ARCHEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS IN MISSOURI 10 



DESCRIPTION OF SITES AND ARTIFACTS 

 THE RENNER SITE 



Line Creek is a small formerly perennial stream emptying into 

 the Missouri from the north about 4 miles above the mouth of the 

 Kansas River and an equal distance below Parkville. Heading in 

 the rolling uplands along the Platte-Clay County boundary about 6 

 miles north of the river, the lower 3 miles of its course parallel this 

 line about half a mile or slightly more to the west. Like the neigh- 

 boring creeks east and west, it flows in a gradually deepening valley 

 about half a mile wide whose lower portion is characterized by a 

 narrow intrenched channel, a flood plain of limited extent, and rela- 

 tively broad discontinuous terraces. Timber-covered bluffs overlook 

 the valley from both sides. About 400 yards west of the junction of 

 highways U. S. 71 and Missouri 45, the creek leaves its own valley to 

 follow an artificial channel southward past Riverside Racetrack across 

 the flood plain of the Missouri, which it joins in less than a mile. 

 Probably the recent straightening and shortening of its lower course 

 with the resultant increase in stream velocity and cutting power 

 farther up was at least partially responsible for its deep intrenchment. 



Since the course of the creek is from north to south, whereas the 

 Missouri trends almost due east, the latter cuts squarely across the 

 smaller valley and its bordering upland ridges. The ridges termi- 

 nate in steep southward-facing bluffs about 150 feet high. Their 

 limestone bases may be visualized as bulwarks that deflected the 

 Missouri past the Line Creek embayment at those times in the recent 

 past when the current flowed along the north edge of the present 

 flood plain. Characteristically, as on most other side valleys here. 

 a series of terraces begins as soon as the bluffs afford protection from 

 the vagaries of the Missouri. 



A scant 300 yards north of the protecting bluff line, in the middle 

 of Line Creek Valley, is the Renner site. It occupies a well-drained 

 convenient terrace (pis. 1, 2) with the creek to the east and south, 

 Juntin Branch to the north, and a timbered ridge to the west. At 

 present, Juntin Branch touches the site only at its northern tip. 

 Until 25 or 30 years ago it skirted the base of the village terrace for 

 nearly a hundred feet miore, thence looping back toward the northeast 

 to empty into Line Creek about as now. Its course today is due to 

 artificial straightening of the channel through the neck of the old 

 meander, now discernible only as a shallow swale and wet weather 

 pond. Between the terrace (elev. ca. 764+ feet) and Line Creek, 

 south of the former bed of Juntin Branch, is a patch of bottom land 

 (elev. ca. 750 feet) including perhaps 6 or 7 acres. In 1937, part of 

 this was in corn, the rest deep in native prairie grasses and pasture. 

 Another fine terrace fronted by arable bottoms lies just north of 



