Book Description

The Fairchild site (LA 45732) is a huge archeological site covering an area of at least one-half by one-quarter mile on a west slope alluvial fan of the Sacramento Mountains. This report covers limited surface collection and subsurface testing of a 1500 ft long section of a 50 ft wide right-of-way through the site. The right of wells to Holloman Air Force Base. This report contains the results of archeological testing by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Albuquerque District, in November 1983, and also by the Office of Contract Archeology in May 1984. Systematic 10 percent surface collection shows that archeological materials are scattered across the right-of-way, with some areas of much greater material density. These high-density areas are primarily discrete concentrations of fire-cracked rock, ranging from less than 1 m to more than 4 m in diameter. Subsurface test excavations uncovered no subsurface features within the right-of-way, not even beneath the fire-cracked rock concentrations. Analysis of the recovered artifacts and ecofacts reveal that the right-of-way area was used by groups of hunter-gatherers on a scheduled round of seasonal mobility. We suspect that it was used primarily as a location for roasting succulents during the spring. Mesquite may also have been procured and processed at the site during the fall.