{"id":341,"date":"2026-02-14T14:02:06","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T19:02:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/?p=341"},"modified":"2026-02-14T14:02:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T19:02:07","slug":"garrison-dam-archaeology-village-sites","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/2026\/02\/14\/garrison-dam-archaeology-village-sites\/","title":{"rendered":"Garrison Dam Archaeology: Village Sites"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Lotte Govaerts<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

(This post was originally published on the Rogers Archaeology Lab blog on February 21, 2021. You can see the original post archived here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve been a bit absent from the blog this past year, but we do have some new content lined up for you. First up, a return to our series on the historic archaeology of the Missouri Basin Project, with an installment on the archaeology of the Garrison Dam survey area. [Note: the site descriptions in this blog post are excerpts from my 2016 paper on the impacts of Garrison Dam (Govaerts 2016)].<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the most recent installments in this series (here<\/a> and here<\/a>) I discussed the construction of Garrison dam and its ecological and social impacts. In earlier installments<\/a> I described how large-scale archaeological salvage took place between the 1940s and the 1960s, due to the construction of large dams:  concerned archaeologists formed the \u201cCommittee for the Recovery of Archaeological Remains\u201d (CRAR) and the Interagency Archaeological Salvage Program (IASP). The Smithsonian Institution (SI) created the River Basin Surveys (RBS) to conduct archaeological fieldwork under the IASP. A local office, the \u201cMissouri Basin Project\u201d (MBP) was established to deal specifically with RBS salvage work in the Pick Sloan dam area. This office was located in Lincoln, Nebraska. Operations began in July 1946. Ten local state universities and historical societies (from communities along the river from Kansas to Ohio), the Science Museum of St. Paul, and the University of Wisconsin joined field parties along the Upper Missouri. (Wood 2014, p.41)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Black-and-white
Larry Tomsyuck (Administrative Officer, Missouri Basin Project, left) with John Corbett (Chief Archeologist, National Park Service, center) and Frank H. H. Roberts, Jr. (Director, River Basin Surveys, right) outside the Missouri Basin Project office at 1517 O Street, Lincoln, Nebraska, which housed Missouri Basin Project operations from 1951 through 1963\u201364. Roberts directed the River Basin Surveys program from its inception in 1945 through 1963\u201364. (RBS photo 00-L526, published with the above caption in Thiessen 1999, p. 34)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The contribution of the Missouri Basin project to the archaeology of the Northern Plains was significant. Hundreds of sites were recorded in these dam areas, over 150 of them in the Garrison survey area (Caldwell and Smith 1952). Only a handful of those were excavated more extensively in the limited time available to researchers. Even so, these excavations in the dam survey areas were important to the study of  indigenous cultures and the expanding Euro-American presence in the Northern Plains. As we\u2019ve discussed previously<\/a>, the investigation of \u201chistoric\u201d sites was approached a little differently, compared to the investigation of other sites. Because these \u201chistoric\u201d sites form the topic of my research, I will discuss them separately in upcoming installments in this series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Plains Village Culture<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Plains Village peoples were living in the Central and Northern Plains throughout the second millennium of the current era. They resided in permanent earth lodge villages near rivers, and practiced horticulture as well as bison hunting. The chronology of the Middle Missouri region of the Plains Village tradition was constructed based on the findings of excavations associated with the main stem Missouri dams. (Bamford and Nepstad-Thornberry 2007)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The excavation of Plains Village sites was prioritized over sites associated with earlier hunter\/gatherer groups because they were considered more unique. Such sites existed only along the river, and thus a large percentage of them would be lost in the dam project, while hunter\/gatherer sites are also found elsewhere. Further, Village Plains sites and historic period villages were easier to locate than deeply buried older sites, as they are more recognizable at the surface. (Wood 2014, p. 43)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Plains Village sites in the Garrison Survey Area<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Among the Plains Village sites investigated in the Garrison Dam area was \u201cGrandmother\u2019s Lodge\u201d (32ME59), which probably dates to the earliest Plains Village occupation of the area (Woolworth 1956). The site is associated with the \u201cGrandmother\u201d or \u201cOld Woman Who Never Dies\u201d, a mythological figure held in reverence by the Hidatsa, Mandan, and Crow.  The Grandmother\u2019s Lodge site probably dates to AD 1200\u20131300 (Johnson 2007, p. 15, 174). The site consists of a single rectangular structure, making it a northern outpost of the \u201crectangular house tradition,\u201d a building tradition associated with the earliest Plains Village occupations further south.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Black-and-white
Excavations at Grandmother’s Lodge (32ME59) (Photo: State Historical Society of North Dakota, reproduced from Caldwell and Smith 1952)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Nightwalker\u2019s Butte-In-The-Bullpasture (32ML39), was given such a specific name to distinguish it from two other nearby butte sites associated with Nightwalker. \u201cNightwalker\u201d is a mistranslation of a Hidatsa leader\u2019s name that means something like \u201cHe Who Walks in Twilight,\u201d and should more accurately be referred to as \u201cDuskwalker.\u201d The site consists of an isolated bluff-top village in a badland area of McLean country. The village is associated with a breakaway band of Hidatsa. It was palisaded and contained 27 circular earth lodges (Lippincott 2007). Analysis of some of the recovered material dates associated the site with the Knife River phase (1675\u20131862) of the \u201cDisorganized Coalescent Variant\u201d (Lehmer, p. 172\u2013177). Further analysis of recovered materials later narrowed the village occupation date down to 1700\u20131750 (Johnson 2007, p. 194).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later Village Sites<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
\"Very
Aerial view of excavations at Rock Village, excavated houses dating to the village occupation are visible on both sides of a long trench, which was dug to expose a more deeply buried occupation. (Photo source: RBS, reproduced from Caldwell and Smith 1952<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Later earth lodge villages examined during the RBS in the Garrison dam area include Rock Village, a Hidatsa village established in the late eighteenth century and occupied through the mid-nineteenth century; and Star Village, the last independent Arikara village, established in 1861 and abandoned one year later when the occupants joined the Mandan and Hidatsa at Like-A-Fishhook village across the river (Caldwell and Smith 1952). A still more recent Native site excavated by RBS crews was 32MZ1, also known as Crow-Flies-High (Malouf 1963). This was the site where another breakaway band of Hidatsa established a village away from the main Three Tribes villages at Like-A-Fishhook around 1870. This band of Hidatsa, led by and named after a man named Crow-Flies-High resisted reservation life and allotment. They established a village near Fort Buford at the mouth of the Yellowstone, and remained independent from the reservation for almost twenty-five years (Meyer 1977, p. 138\u2013142).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Black-and-white
Portrait of Crow-Flies-High, 1881 (unknown photographer, via Wikipedia)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Next up in this series , I will discuss the three \u201chistoric\u201d sites excavated in the Garrison Dam survey area: Fort Stevenson, Fort Floyd, and Fort Berthold. Stay tuned!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n
Previous posts in this series:<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n\n

