Land of the lost: Museum in Overton features Southwest history

Thursday, Aug. 22, 2002 | 8:23 a.m.

Little moves on the grounds of the Lost City Museum on a weekday afternoon in August. At 100-plus degrees the shaded picnic area is quiet. The split-level parking lot is empty.

This time of year most tourists aren't interested in taking the excursion 60 miles northeast of Las Vegas even though the excessive temperatures add to the allure of the adobe (and air-conditioned) museum built in 1935.

"We always get our European visitors in the summer," Kathryne Olson, director of the Lost City Museum in Overton, says while standing in the museum's original wing.

"They've seen the Western movies. And the Indian culture is very popular in Europe and Asia."

The Lost City Museum is home to artifacts left behind by communities that thrived in the area as far back as 3,000 years ago.

From the archaic hunters and gatherers to the Basketmakers to the Pueblos, the societies used what resources they had in the area. They traveled. They traded. They hunted. Some farmed and mined salt. Then they disappeared.

"The first mystery is whether these people developed out of a desert group or whether populations moved here," Olson says. "The next mystery is where did they go when they left."

Much of what was left behind can be found inside the museum: pottery, baskets, toys, hunting tools, jewelry and canteens.

The museum also features geological and Paiute exhibits (Paiutes came to the area in 1000 A.D.). The museum's back wing was built in 1981 around a pueblo foundation excavated by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1935.

Re-creations of an underground "pit home" and an above-ground pueblo home were built on original foundations on the grounds.

Officially known as Pueblo Grande de Nevada, the area was named Lost City by New York archaeologist M.R. Harrington, who began excavating the stretch of Anasazi ruins in 1924.

"He would call it Nevada's Lost City because it was more romantic," Olson said. "And over the years that's what it became."

The area was originally home to people known as the Basketmakers who lived in open areas, made baskets, hunted and gathered.

Late Basketmakers farmed and lived in pit dwellings 2,000 years ago. Pueblo cultures lived in the area around 600 A.D. in above-ground housing made of adobe.

They used the nearby Valley of Fire for hunting sheep, tortoise and rabbits. They made tools from stone, bone, shell and wood. They painted their pottery. They boiled and roasted their food.

Yucca plants were used for soap, fiber and as a source of food.

"They ate the hearts of the yucca," Olson said. "There's a meaty center. It's kind of potato-like. They would roast it.

"They knew how to get along in their environment and they used most of it."

Archaeology

More than 150 archaeological sites have been discovered along the Virgin and Muddy rivers.

The ruins were first noted in the early 1800s. In 1924 Nevada Gov. James Scrugham heard about the artifacts found along the Muddy River and contacted Harrington, who determined they were from Pueblo cultures. Until then, nobody thought Pueblo Indians lived west of the Colorado River.

Archaeologist Eva Jensen is currently sifting through artifacts collected during excavations in the 1980s and '90s, when developers were building throughout the area. She said trying to understand the full story of the Anasazi and what they believed and how they lived, is like putting a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle together with only a small number of pieces.

"We'll never know everything," Jensen said. "So much has been lost already."

For some visitors, the mystery adds to the appeal.

"People are always more fascinated by the unknown," Jensen said. "And we get a lot of visitors from everywhere. People from almost every country."

What they do know at the museum is that the Anasazi would use the area for its resources, leave and return later.

"We think that in the hot times the natives left the valley," she said. "I'm sure that there were people who did stay here because their crops had to be watered somehow."

When human remains are encountered during excavations, Olson said the local Pauite Tribe is contacted regarding their removal.

"You have to walk a fine line," Olson said. Even with artifacts, some people say they should be left to return to the Earth.

An excursion

After 67 years the rustic museum that was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps to house the artifacts shows no sign of wear.

"It's amazing that we're still standing after 67 years," Olson said. "You can walk in here and you get the feeling of a museum (in) a museum."

Though still popular in its peak seasons, attendance at the museum has dwindled over the years, a circumstance caused by the increasing number of family attractions on the Strip, Olson said.

"We get about 30,000 visitors a year," she added. "We used to get about 45,000.

"It used to be if you came to Las Vegas there wasn't a lot for a family to do. Now there are a lot of things for families to do."

For Las Vegas residents, however, the drive to the museum can be a refreshing change from strip malls and gated subdivisions.

Today the agricultural towns of Logandale and Overton have all the small-town markings: open yards, tire swings, livestock, crops, hay bales, a one-screen movie theater, an ice cream shop and a deli.

Said Olson, "It makes a nice trip."