l8o SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 93 



rounding hills shall prove to be due to human agency, this was a period 

 when the upper valley was generally uninhabited. With the forma- 

 tion of the present level of the upper valley and the resumption of 

 drainage by the recent stream (Sterns Creek) the flat was reoccupied 

 by another people, those of the " rectangular earth lodges " (Nebraska 

 culture). How long they occupied the site or how many houses 

 they may have had in the vicinity is uncertain, owing to still later 

 changes. That they were entirely prehistoric is evidenced by the fact 

 that in none of the very numerous Nebraska culture houses excavated 

 in the past 20 years has any trace of Caucasian contact been en- 

 countered. Besides the remains clearly pertaining to the rectangular 

 lodge dwellers of the Nebraska culture, a few other artifacts have 

 been found on the surface of the flat which may be connected with 

 still another culture. Hence we have at this place clear evidence of 

 two distinct occupations — that of the Sterns Creek culture and later 

 of the Nebraska and a related culture, all three groups being 

 prehistoric. 



With the coming of the whites the valley underwent still further 

 changes. The flat was plowed and all surface evidence of the earth- 

 lodge pits gradually destroyed, though the cultural debris from these 

 sites still testifies to their former presence. Later the drainage ditch 

 was dug directly east to the river (fig. 24) and with a shortened and 

 direct drainage Sterns Creek began to cut down into the alluvial fill 

 of the flat, thus forming the present deep, narrow gully. In this way 

 portions of the deeply covered human habitation levels and small sec- 

 tions of the older stream bed were once more exposed. This is the 

 history of the site so far as our present imperfect knowledge extends. 

 Such an interpretation of the evidence adds little to that already pre- 

 sented by Sterns (1915), but has the value of corroboration based on 

 independent observation and excavation. 



NEBRASKA CULTURE (SURFACE DEPOSITS) 



Since two definite levels of human occupation have been distin- 

 guished at the Walker Gilmore site, we will discuss the cultural evi- 

 dence from each separately, taking up first the material recovered 

 from the present ground level of the flat. Owing to the activity of 

 Sterns and of local collectors since that time, the surface material in 

 the plowed fields (see " corn field," fig. 24) is rather scarce. How- 

 ever, a rather brief time spent in surface collecting there in the spring 

 of 1931 yielded 105 potsherds and a small amount of worked stone. 

 In general this pottery was very uniform, save for certain exceptions 



