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Site Descriptions <br />Site 5MF319, a historic rock alignment, is located on the northwest bank of the <br />Velanzas Livestock Pond 1, in the Williams Fork Mountains at an elevation of 7315 feet. <br />Surrounding vegetation consists of sagebrush, grasses, serviceberry, Gambel oak, and aspen. <br />The site is underlain by Cretaceous age sandstone, shale, and major coal beds of the Williams <br />Fork formation. Soil on the site is light brown clay loam with a depth of up to 60 inches. <br />The soil, Hesperus loam, is found on plateaus and mountainsides and is well drained and <br />formed from colluvium and residuum derived from sandstone mantled by basalt rock <br />fragments (USDA NRCS 2004). The Velanzas Livestock Pond 1 is the nearest source of <br />water. <br />The site was originally recorded in 1975 by the Laboratory of Public Archaeology <br />CSU. It was described as a rock wall built of sandstone slabs. The resource was recorded as <br />running east to west on the embankment of an unnamed reservoir. Milled lumber was found <br />in association with the resource and was interpreted to be remnants of a possible door (south <br />side) and window (west side). The wooden elements were described as severely decayed. It <br />is noted that the area had been recently disturbed by power line road cuts. The site was field <br />evaluated as need data (Arthur 1975). <br />Grand River Institute revisited the site during the present project. The location data <br />was updated and the site was re -mapped and photographed. A boundary measuring 50 by 35 <br />meters was established around the observed cultural materials. The rock alignment and one <br />of the wood piles were relocated. A rock pile (Feature 2, possible collapsed wall?) and a <br />mano were newly recorded. <br />The rock alignment (Feature 1) is characterized by stacked sandstone rocks and dirt, <br />forming four mounds that are approximately 3 to 5 feet in width. The mounds create a <br />roughly square shaped alignment. The feature was constructed along the embankment of an <br />unnamed reservoir. Sagebrush has overgrown the outside walls of the rock alignment; the <br />sandstone rocks can be better seen from the inside of the feature. The possible door was <br />relocated in the south wall; it measures approximately 3 feet wide and no wooden door <br />fragments, documented in the original recording, were observed. The window and associated <br />wooden fragments were not relocated within the structure. The feature is interpreted to be <br />the remains of a historic foundation. <br />Three pieces of 7 inch wide by 1 inch thick boards are located 15 meters to the <br />northwest of the rock alignment, on the edge of Feature 2. The wooden boards are heavily <br />deteriorated. <br />Historic research produces multiple documents possibly associated to the site. A <br />General Land Office (GLO) plat, surveyed in 1910, shows a "house" in the same area of the <br />site. The house is not indicated on the 1887 map. The GLO had one land patent on file for <br />V. <br />