ANCIENT MOUNDS IN JOHNSON COUNTY. IOWA. 



By Clement L. Webster, Charles City, Iowa, 



Johnson County occupies a position in the southeastern portion of the 

 State. Its topography is peculiarly that of loess regions, being for the 

 most part a very rolling and (along the streams) broken prairie country. 

 This area is watered by the Iowa Eiver and its tributaries. The Iowa 

 is a beautiful meandering stream. Entering the county near its north- 

 west corner, it flows almost due east to the center of the county, where 

 it abruptly turns and continues its course through the region in a south 

 by southeast direction. The valley of the Iowa Eiver and its tributaries 

 is relatively narrow and deep, and bordered by more or less steep 

 acclivities and flanked at frequent intervals by deep but narrow and 

 rapidly ascending ravines. 



The immediate valley of the Iowa Eiver attains an average width of 

 slightly over one-half of a mile, and its channel has been eroded to a 

 depth varying from 50 to over 175 feet below the valley borders. The 

 small tributaries have also eroded their course to a depth of from 10 to 

 80 feet. There are no exte-usive marshes or swamp«. 



The soil of the area is for the most part a yellow homogeneous loess, 

 and is of quite inferior quality for farming and the production of the 

 cereals compared with the rich black drift soil of other portions of the 

 State to the north. 



The valley of the Iowa, especially in the northern half of the county, 

 with its heavy skirting of timber, fluted sides, and often bold escarp- 

 ments of Devonian rock, is perhapsone of the most beautiful regions in 

 the State. 



This valley was once the seat of a populous settlement of the mound- 

 builders, as is evidenced by their remains. Of these silent records of a 

 long vanished race the most important as well as the most legible are 

 the earthen mounds which cover the bones and dust of their dead. 

 They crown many of the peaks and ridges of the bluffs, most of them 

 assuming only moderate proportions while large numbers are mere 

 swellings of the surface not readily recognized as being of artificial ori 

 gin — this arising mainly from the degradation by the plow. 



H. Mis. 600 38 593 



