date (currently the most accurate form of dating) for Paleoindian material (9,800 years old). The Landmark currently serves as a field laboratory for geology, soils, and radiocarbon dating studies, as well as being an active archaeological and natural history preserve.
Excavations today are conducted on an annual basis. The Museum of Texas Tech University has been involved with the discovery, preservation, research of, and education about the Lubbock Lake Landmark for over 80 years.
The Lubbock Lake Landmark is an archaeological preserve containing evidence of peoples on the Southern High Plains for almost 12,000 years. Due to its nearly complete record of human activity within well-stratified and well-dated geological deposits, the Lubbock Lake Landmark is one of the most important archaeological sites in North America.”
More information can be found here:
https://www.depts.ttu.edu/museumttu/lll/About.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lubbock_Lake_Landmark
https://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/lubbock/
The main reason I wanted to see this place was the life size statues of the mammoths and I was not disappointed.
Wait! What did that say? The modern day elephant is not the direct ancestor of the mammoth – Interesting!
The detail was incredible:
They had a great little museum there where I learned some interesting tidbits.
Imagine walking the plains and an 1100 pound lion comes out of the grasses – Yikees!
Plus this lion did not have a mane:
We have seen this many times over the last 10 years. In the museum, I see AD and BP used, no BC. So I am not quite sure where the BP and BC is used.
The excavating here found items that went back to over 11000 years ago.
So they now have evidence of humans being here in North America at least 11,000 years ago. (I know that I have to ask the question.. Is it 9000 BC or 11000 BP?)
What happened? They still are not certain.
How the bison adapted to the changes in the weather:
Ancient Bison Skull:
Current Bison Skull:
The next series of displays talked about the ancient peoples journey to this area. If you ever get to the Yukon or Alaska, they have some great sites about Beringia and the Athabasca peoples.
And then their demise:
The range of the bison over time:
Ranch brands…(No 6666 here..)
The site has a few trails and I decided to take the one to the dig sites.
There was a lake here from earliest times until the 1930’s when it dried up.
Here is the area of that lake:
More sculptures – WOW!
Imagine this guys standing 12 foot high – Another Yikees!
The dig sites:
There are six sites and there were explanations on what they found at each site. See the links above.
As the hunters and ranchers made their way west, a store was established here:
The marker of that store:
Now it is used for surveying and mapping the Landmark:
As I made my way back to the truck,.. what a site!
I am so glad that I did this – so very interesting and if you enjoy learning about ancient animals and people in North America, this is definitely a place to see. They do different programs so check it out if you are in the area.
Today is our last day at Lubbock. There is still so much to see and do in this area that we will return.
We finished our evening at the Elks with our neighbors Robin and Rich and hope to see them down the road.
Tomorrow we continue our south and west journey so stay tuned, enjoy today and thanks for following along.
1 comment:
I still don't like it.... Maybe cause I am getting old ... But when you find an old history book.. it is BC and AD.. sheesh.. changing is going to make even more confusion!
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