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Welcome to Exploring the Ancient Southwest
When most of us think of the Ancient Southwest, we think of mysterious stone Cliff Palaces tucked into large caves in the sides of sheer sandstone cliffs such as those at Mesa Verde.
Or we think of the engineering feats that built the four-story Pueblo Bonito city structure in Chaco Canyon.
But there are many more aspects of the Ancient Southwest that the Camp program is uncovering to share with students and families online.
Did you know the REALLY Ancient Southwest used to be connected to the single continent called Pangaea?
And that for millions of years dinosaurs roamed the Southwest region of that massive continent in the Mesozoic Era? And it might surprise you to know that for a lot of that period, the shores of the Pacific Ocean actually lapped up against what is now the Sierras and along the edges of the Arizona and Utah regions? Life was very different in the Ancient Southwest in these very ancient times … and the study of that time is a fascinating adventure into the fossil record including dinosaurs, ancient plants, petrified wood, and incredible geologic change. The first trees were ancient Sequoias, while ferns, horsetails, and cycads created a green under story in the forest and across the plains. The first flowering plants - like the magnolia - first began to form and bloom in the Ancient Southwest in this very ancient, distant time.
As the continents moved around, and drifted into the places we now know them today, their shifting caused tremendous geologic pressure on
the Ancient Southwest - so much pressure that the Sierra Nevada and Rocky Mountains formed, and the Colorado Plateau of the Four Corners was
lifted a mile in the sky. But even more astounding, the rock at the bottom of the Grand Canyon pre-dates all of this to 1.7 billion -
not million - years ago, and the rivers that have carved this and other magnificent sandstone canyons in the Southwest are now providing us with a chance to see time revealed on a scale so vast that it is nearly unimaginable.
By the time the first human inhabitants arrived, it was the Ice Age and massive mammoths, lions twice their size today, and horses the size of large dogs lived in the Ancient Southwest. There are signs that the first people were hunting and preparing these now-extinct mammals over 30,000 years ago in the Ancient Southwest. In fact, the Clovis and Folsom peoples who left evidence of their Ice Age hunting all over North America are named after finds first discovered right in the Southwest, which was then at the warmer, southern end of the massive ice sheets spreading down from the arctic.
Following these Ice Age hunters, as the climate changed, the ice melted, and the size of game grew smaller, the Archaic people lived in the Southwest, using caves for homes, and hunting and gathering. They were followed by the Basketmakers who developed five important technologies that changed life forever in the ancient world - basketry, agriculture, first permanent houses and villages, pottery, and the bow and arrow. As the diet changed, the housing changed, and as pottery was developed, the health of the people improved by allowing them to boil and store their three life-giving crops - corn, squash and beans.
From their pit houses, the Basketmakers rose to create the beautiful stone cliff houses, large ceremonial kivas, and cities linked by vast road networks. In the south, the people perfected acres-wide adobe villages and towns with ceremonial mounds, ball courts, and the marvel of vast irrigation canal systems to help overcome the arid land. Known as the Ancestral Puebloans (the new wording replacing Anasazi), Mimbres, Hohokum, Salado, Sinagua, these people left behind a marvelous legacy we will be exploring together in Camp Internet.
Do you know that the largest city - one with a sophisticated water canal and sewage system - that was a major trade hub for the Ancient Southwest, was 27xs as large as Pueblo Bonito? Few people know of this amazing city that covered 88 acres and controlled an area over 50 miles in diameter. This lost city has been rediscovered and it is in the northern region of Mexico, 100 miles south of the New Mexico border. Called Paquime, this city held thousands of people, raised parrots from the tropical south to trade for turquoise, shells, and copper, and influenced the lives of people in a larger region known as Casa Grandes.
And what became of these ancient peoples? Their ancestors live on today in the Pueblos along he Rio Grande and in Indian tribal nations across the southwest. Camp Internet will be introducing their traditional, ancient legacy of art, dance, crafts, and ceremonial practices so we can all better understand how the ancient world is still alive with us today. We will also learn about the artists and writers who have come to the Southwest and who have walked in the footsteps of the ancient ones - Georgia O'Keefe, Zane Grey, Edward Abbey - these 20th century figures brought the Southwest to light for millions of people all over the world.
Camp Internet's Explore the Ancient Southwest includes the geology, paleontology, ecology, weather, archaeoastronomy, plant and animal, and human life that have shaped in this remarkable region for million, even billion of years. Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, Western Texas, Northern Mexico, Baja California, Southern California and Nevada are today part of the region the Camp is studying in the big picture of the Ancient Southwest. From the Channel Islands of the coast of California with their 13,000-year-old human bones, to the youth in the Pueblos today, we will be learning some mind-boggling facts, and some astounding insights into what life has been like across the vast time embodied in the Ancient Southwest.