News Feature                                                            8/26/2008

Sauk Valley Man was discovered in 1935

Personnel from the NRCS Todd County Field Office, along with several partner agencies, recently visited the site where the Sauk Valley Man was discovered in 1935. The burial was discovered when human remains fell from the wall of a gravel pit as workers were cutting off an overhang along a terrace of the Sauk River. The workers said the remains came from an undisturbed context 16 inches to 4 feet deep but the exact context was never verified. A recent Accelerator Mass Spectrometry bone date of 4360 to 4190 +/- 70 years B.P. (2410 to 2240 +/- 70 B.C.) suggests that the burial dates to the Archaic period.  

The visit to the site was a side trip after NRCS performed an archaeological survey at a nearby location on behalf of the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). The USFWS plans to restore a wetland about ¼ mile southeast of the burial site. The survey team consisted of employees from the NRCS Todd County Field Office, the USFWS, the Todd County SWCD, the Minnesota State Historic Preservation Office, the landowner, and the NRCS Cultural Resources Specialist. The survey failed to unearth any cultural material but the subsequent trip to the gravel pit and the chance to examine the landowners artifact collection was notable.  

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