Archaeological Dig: Group Takes a look Into the Past

LINN COUNTY – Dozens turned back the hands of time.   

Representatives from the State Archeologists Office, the Iowa Archaeological Society and a group of Wickiup Hill Summer Camp Kids took part in a dig at Wickiup Hill Thursday.

"We're not really sure what we're going to find here,” said Iowa Archaeological Society President Donald Raker.

Layer by layer archeologists looked for clues.

They sifted through piles of earth to find answers about who used to live on this land.

"People have been living on this terrace for thousands of years on and this will give us a glimpse of what's in the terrace,” said Archaeologist Lynn Alex with the Office of the State Archaeologist.

"So far we've been finding some flakes, which are the byproducts of making a sharp tool. We have found a spear,” said Wickiup Hill Outdoor Learning Center Conservation Education Specialist Gail Barels.

Everything searchers found traced back to Native Americans.

The biggest find was that spear point.

"The point we found yesterday could date back 3,000 [to] 5,000 years,” Alex said.

Cael Joens helped discover it as part of his summer camp.

"I just feel like, we're all pretty proud that we found a big part of Iowa history that originated a long time ago,” Joens said.

But the work isn't easy; it's tedious especially in the heat.

"It's hard, it's challenging. It's really hard actually,” Joens said.

This group knows, however, this isn't the end of the challenging work.

There are still many more clues to our history to discover at Wickiup Hill.

"We have continuously about 600 acres here, which will take many years, many, many years to study,” Barels said.

The archaeological dig lasts through July 8.

After that, they'll take all of their pieces to a lab where they'll be tested and studied even further.