Society Activities

Rock Art Task Force

2007 Rock Art Report – by Teddy Stickney

This year the Rock Art Recording Group has been busy.

March 2007 we were in the Panhandle recording 3 sites.  The first site was a site that we had been trying to locate since 2006, Brown’s Camp.  This site was recorded by Kirkland; in the book, “Rock Art of the Texas Indians,” it was located at Brown’s Camp.  We had been to the ranch house at Brown’s camp visiting with the foreman asking about the site.  We showed him the photograph in the book, but he replied that he hadn't seen any formation like this.  We sent out the word around the Panhandle and received a confirmation of the site being on the Canadian River Ranch.  Rolla Shaller contacted the foreman and he replied that he knew what site we were trying to find.

We did get to the site and record it.  It is at the location known as Otis’s Rock or Castle Rock.  We also looked at two other sites that the ranch foreman knew about, so we got the two more sites recorded.  Being in March, we were hampered by weather; Mother Nature thought it would fun to rain.  We had driven on the canyon floors to reach these sites, so we were anxious about being able to get out if it rained very hard.  Also we couldn’t write on wet paper.  So every time a shower came through, we found ourselves sitting in the truck waiting.

We finished the recording in the Panhandle a day earlier than planned, so we spent one day in the archives of the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum researching field notes and photographs for rock art sites.  There were a number of sites, but the notations on the photographs didn’t give us a clue as to where they are located.  So more research on these collections is needed.  We wish to thank the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum staff for letting us do this research on such a short notice.

July 2007 found us in the Comstock, Texas, area recording a shelter having the Lower Pecos Style, Red Monochrome, and Red Linear.  It was important to get this site mapped.  We did some wading in standing/slow flowing spring water to reach some of the pictographs.  We finished the site in five days.  The group wishes to thank SHUMLA School for letting us camp out at their facilities.

We will try to record three sites in the Seminole State Park for the Holiday week.

We are working with Tom Alex of the Big Bend National Park to setup a recording session in the park in March 2008.