4/24/2008
TIM UNRUH

REPUBLIC — New techniques in digging for history have researchers excited about what they might uncover May 31-June 15 at the Pawnee Indian Village State Historic Site.

The Kansas Historical Society, Kansas Anthropological Association, and University of Kansas are co-sponsoring this year’s 33rd annual Kansas Archeology Training Program field school at the site in northwest Republic County.

Anyone 10 or older can participate in the program. Early registration rates are due by May 2. Forms are available at www.kshs.org.

Organizers are expecting 100 or more people to join in the big dig and hundreds to thousands of onlookers at the fortified village that was occupied in the 1820s by the Republican band of the Pawnee Indian tribe, said Richard Gould, site administrator.

The site normally welcomes about 10,000 visitors in a year, he said.

Archaeologists excavated for the museum and five other lodge depressions in the mid-1960s. The activity brought a lot of people to the site, which is eight miles north of U.S Highway 36 on Kansas Highway 266 near Republic.

“One afternoon, 2,000 people showed up,” Gould said.

Reporter Tim Unruh can be reached at 822-1419 or by e-mail at tunruh@salina.com.
For more on this summer's dig, read reporter Tim Unruh's story in Friday's Salina Journal.