382 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 194 5 



the Pimas, resident in the district, and received the reply, "Ho-ho- 

 kam!" meaning nothing more nor less than "those who have 

 vanished." The canals and the adjacent ruins already were aban- 

 doned and ancient as far back as Pima tradition carried. 



Thanks to archeological researches sponsored by the University of 

 Arizona, the city of Phoenix, Gila Pueblo of Globe, Arizona, the 

 Bureau of American Ethnology, and other agencies, the erstwhile 

 forgotten annals of the Canal Builders in great part have been 

 recovered and recorded. This is particularly true of the material 

 aspects of their culture. 



As indicated by their numerous irrigation canals, the Hohokam 

 peoples were agriculturists. In and adjacent to the Salt River Valley 

 there are the ruins of some 20 ancient farming communities, each 

 with its central communal adobe structure, with perhaps half that 

 number in the valley of the Gila. The most impressive of these ruins 

 in the Gila drainage is the noted Casa Grande, now preserved as a 

 national monument. 



Outstanding in the Salt River Valley is Pueblo Grande, a part of 

 the park system of the city of Phoenix, located just east of the city 

 limits. Here the enterprising capital city of Arizona has erected an 

 anthropological laboratory in which is housed a museum of the 

 Hohokam culture, workrooms and laboratories, accommodations for 

 visiting anthropologists and students, and living quarters for the 

 director of the laboratory, who also has the title of city archeologist. 

 During the months of February and March 1944 the author had the 

 pleasure of being a guest at the laboratory, with unusual opportunity 

 for studying the Hohokam culture at first hand. 



A brief description of Pueblo Grande ruin and its adjacent farming 

 community will serve as an index to the culture as a whole, which 

 is quite homogeneous throughout the area of its occurrence. 



The ruin of the Pueblo Grande community structure, adjacent to 

 the laboratory, is a more or less rectangular truncated mound of 

 earth and stone, some 150 feet in width and 300 feet in length with 

 an approximate height of 30 feet. It has been partially excavated by 

 Director Halseth and his associates and students, and proved to 

 consist of a large number of rooms or compartments of varying sizes. 

 The walls and partitions are constructed of flat stones and boulders 

 imbedded in adobe clay, with roofs of logs, poles, brush, and adobe. 

 Enclosing the structure, and built from similar materials, was a high 

 wall. Entrance to the resulting compound presumably was by means 

 of ladders. The structure and its compound served the community 

 as a granary and storehouse for their corn, beans, squash, and other 

 products and possessions, and as a safe retreat from marauding 

 tribesmen from outside their borders. The great size of the structure 



