Week learn about a National Historic landmark in colorado. She talks about the fighting on the property. Friends of the acm cohosted this event. It is about one hour and 45 minutes. I would like to introduce our speaker for tonight. Her name is marilyn. She is in it alamosa native. And ownerrchaeologist of a consultancy firm. She has over 40 years and experience and Cultural Research management and a degree and anthropology from a outofstate university. She has a masters degree from Colorado State university. Conducted thely alsoeological research but Archaeological Research on great standins for several decades. Interests include culturally modified trees, trailology, old spanish historic, and artifacts called livio phones. The instrument made of rock. As a added bonus to tonights performance she will discuss with the phones sound. If you notice in the back we are being recorded by cspan three for their historic weekend program. Ask thatime we would you turn all cell phones off. At present marilyn. [applause] this is the story of the settling of the american frontier. It is not the usual story that you think of where people were heading west from the eastern united states. Another important story of toinos moving northward settle American Land after the end of the mexican war in 1848. To help give you a brief geographical orientation. On this map you can see where the homesteads are. There is great standin National Park. Most of you know where that is. It is just to the west of the park. Also put forth garland on there to give you a sense of tore we are in relation where they had their homestead. As many of you already know fort sachusetts was established i dont know if i have the right date 1852. I get some of this off of the internet. It in 1858. Replaced ok. We know that the fort benefited the economy of early hispanic settlers. It created a local market for cattle and grain and flour and produce. The hispanic farmers were also paid in u. S. Currency making it possible for them to more easily purchase American Goods. Also eventually able to get credit. One of the board was born in the parts of mexico. He is shown here on the right with his grandson. In this 1900 photo. We ahead by photographs of them. Once we have reported fresh. One moved south from town in 1864. At that time most early hispanics that were settling in the southern part of the valley words settling on Communal Land that they used for farming. There living on land grants. They were not living on public land. Property in a small the southern valley. He lived there for about one year. He married a woman. In 1865 together they established a small ranch northwest of the four. That was the same year they moved further northwest. It was a a know very. No one else was there. Was soolated settling unlike the plazas where people were living together. There were forced to be thrice selfreliant. We assume they had to form some kind of relationship with the native americans. Apaches who were still using the area at the same time. Their son talked about hiding in the plants when the native americans would, to help. This was really a risky endeavor for them. They were out there by and yet they became very successful ranchers. Pedro was born the next year. Generationhe first of american boys in the family. He filed his first legal land claim and 1878. He also applied for a Homestead Entry an agent you want. Orn though he did not write speak english. He was very smart about this. Wife according to the local newspaper it was the nicest french alps in the valley. It even reportedly had stainedglass windows. That is pretty impressive considering it is way out. We have noty historic areas of that house. Everything that we know or are learning it is either from Historic Records or from the fbi. That is why archaeology is so important. It out raising cattle. Later he became one of the areas largest seat razors. Is that he had several hundred bales of hay. Even by early may he was producing a lot. Early on we think that he may have been selling much of his stock in produce two for garland. It makes sense because this would have been the place where you could sell your produce. Maybe later of a look to the Court Records we may be able to find where it actually has his name somehow that actually shows he was selling things here. It really makes sense because there was no are else. He was assigned that early on. Have used ased to many as 16 horses to haul wagons across the sand to his customers. If any of you have tried to drive in a car across the sand you know how difficult that is. Imagine driving your wagon that across the sand. He is 15 horses. This is a description i really liked. They described him going across the sand with his low pay. In the middle a large bird swooped down. Somebody wrote that down. He mustve been pretty impressive to see him with all of the animals moving across the sand. Next he was the only one to survive from the delta. He had five sisters but they all died as children due to dip their area or typhoid fever. 1983 he file on his own homestead about three quarters of a mile closer to his parents. He was only 17 at the time. Shows we are looking at a time with that. In 1885 pater decided he would raise the following cattle and horses and sheep like his father. He argued that sheep would cause him trouble. That this was cattle country. That sheep country. Having trouble myself i can see your kids in the agency do what you did. Definitely by 1885 he recorded that he had built a over room house, is stable time he added more land to his buildings. He then obtained over 500 acres. Instead of building a mud families hee other chose to build this twostory log house. Which was much more similar to a close eye did anglos style buildings. I thought this was very interesting because he definitely wanted it to be seen. That is very interesting and it may also have something to do with him trying to break away from his fathers views. Pedro and sophia and father and mother became very successful in expanding their land tonys land owning. Many early hispanics settled in the area where squatters. They were of actually removed by those who obtained a legal land title. That is why they were so successful. Legal landly got right with the property. In