The Morton Site: New Discoveries…..More Questions!

Provided by May Speaker Nicole Marie “Nikki” Klarmann, MA

The Morton site is a sprawling, loosely organized village site two miles upriver from Dickson

Mounds. It was named after its former owner, Joy Morton of Morton Salt, who had a hunting lodge on the property in the 1930s. The site was occupied during the 14th century ACE by Middle Mississippian people with southern affiliations and Oneota people of northwestern origin. Our May speaker addressed Community, Household & Landscape: Examining Spatial Structure for Evidence of Integration at the Morton Village Site, Fulton County, Illinois.

One aspect of the joint Dickson Mounds/ Michigan State University project was to determine the relationship between these two ethnic groups. Speaker Nicole Marie “Nikki” Klarmann’s role in the multi-faceted project was to examine the architectural remains for clues to the nature of the relationships, and degree of coalescence. The site was subjected to a magnetometry survey to locate the buried house floors and storage pits without excavation. In some cases, the indicated building locations were subjected to test excavation or “ground truthing” to test the validity of the magnetometer readings.

Since the Middle Mississippians placed their wall posts in trenches and the Oneota people did not, it was possible to determine who constructed particular structures. When Klarmann’s architectural research is combined with that of others examining different aspects of the archaeological record, such as stone tools and weapons, ceramics and animal and plant remains, it is hoped the research team will be able to determine whether or not the Mississippians and Oneota were occupying the same buildings (cohabiting), were living side by side, or were on the site at different times.

~ report by Deb Stelton ~