Saturday, April 10, 2010

Historical marker (UPDATED)


Today while driving up WV State Route 2 along the Ohio River, I saw this historical marker just below the community of Gallipolis Ferry. I don't remember seeing it before, and judging from the freshness of the paint and the dirt around the base, it must be new.


This was the first I had heard of Adena burial mounds in Mason County WV. It doesn't surprise me that they are there, but I now must wonder where. This marker is surrounded by land that has been farmed for generations. I looked around and didn't see anything that obviously looked like a mound.

That's a task for another day.

FURTHER THOUGHTS, NOW THAT I'VE SLEPT ON IT:

I remember now that when the canal was built at the Gallipolis Locks and Dam in the late 1980s and early 1990s, they had do do some excavation in the "plow zone" of that area. And in 1978, I did a story about some students from WVU doing some excavations and searching in farmland on the upper end of Point Pleasant. So yeah, now I remember, but it's never been made a big deal of. Maybe this marker will help change that.