Post by lizs on Jan 4, 2009 14:21:38 GMT -6
Hi, I figured it's about time I actually registered here. Great place! I've e-mailed with Diane before on a couple topics over the years.
My story: I started solo traveling in the West around 1996-ish. Wasn't quite 40 yet. I recall running into a guy at a phone booth in Cheyenne (ahh pre-cell phone mania! lol). He was from New York. Said he'd flown out to visit locations from the "Indian Wars." Hmmm, I thought. Weird... but kinda interesting...
Flash forward: I developed interests in nature, the West and its many facets, backpacking, archaeology (am really into rock art), geocaching (you'd be surprised where geocaching has taken me and the discoveries I've made
), visiting units of the National Park System and, yes, Indian Wars. I'd never realized how the Civil War just kind of segued into the West and the Indian Wars. (Oh and I LOVE "Dances with Wolves!" 
)
Over the past few years through the Passport in Time (PIT) archaeology and historic restoration program of the U.S. Forest Service, I've looked for and helped document rock art twice in the vicinity of Edgemont, SD (where plains meet the southern canyons of the Black Hills); did a pedestrian survey looking for Cavalry artifacts at Warbonnet Creek in NW Nebraska (we found what was apparently a homesteader's Cavalry pin from the Spanish-American War) - oh yeah and Paul Horsted came to talk to us about that one-on-one skirmish; hunted for various Indian and other artifacts in the Slim Buttes of NW South Dakota (we thought we found a piece of a bayonet, but now it seems it wasn't); and last summer, talking myself out of a rock art foray into the Cave Hills of NW SD (hey, I can do without the uranium tailings awaiting clean-up even if it was a wet year and mebbee was safer), I instead went to the Devil's Tower vicinity in NE Wyoming to look for remnants of an antelope drive line and trap.
In 2006 I immersed myself at Little Bighorn during anniversary events, taking the tour, seeing the movie (maybe twice?!?), and going to both battle re-inactment shows. (They kind of feel like being at a Buffalo Bill Wild West show, I imagine...) I've been to various other battle and fort locations. This summer I visited Fort Laramie, which has been on my list... and then also, unawares, wandered across a historical sign documenting the Custer expedition going through the area near near Aladdin, Wyoming (I was visiting a historic coal tipple near there) . On a trip to South Dakota over Thanksgiving, I was able to visit a monument on private property on the Pine Ridge Reservation honoring a Ghost Dancer who was on a raiding trip from the Stronghold Table when he was killed by a rancher. I'm very interested in Wounded Knee and have been to that cemetery a few times. I have not yet been to Sitting Bull's momument... thought I might make it over Thanksgiving, but went farther south instead.
Geocaching (of all things!) introduced me to Minnesota's own Indian Wars... and also took me to another spot at Pine Ridge Reservation that few know of... to the Slim Buttes... and to that coal tipple mentioned above... as well as pioneer graves of children in the Bear Lodge Mts. of the Black Hills, far off the beaten path.
Also, I'm a photographer... and a local news editor at two weeklies. Additionally, I write a weekly column about just the sorts of things I noted above. ;D
Anyhooooooo.... that's my background. I look forward to observing the experts and diehard amateurs in all endeavors on this board. And I'll look at a possible trip to Little Bighorn, although I've heard rumours of PITs dealing with rock art in the Black Hills again this summer. Vacation time is just too short!!
;D
My story: I started solo traveling in the West around 1996-ish. Wasn't quite 40 yet. I recall running into a guy at a phone booth in Cheyenne (ahh pre-cell phone mania! lol). He was from New York. Said he'd flown out to visit locations from the "Indian Wars." Hmmm, I thought. Weird... but kinda interesting...
Flash forward: I developed interests in nature, the West and its many facets, backpacking, archaeology (am really into rock art), geocaching (you'd be surprised where geocaching has taken me and the discoveries I've made
), visiting units of the National Park System and, yes, Indian Wars. I'd never realized how the Civil War just kind of segued into the West and the Indian Wars. (Oh and I LOVE "Dances with Wolves!" 
)Over the past few years through the Passport in Time (PIT) archaeology and historic restoration program of the U.S. Forest Service, I've looked for and helped document rock art twice in the vicinity of Edgemont, SD (where plains meet the southern canyons of the Black Hills); did a pedestrian survey looking for Cavalry artifacts at Warbonnet Creek in NW Nebraska (we found what was apparently a homesteader's Cavalry pin from the Spanish-American War) - oh yeah and Paul Horsted came to talk to us about that one-on-one skirmish; hunted for various Indian and other artifacts in the Slim Buttes of NW South Dakota (we thought we found a piece of a bayonet, but now it seems it wasn't); and last summer, talking myself out of a rock art foray into the Cave Hills of NW SD (hey, I can do without the uranium tailings awaiting clean-up even if it was a wet year and mebbee was safer), I instead went to the Devil's Tower vicinity in NE Wyoming to look for remnants of an antelope drive line and trap.
In 2006 I immersed myself at Little Bighorn during anniversary events, taking the tour, seeing the movie (maybe twice?!?), and going to both battle re-inactment shows. (They kind of feel like being at a Buffalo Bill Wild West show, I imagine...) I've been to various other battle and fort locations. This summer I visited Fort Laramie, which has been on my list... and then also, unawares, wandered across a historical sign documenting the Custer expedition going through the area near near Aladdin, Wyoming (I was visiting a historic coal tipple near there) . On a trip to South Dakota over Thanksgiving, I was able to visit a monument on private property on the Pine Ridge Reservation honoring a Ghost Dancer who was on a raiding trip from the Stronghold Table when he was killed by a rancher. I'm very interested in Wounded Knee and have been to that cemetery a few times. I have not yet been to Sitting Bull's momument... thought I might make it over Thanksgiving, but went farther south instead.
Geocaching (of all things!) introduced me to Minnesota's own Indian Wars... and also took me to another spot at Pine Ridge Reservation that few know of... to the Slim Buttes... and to that coal tipple mentioned above... as well as pioneer graves of children in the Bear Lodge Mts. of the Black Hills, far off the beaten path.
Also, I'm a photographer... and a local news editor at two weeklies. Additionally, I write a weekly column about just the sorts of things I noted above. ;D
Anyhooooooo.... that's my background. I look forward to observing the experts and diehard amateurs in all endeavors on this board. And I'll look at a possible trip to Little Bighorn, although I've heard rumours of PITs dealing with rock art in the Black Hills again this summer. Vacation time is just too short!!
;D 
