 Wiant
inspected and commented on various artifacts
that local residents brought along with
them. These items included arrowheads of all
sorts (spear heads, knives, drills and arrow
tips), axes, mallets, work stones and more.
Wiant usually was able to give approximate
dates, which went back several hundreds of
years to when there were several fairly
large Indian communities of 100-200 members
in the Logan County area around Salt Creek
and around Lake Fork, which was quite a
large lake in those days.
The director explained that most small
arrowheads were pared down from larger ones
due to re-sharpening their tips caused by
breakage when the arrowhead-tipped spear
slammed into its intended game animal and
hit a bone. The smaller ones, then, were
used for tips of smaller spears and/or
finally on arrows.
Many have incorrectly believed that the
Indians put some twist into their arrowheads
(for better dynamics when in flight) when
shaping, but this is not held to be true any
longer. The "twist" comes from the simple
fact that the arrowhead has been
re-sharpened several times on one side and
then the other to get the tip back to its
sharpened state. The feathers on the arrow
provided all the aero-dynamics needed for a
true flight of the arrow.
And, the Indians knew how to serrate
their arrowheads to be used for sawing or
knife cutting.
Wiant says all of this "connecting of the
past" work changed significantly throughout
the world of archaeology when, in 1950,
radioactive dating was discovered. This
process is so accurate that they can get
results, they believe, within 60-70 years
Wiant spoke of the upward grade along
Interstate 55 from Lawndale to Bloomington
where the last ice age stopped on its
southward movement through Illinois.
Scientists ascertain this by dating rocks
that were pushed along and over by these
glacial occurrences that swept through
Illinois, going as far south as the
Carbondale area, in the first glacial age.
He said that prior to 20,000 years ago
there were no humans in the Americas. Then,
he said, peoples from Asia were probably the
first inhabitants, trekking across the
Alaskan connection down through Canada into
the West Coast regions and on down into
South America, all the way to Chile, where
excavated artifacts show these people came
from Asia, not Europe. This occurred around
10,000-15,000 years ago when these Asian
Indians hunted bison. Several skeletal bison
have been found with arrowheads lodged in
their bones. He spoke of these natives
having domesticated dogs around 8,500 years
ago.
The director spoke of the very important
discovery by these Indians of cultivation of
plants, which became crops good for
sustenance about 1,000 years ago. He
remarked that this is the "big reason we are
all here." Along with this was the discovery
of containers to cook, serve and store these
plant foods, primarily with the invention of
ceramic (clay) pots. Previously, weavers
made baskets that could even hold water, but
cooking containers created an entirely
different world.
Wiant spoke of the bow and arrow
invention that revolutionized Indian hunting
and warfare. This invention "went from the
East Coast to the West Coast very quickly,"
he said.
He said that maize was invented about 500
A.D., but that led to health problems which
caused tremendous diseases and the wiping
out of entire tribes over the years.
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Wiant talked more about the Illinois
Indians, saying that it was primarily the
Kickapoo Indians who roamed this state from
1700 to 1800. The Potawatomies and Iroquois
were also in our area, the latter laying
waste to the Starved Rock region in the
early 19th century. He said that the
Iroquois took about 600 native prisoners
back to the New York State area.
The Dickson Mounds director
spoke of Gen. Benjamin Harrison, later a
U.S. president, making a very important
treaty with the Indians that freed all of
the Illinois region to white settlers. When
Harrison signed the 1809 Treaty of Fort
Wayne with several native tribes, the United
States acquired 3 million acres of land,
which included the Indiana and Illinois
territories, with a single document.
Wiant told of an important discovery of a
Native American community near Broadwell
when I-55 was being built in the 1970s.
A Mr. C.C. Ewing of Lawndale described
what the local central Illinois Native
Americans looked like in the early 1800s.
Wiant said that by 1837, the Indians were
pretty much gone from Illinois, with the
Black Hawk War of 1832 hastening this
process. He spoke of the "Trail of Death" of
the Potawatomies from South Bend, Ind.,
through central Illinois and southern Logan
County on to Kansas in 1838.
[By PHIL
BERTONI]
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