Lake treasures tell storied history of the Coosa and its people
Story by Roxann Edsall
Photos by David Smith and Courtesy of Archaeological Research, The University of Alabama
Have you ever found an arrowhead or broken pottery on your property and began to wonder about the history of the place on which you stood?
Maybe you started picturing a Native American encampment near the banks of the river. You might have even imagined what the river might have looked like thousands of years ago when the first Native Americans arrived in North America and the American Mastodon and giant ground sloths still roamed Alabama.
Without a doubt, there is much notable history documented around Logan Martin and Neely Henry lakes. For thousands of years the ancestors of the Mvskoke (Creek) people inhabited the area and left behind pottery sherds, arrowheads and other projectile points. Building towns and cities, these people raised their families along the banks of the river and traded their available goods for those they needed.
Protecting and preserving items that surface on the edges of Logan Martin and Neely Henry is coordinated through the efforts of Alabama Power’s Environmental Affairs department. Bill Gardner has worked for over 20 years in environmental affairs for the company, and he shared with members of the Logan Martin Lake Protection Association examples of items that have been found in and around the lake over the last several decades.
“Around the Coosa, we’ve found pipes, soap stones, nutting stones, grinding bowls, round scrapers, fishhooks made of bone, and lots of pottery,” shared Gardner.
“While most of the items collected by our archaeologists are safely stored for use by researchers and future generations, we often make reproductions of projectile points and vessels so we can share with people what they would have looked like and discuss how they would have been used. Tammy Beane, a Ft. Payne artist, recreates the pottery vessels based on her extensive research into the manufacturing techniques and designs created by the original indigenous artists.”
Most of the original artifacts are stored at the Erskine Ramsay Repository in Moundville, Alabama. The center is run by The University of Alabama Museums. The museum’s Office of Archaeological Research is one of the contractors Alabama Power Company uses to help protect cultural resources around their lakes.
Matthew Gage, Ph.D., RPA, is director of the program and explains that in the time since human occupation around the Coosa River began roughly 13,000 years ago, there have been many different types of finds, and their discoveries reveal how the land was used in various time periods.
“There are very few Paleoindian artifacts in the Coosa River drainage, but in subsequent millennia, other people left behind projectile points, stone knives, grinding stones, soapstone bowls, stone axes and celts,” explains Gage. “Pottery began to be made in the Coosa Valley sometime around 600 BC.”
By 1400 AD, the Coosa Valley was occupied by the Mvskoke people (Muscogee), who were known to be heavily involved in the European fur trade. “Artifacts from this period include everything from beads traded or given as gifts by the Hernando DeSoto expedition to gun flints and brass buckets.
“Later, the establishment of ferries across the river and river boat travel are incredibly interesting and left behind unique artifacts from boilers to forged barge nails,” said Gage.
Several earthworks have been found all along the river at various crossing points due to the region’s involvement in the Civil War. The establishment of river towns and communities dependent on access to the river for shipping of their agricultural products left behind remnants of shipping wharves and farming implements.
One of the interesting cultural sites found on the Coosa included remnants of a large Mississippian village dated to around A.D. 1150. “It had two moats dug around the outside and a palisade of vertically set posts that surrounded the village on all but the river side,” describes Gage.
“Several of the sites in the area from this time period are fortified and are likely reflective of the changing times when people were migrating into the area and those already in the valley were trying to protect themselves from invaders. We know that the Cherokee were working their way down from the north and may have been conducting raids on the Mvskoke inhabitants of the area.”
There are hundreds of archaeological sites that have been identified along the Coosa River. Investigations on many of them continue today. The archaeologists working with Alabama Power access the sites from boats. Well identified as researchers, these archaeologists will readily offer their credentials to landowners concerned about their work along the shoreline.
One of those boats appeared near the home of Naomi Kircus about 10 years ago. She lives on the Talladega side of Logan Martin Lake and witnessed an archaeological dig in front of her home. That site produced several pieces of broken pottery. “There were two guys in a boat, both archaeology students,” Kircus recalls. “They found where there had been a fire pit next door to my house.”
Artifacts found around the lake are fascinating to find and help to tell the story of those who enjoyed these waters before us.
Residents finding and keeping arrowheads from their own property is not an issue. Things found in the water, at water’s edge, and in the lakebed at drawdown levels are the issue. Alabama Power does not own the river channel but does own land outside of the channel to differing levels on each lake. Alabama Power ensures the protection and preservation of these artifacts and archaeological sites as part of the National Historic Preservation Act.
As exciting as it is to find relics and artifacts, their part of the story is diminished when residents collect and keep them. “Artifacts tell the story of our past,” says Gage. “Their context is just as important as the items themselves.”
Gage uses the analogy of a book to further explain what happens when people collect artifacts from a site. “The artifacts and features are like the words in a book,” he says. “When they’re all there, it’s easy to read and understand what’s going on. But every time you take away one of those artifacts or destroy one of the features, it’s like taking away the words.” The fewer the words, the harder the story is to understand.
If you do stumble across what you believe is an artifact or incidents of artifact looting, contact your Alabama Power Shorelines office. Leave the item or feature undisturbed. Document its location and photograph the find. And finally, avoid the possibility of further looting by not publicly sharing the location of the artifact. Enjoy the moment and the find, but allow the artifact to tell its true story in context.
