SECRETARY'S REPORT 75 



rison Reservoir basin, near Hazen, N. Dak., a few miles above the dam 

 site. Rock Village was reputedly occupied in the late eighteenth 

 century by the Hidatsa. During the field season, which terminated 

 November 3, five house floors had been uncovered and a number of 

 other features investigated. A party under the direction of Donald 

 D. Hartle resumed work at that location early in June. Additional 

 house floors were being uncovered and a number of cache pits had been 

 cleaned of their accumulated debris. The artifact yield was proving 

 satisfactory and the specimens should add to the picture of the Plains 

 culture as a whole. Rock Village is particularly interesting because 

 it presumably was the most northerly of the fortified earth-lodge vil- 

 lages belonging to the period preceding the replacement of aboriginal 

 material culture by trade goods obtained from the white man. 



A second party, under the direction of G. H. Smith, was sent to 

 the Garrison Reservoir in June to study the site of Fort Stevenson, one 

 of the important military posts in that area during the period 1867 

 to 1883. The post was located a few miles above the dam site on 

 the left side of the Missouri River. By the end of the year the founda- 

 tions of the post hospital had been traced and excavations had been 

 started on the site of the south barracks. There is considerable docu- 

 mentary information about Fort Stevenson, but knowledge of the 

 post will be considerably broadened by the study of its actual location 

 and remains. 



At the beginning of the fiscal year excavations were being conducted 

 at the Tiber Reservoir on the Marias River in Montana by a party 

 under the supervision of W. D. Enger. Two of the sites investigated 

 were occupation levels attributable to a simple hunting culture. They 

 were characterized for the most part by hearths ; charcoal ; bones from 

 bison, deer, and smaller mammals ; and scattered chips of stone with an 

 occasional artifact. The cultural levels began approximately 2 to 4 

 feet beneath the present surface, and in one of them a rock-ringed 

 hearth about 2 feet in diameter was found 7i/2 feet below the surface. 

 The yield from both sites was small, but there is sufficient evidence 

 to indicate that the area was not heavily populated and that the peo- 

 ple were dependent for the most part on the hunt for their subsistence. 

 Other sites examined, but not extensively dug, included tipi-ring 

 clusters, bison kills, and surface camp sites. Sites such as that con- 

 taining the deeply buried hearth may contribute important informa- 

 tion on the rate of deposition in the area in question. When materials 

 from the low level are correlated with those from other districts, it 

 may be possible to determine the lapse of time since the fire pits were 

 built and used. 



Paleontological and geological investigations were continued in 

 the Missouri Basin during the year. In the summer of 1950 a party 

 under Dr. Theodore E. White explored Tertiary deposits in reservoir 



