NO. 2 SALVAGE PROGRAM, I95O-I95I — COOPER 83 



Inasmuch as in 1951 no dams were under construction in Montana 

 that were then believed to constitute a serious archeological salvage 

 problem, Montana State University agreed to put a party into the 

 Garrison Reservoir, where the time when many sites would be lost 

 through inundation was drawing inexorably nearer. Garrison was 

 selected from among the high-priority reservoirs because of the prob- 

 ability that, in view of its location, it would yield materials relating 

 to Montana archeological problems, properly the first concern of the 

 Montana institution. Carling Malouf, with 10 student helpers, exca- 

 vated in 3 small camp sites on the right side of the Missouri River in 

 Mercer County during the period June 12 to August i. The three 

 sites (32ME43, 32ME54, and 32ME55), although differing widely 

 in productiveness, were similar in their topographic situations, lack 

 of evidence for dwellings or other structures, and the general nature 

 of the occupations represented. All were found along the edges of 

 low terraces bordering the river bottoms and in at least two there was 

 evidence, in the presence of sterile lenses separating occupational 

 deposits, that the use of the location was intermittent. The artifact 

 complexes appear to have been similar at the three sites and in their 

 various levels, except that White trade materials were confined to the 

 higher deposits and at one site (32ME43) pottery was absent in the 

 lower ones. This last situation may, however, be explainable in terms 

 of the very small quantity of cultural materials of any kind recovered. 



Fire hearths were found to characterize all the sites and were espe- 

 cially numerous in 32ME43. They were of three kinds; unprepared 

 surface fireplaces, basins averaging about 25 inches in diameter and 

 7 inches in depth, and relatively deep pits with fairly straight walls 

 containing fire-cracked stones. Clusters of stones and concentrated 

 areas of fragmented bones were distributed through the deposits, and 

 it was near these and the hearths that most of the pottery was found. 

 Chipped-stone artifacts, predominantly of "Knife River flint," in- 

 cluded side-notched and, rarely, corner-notched points, knives, and 

 scrapers. The pottery is reported by Malouf to be of the "Mandan- 

 Hidatsa-Arikara tradition." 



The evidence reported from these three sites suggests that they 

 are all locations that were occupied briefly and intermittently by 

 small parties, probably from larger, relatively settled communities 

 in the region, engaged in hunting or gathering activities. 



SOUTH DAKOTA 



Owing to the magnitude of the salvage task in the Fort Randall 

 Reservoir and the rapidly dwindling time remaining to accomplish it, 



