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FINAL CULTURAL RESOURCE STUDY OF THE <br />• 1984 REVISED PERMIT AREA AND ADJACENT <br />VICINITIES OF COLORADO WESTMORELAND INC'S, <br />ORCHARD VALLEY MINE, DELTA COUNTY, COLORADO <br />Vol. I <br />ABSTRACT <br />By <br />Steven G. Baker <br />CENTURIES RESEARCH, INC. <br />This document constitutes the final report on baseline <br />cultural resource studies conducted by Centuries Research, <br />• Inc. on behalf of the Orchard Valley Mine of Colorado West- <br />moreland Inc. This mine is located in the North Fork Valley <br />~f the Gunnison River near Paonia, Delta County, Colorado. <br />Colorado Westmoreland currently mines coal under various <br />federal leases and has applied to the Colorado Mined Land <br />Reclamation Division and the Office of Surface Mining for a <br />permit to expand coal mining beneath approximately 5,000 <br />additional acres of land controlled by the Bureau of Land <br />Management and private individuals. In satisfaction of <br />permit requirements primarily rooted in The National His- <br />toric Preservation Act (36 CFR 800), Colorado Westmoreland <br />contracted with Centuries to perform the baseline studies. <br />A multiple survey strategy was used by Centuries. This <br />began with a Class I Literature Review or compendium of <br />existing knowledge about the general project area. This was <br />followed by a Class II or statistically based random sample <br />of previously unsurveyed areas within the permit area <br />itself. A Class III or 100 percent survey of selected <br />portions of the permit area, namely spring areas, rock <br />shelters and bottom lands, was also completed. Finally a <br />simple discretionary reconnaissance was carried out both <br />within and around the 1984 permit area in an effort to find <br />out where resources could be found as opposed to where they <br />could not. As a result of this multiple survey strategy <br />twenty (20) new resources were discovered. These range from <br />• early 20th century homesteads to prehistoric Indian sites. <br />When combined with the sites recorded in previous inven- <br />