GENERAL50296

• Permit No: M1993027
• IBM Index Class Name: General Documents
• Doc Date: 6/28/1993
• Doc Name: CULTURAL RESOURCE INVENTORY SCHOOLFIELD PIT CUSTER CNTY COLO
• Media Type: D
• Archive: No

~ ~ • I • \I
A cultural resource inventory of the proposed Schoolfield gravel
pit was conducted by James M. Brechtel, Consulting Archaeologist, on 16
June 1993. The inventory was conducted for Seifert Enterprises to
ensure compliance with applicable Federal guidelines and legislation,
including NHPA 1966, NEPA 1969, EO 11593, AHPA 1974, and 36 CFR 800.
The inventory was recommended by the Colorado Historical Society.
James M. Brechtel, Consulting Archaeologist, holds Bureau of Land
Management Cultural Resource Use Permit #C-46004, State of Colorado
Archaeological Permit #93-7, and USDA Forest Service Special Use Permit
#88004R, among others.
The proposed gravel pit is located on private land in the SW/NW',
of Section 2-T23S-R72W, as shown on the attached Project Map. The total
area inventoried for this project is approximately 9.35 acres. Field
notes for this project are on file at the office of James M. Brechtel,
Consulting Archaeologist, in Fort Collins, Colorado.
II~VIRON4~7Ti'AL DATA
The general project area is the Wet Mountain Valley of the
Southern Rocky Mountains physiographic province. The Wet Mountain
valley is a north-south trending intermontane valley, bounded by the Wet
Mountains on the east and the Sangre De Cristo Mountains on the west.
The proposed project is the portion of the valley which is drained by
Grape Creek, a tributary of the Arkansas River.
The parcel inventoried includes a flat ridgetop and moderate side
slopes, which are part of a local pattern of moderately to deeply
entrenched east/west drainges and intervening ridges. These drainages
enter Grape Creek in the Wet Mountain Valley proper, about 1 to 2 miles
west of the parcel.
Soils in the immediate area are extremely rocky/gravelly. Most of
the surface within the area inventoried is covered with an apparent lag
deposit of dense basaltic and porphyritic crobbles/gravels. The soil is
gravelly loam. This general area is underlain by Precambrian igneous
material and Tertiary volcanics.
Vegetation cover in the area inventoried averages 15-35%, and
consists predominantly of various native grasses and flowering plants.
Ground visibility was considered adequate for purposes of the inventory.
Elevation of the area inventoried is about 8300 ft.
EXISTII~G DATA b LITEI~ATDRE REVIEFi
Files of the Colorado Historical Society were researched in March
1993. These files contained no record of previous cultural resource
inventories or known cultural resources within the area to be directly
impacted by the current project.
The appropriate RP3 publications were also consulted for data
relevant to the known cultural background of the project area. Since
this area [[ey be considered transitional between plains/mountains
erntones, prehistoric cultural influences from both of these areas are
possible in the project vicinity.
Eighmy's (1984) plains prehistoric chronology proposes
Paleo-Indian, Archaic, Ceramic, and Protohistoric periods to describe