early 1902 after they had n there for new elite for for decades. Conflict interrupted between cattle, and sheep ranchers in the area. Andearly hispanics ranchers farmers who raised sheep began to experience that intimidation. Descendent noted, in the the war was not just between sheep and cattle but between persons of different cultural background. First someone burned a bar down. On his property. Then on january 25, 1902 90 of his sheep were killed and others were wounded and driven away. Just prior to that someone reportedly fired a shot into the warehouse. They live in fear. The family was worried. They were out there by themselves. In theht while she was isolated house alone with one of her children sophia heard unknown man right to the area. She told the story that she was so frightened that she and her child were taken outside. They after he spent the night because they were afraid to be in the house. On february 2, 1902, teofilos house was burned to the ground with its entire contents and the family the cattlemen in the area. Had lost money in a bank failure in earlier years, so he kept all his cash at home like a lot of early settlers did. When the house burned down he reportedly had 8,000 in there and it burned up. In march of 1902, teofilo and pedro sold their land and water rights for 30,000 to the cattle ranchers. That was quite a bit of money back then in 1902. They were forced to leave when they had legal title to their property. Teofilo moved to the town of san he left his homestead and he died there in 1915. Pedro moved to the sergeant area and died in 1934. Pedro raised cattle and horses and not cheap like his father, his descendents believed he left with his father because of all the violence and intimidation. They were worried. They were scared. When somebody burns your house down, you do not want to be there anymore. They did not have any recourse at the time. Ramifications of this ranch more violence do not and did not end when the chat euro when the trujillos sold out. On the ranch and owned it from 1912 to 1947. How thethe story about violence and intimidation had longrange effects on people. This is what he told me. The 1930s, almost three decades after the trujillo were burned out, when bob was a boy living on the mend a ranch, hes to go he used to go to uber to get supplies. They would always stop by the pedro place. He would stop and see if he needed supplies from town. Bob said he did this many times where they would stop by and see what he needed, go to town, pick up the supplies. Bob said later he was reminiscing with his uncle about these trips they made to town and his uncle was talking about his wife. He said he never saw her, even though they had been there many times. His uncle said the reason you did not see her is that she was so traumatized by the violence during the period of the cattle and sheep wars that even 30 years later when she sought dust the when she saw dust in distance, she would run upstairs and hide because she was still so scared. Howink it is interesting these events do not just happen and then end. And stories get passed on it is a big deal for people even in the future. The pedro house was considered isolated even by the 1940s. Ranch hands and their families did not want to live there. Far away and was eventually abandoned in the 1940s. I have thought a lot about these feelings of isolation, living at these early homesteads and i often wondered what it would be like to live there during the early days of the trujillo occupation, especially as a woman, thinking you are often out there by yourself. Wererst the trujillos likely concerned about native americans who were still out in then later on during the cattle and sheep conflicts they were concerned about the violence that occurred then. Ill was thought it would be interesting to go out there and work at one of these sites by myself as an archaeologist to try to get a sense of what that isolation may have felt like. Car, butut there in my being out there by yourself is an interesting experience. I got that chance in 2011. I was out there working at the teofilo place, i was by myself, and all the sudden i saw this dust. Likeught that is just these people had experienced. I thought he was coming out here . Im here by myself, and i felt vulnerable, even a few years ago, being out there. Luckily, this story is a great , who is ind bunch the back there was driving, not too fast. He was driving out there and all the dust was coming from fred. I did not have anything to worry about. He helped me. Of whative me a sense the isolation might have been like during those early years. How did we learn what happened at these homesteads . One of them was burned down, one just have these old buildings. How did we learn about the history and the family and how they lived . In 2002 we got a state Historical Fund grant through the Nature Conservancy to do culinary work at the pedro to do preliminary work at the pedro place. We researched the site, we evaluated it, we plotted the artifacts and documented what was around the house. Historic structures assessment done for this building. It was a little crooked. It had some problems. We wanted to know what needed to be done to stabilize this building. Tom in 2004, lorraine and simmons were able to nominate and get listed this homestead site on the National Register of historic places, which was exciting. It is considered important because of its relationship to the development of ranching in the San Luis Valley. It is a two story log house which is not very common. Valleyf you are from the , and you do not usually see two story log structures. It was important for its archaeological component, which are what help us tell the story about what happened here. Are there any people in this photo in the room . Thereght recognize dolly, are several other folks who are very active in volunteering in the community. Loretta . Yes. She is in there. Thank you for helping us do that. Do you have a hat on . Yes. The archaeological remains at the pedro site date from the late 1870s, that is when pedro built his place there, to the 1940s when the ranch hands abandoned it. Some of the interesting artifacts, we found a lot of ranch related limit which you would expect. We found a mule