This volume provides an overview of the history
of archeological investigations conducted at the famous catlinite
quarries that constitute one of the primary resources of Pipestone
National Monument, Pipestone County, Minnesota. It also provides
an inventory of the 43 identified archeological localities or, in
Archeological Sites Management Information System (ASMIS) terms,
subsites that comprise the monument, the entirety of which is officially
recorded as archeological site 21PP2. Euroamerican knowledge of
the catlinite quarries since the seventeenth century is summarized
and nineteenth-century antiquarian interest in them is reviewed.
Professional archeological investigations of the quarries, which
began in ca. 1878 and have continued to the present day, are summarized
and archeological inventory investigations conducted in 1993, 1994,
and 1997-1998 are described. The latter investigations were conducted
under the aegis of the National Park Service’s Systemwide
Archeological Inventory Program (SAIP), and were synchronized with
prescribed fire burns to reduce vegetative fuel load and encourage
the growth of native prairie vegetation. The SAIP inventory was
facilitated by the development of a photogrametrically-produced,
geo-referenced base map with 50-centimeter contour intervals. Test
excavations were conducted at the Richner site, an extensive prehistoric
artifact scatter, and at a stone circle site discovered in 1994.
Catlinite as a geological substance is also summarized in the report
and past chemical and mineralogical studies designed to characterize
catlinite and other pipestones, as well as to correlate archeological
artifacts of catlinite with geological material sources, are reviewed.
The 43 archeological localities, or ASMIS subsites, are comprised
of stone quarries, petroglyphs, mounds, stone circles, artifact
scatters representing temporary habitation and catlinite workshop
sites, a group of presumed tool sharpening grooves, and historic
graffiti. Historic and archeological clues to the existence of a
small cemetery for students of the Pipestone Indian School, used
around the turn of the twentieth century, exist but this
feature is not considered an archeological resource and its existence
remains to be confirmed through non-invasive geophysical methods
such as ground-penetrating radar. The monument’s Native American
rock art, found both in situ and on slabs of quartzite removed from
their original location near the Three Maidens boulders during the
late nineteenth century, was also documented as part of the 1990s
inventory efforts. Test excavations and observations of the extent
of ground surface disturbance due to the actions of burrowing rodents
suggest that the monument’s soil mantle is experiencing on-going
bioturbation which leads to repeated cycles of burial, exposure,
reburial, and reexposure of archeological artifacts and features.
It is recommended that archeological inventory investigations and
total station transit mapping continue to be synchronized with future
prescribed burns to increase knowledge of the monument’s archeological
resource base as this burial/exposure cycle takes place.
Pipestone National Monument in its entirety is a property listed
on the National Register of Historic Places. In addition, the rock
art sites of the monument, both those that occur in situ and images
represented on displaced slabs, are contributing elements of a multiple
property National Register of Historic Places district based on
the theme of American Indian rock art in the state of Minnesota.
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