What is Historical Archaeology?<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

How the River Basin Surveys Shaped Historical Archaeology<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Upper Missouri River Basin in the Nineteenth Century: Fur Trade<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Upper Missouri River Basin in the Nineteenth Century: Military Frontier<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Upper Missouri River Basin in the Nineteenth Century: Indian Agencies<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Garrison Dam<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lake Sakakawea and the Woman it was Named After<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n
References<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Bamforth, Douglas B., and Curtis Nepstad-Thornberry. \u201cThe Shifting Social Landscape of the Fifteenth-Century Middle Missouri Region.\u201d In Plains Village Archaeology: Bison-Hunting Farmers in the Central and Northern Plains<\/em>, 139\u201354. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2007.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caldwell, Warren W., and G. Hubert Smith. Garrison Reservoir: Geology, Paleontology, Archeology, History<\/em>. Missouri Basin Project of Smithsonian Institution, 1952. http:\/\/www.npshistory.com\/publications\/corps\/garrison-reservoir\/index.htm<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Govaerts, Lotte E. \u201cTransformative Consequences of Garrison Dam: Land, People, and the Practice of Archaeology.\u201d Great Plains Quarterly<\/em> 36, no. 4 (December 30, 2016): 281\u2013308.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Johnson, Craig M. A Chronology of Middle Missouri Plains Village Sites<\/em>. Smithsonian Contributions to Anthropology 47. Smithsonian Institution Scholarly Press, 2007.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lehmer, Donald J. Introduction to Middle Missouri Archaeology<\/em>. Anthropological Papers 1. Washington, D. C.: National Park Service, 1971.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lippincott, Kerry. \u201cNightwalker\u2019s Buttes: A Study in the Closing of an Archaeological Tradition and an Example of Hidatsa Oral History.\u201d In Plains Village Archaeology: Bison-Hunting Farmers in the Central and Northern Plains<\/em>, 259\u201369. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2007.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Malouf, C. River Basin Surveys Papers, No. 29: Crow-Flies-High (32MZ1), A Historic Hidatsa Village In the Garrison Reservoir Area, North Dakota<\/em>. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 185. Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1963.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meyer, Roy W. The Village Indians of the Upper Missouri: The Mandans, Hidatsas, and Arikaras<\/em>. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1977.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thiessen, Thomas D. \u201cEmergency Archeology in the Missouri River Basin: The Role of the Missouri Basin Project and the Midwest Archeological Center in the Interagency Archeological Salvage Program, 1946\u20131975.\u201d United States Department of the Interior National Park Service Midwest Archeological Center Lincoln, Nebraska, 1999.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wood, W. Raymond. \u201cThe Lincoln Office and the Upper Missouri River Basin.\u201d In Dam Projects and the Growth of American Archaeology – The River Basin Surveys and the Interagency Archeological Salvage Program<\/em>, 41\u201352. Walnut Creek, California: Left Coast Press, 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Woolworth, Alan R. \u201cArcheological Investigations at Site 32ME59 (Grandmother\u2019s Lodge).\u201d North Dakota History.<\/em> 23, no. 2 (1956).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Return to our series on the historic archaeology of the Missouri Basin Project, with an installment on the archaeology of the Garrison Dam survey area. [Note: the site descriptions in this blog post are excerpts from my 2016 paper on the impacts of Garrison Dam (Govaerts 2016)].<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":344,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,16,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archaeology","category-field-work","category-history","has-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":349,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions\/349"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lottegovaerts.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}