shoe. Both families had mules and use them in the ranch work. Bottle andniature dog onher a goat or a it. We do not know if it was a toy or medicinal. We found a lot of everyday items. These everyday items are some of the most important things. They tell us how people lived. Where they got their goods. What they used every day, like the marbles. I always like the toys. , likeakes it seem alive real people were living there, and of course the spoon. I found one of my spoons outside in the sandbox and i do not know how the spoon got out there, what you never know. But kit took it out and that was the end of it. Took it out and that was the end of it. A the upper left, you can see flaked glass tool. Many early sites exhibit flaked glass tools. They were made from a piece of broken glass. The yellow arrow shows were they flaked it so it would be sharp. It makes sense that you would use broken glass as a tool. It was free, it was handy, it may just be in your trash dump, and it was sharp. If you cannot run to the , we are allre spoiled and we just go to the store, you can find something and make a tool out of it. We found this at the site and i will show you what we found that the earlier homestead. We also found brownstone artifacts brownstone groundstone artifacts. The stone on the bottom is is how they would ground corn and all kinds of things. Archaeologists find these things, we say this is a multi component site, in other words we would say there were people ande in historic periods probably native americans. Sites weearly hispano the tools toy used process their food. What is interesting about these, right, and on the the bigger one is on the left. We found a number of these just outside the back door, which is where the kitchen was, of the house. That theynse to us were using those artifacts there. The family told us they remembered some of the older folks remembered seeing sofia grinding corn with a mono matate. Ano and a on theer thing we found right is native american pottery. If youre on a site and you find native american pottery, normally you think this is a native american site. This particular type of part a one is called san juan red tan. We found a close to the house. It was between the house and the corral. This pottery was produced in the san juan pablo in new mexico between 1750 and 1925. Evidence suggests that the native americans in new mexico were making pottery like this one specifically to trade with hispanos in northern new mexico. We know the trujillos came from area, so it is likely they brought these with them when they settled. May be sandstone. He asked what kind of sand it is. Im not sure specifically, but a lot of times they are made of sand down. It is easy to shape and easy to find. When we first worked at the later pedro site in 2002, we did not know where the earlier homestead from teofilo was located. , c cannotned down drive out and find it. We were lucky we cannot drive out and find it. Bob is standing on top of the remember whento he was a kid he remembered seeing a burned adobe. ,e were following him around you can see us in our vehicles, and he remembered where he saw that and took us to the site, which was fantastic. , a lotre in the valley of things look the same on the floor of the valley. He had a great memory and we appreciate that. The lower photo on the right shows what the teofilo site looked like when we first got there. There was no structure, there were a lot of rocks, and when we looked carefully we found a lot of artifacts, too. We do not have the actual structures, we do not have the corral, we do not have the barn, we do not have a house. We have the artifacts, and those artifacts are what tell us the story. In 2006 we got another state Historical Fund archaeological grant. We are grateful that exists so we can do a lot of this work. Site ando the teofilo weorded all the artifacts, conducted archival research, we looked in the Historic Records to see what we could find about what they had their according to the historical documents, and we reported the site with a lot of help from volunteers. There are a lot of things out there. We made maps and i will show you what the map looks like, we also evaluated the site as eligible for the National Register. This is what the map looks like that we made of the teofilo place. Feature one is the burned adobe remains that we think is their house. Postso found 21 upright that were buried in the ground, i will show you a picture of that, and we found many concentrations around that. A few lived in a place for a long time, you end up leaving things around your dwelling. That is what we found out there is what the trujillos had left behind for all those years of living in that homestead. Scale . This is 10 meters. I will talk about how big the structure was, so you can get an idea. The scale at the bottom is 10 meters long. Found 2000 stone cobbles. They were everywhere. That was one of our mysteries. I will talk about that in a little bit. The remains of that large adobe structure was the house of teofilo that burnt down in 1902. In shape andgular pretty big for an adobe structure, about 62 feet long and 55 feet wide. ,he evidence of the structure you can see here. Who is ang, archaeologist for the fish and wildlife service. She is showing you what the adobe sediments look like where the house used to be. Sand dunes,y great most of the sediments are sand. Here we had a giant concentration of adobe. That was different than the surrounding area. Bricks, youd adobe can see where the straw was in the adobe, we found adobe plaster fragments that could have been inside or outside of the structure. Know, wastrying to this the actual structure that found a globs of melted glass. If you melt glass, it has to be hot to melt glass. We are assuming they had windows or other glass items they had in the house. You can see these were totally melted down into a glob. We know this was a hot fire. According to the family, the story they heard was kerosene soaked rags were thrown through andwindows and were lit that is why the fire burned so hot. They did not just use a match or something. If you use kerosene soaked racks, that is going to make a hot fire. The 21 upright diameter posts, those are the red circles. We do not know what