DISCOVERY AND EXPLORATION
Pueblo Bonito was first described by Lt. James H. Simpson (1850,
p. 81) following a cursory inspection on the afternoon of August 28,
1849. Twenty-eight years later, in the spring of 1877, W. H. Jackson
of the Hayden Surveys camped 4 or 5 days at a muddy waterhole
west of Pueblo del Arroyo and during that brief period not
only mapped the valley but prepared ground plans and descriptions
of Pueblo Bonito and 10 other ruins—descriptions and plans
used by all who followed (Jackson, 1878). A decade after Jackson,
Victor Mindeleff of the Smithsonian Institution devoted 6 winter
weeks to surveying, mapping, and photographing those same ruins
for a report that never materialized (Mindeleff, 1891, p. 14; Powell,
1892, p. xxx).
The names by which the Chaco Canyon ruins are currently known
have been variously written, but herein, as previously, we adhere to
the spelling that was originally recorded by Simpson and Jackson
and which is that since accepted by the United States Geographic
Board, the Bureau of American Ethnology, and other recognized
authorities.
Merchants from Rio Grande settlements, militiamen on their several
missions, and U. S. Army engineers seeking a better route to
the Pacific visited Chaco Canyon before and after Simpson. Few of
these transients left any record of what they saw along the way, but
some among them did regrettable damage to the old ruins while
searching for souvenirs, and the finger of suspicion points to all.
Members of Colonel Washington's 1849 command have most frequently
been accused of this vandalism but Simpson himself exonerates
them. The troops camped for the night of August 26 about a mile
from Pueblo Pintado, at the head of Chaco Canyon, and 2 days later
left the valley at the Mesa Fachada (Fajada Butte), while Simpson
(1850, p. 78) and nine companions rode on to examine Una Vida
and other ruins, expecting to overtake the command by nightfall.
In 1877 old Hosta, one of Colonel Washington's 1849 guides, told
Jackson (1878, p. 435) that timbers were lacking at Pueblo Pintado
because soldiers "and other scouting parties" had used them for
campfires. Apparently a well-known trail passed this way from
Jemez and the Rio Grande settlements.
Military expeditions against the Navaho were recurrent in the
middle 19th century and more than one camped in Chaco Canyon.
On October 30, 1858, several members of Company E, Regiment of
Mounted Rifles, carved their names on the cliff back of Chettro
Kettle (Vivian, 1948, p. 16), and it is reasonable to believe that
these or other troopers were responsible at least for some of the
holes Jackson and Mindeleff saw in the north wall of Pueblo Bonito.
Years later, during military service at Fort Wingate, May 10, 1909,
to February 4, 1911, Privates Otto Wolford and John G. Bushman
of the 1st Troop, 3d Cavalry, successor to the Mounted Rifles,
carved their surnames at the top of the Pueblo Bonito stairway.
Mindeleff's 1887 photographs, earliest pictorial record of Pueblo
Bonito, provide visible evidence that seekers after treasure had preceded
him with pick and shovel. They had forced every sealed door in
search of open rooms and had breached the high north wall at 3- to
5-foot intervals throughout its full length (Mindeleff Neg. 3022).
"Relic hunting" was both a pastime and a vocation prior to passage of
the Antiquities Act of 1906.
The Wetherill brothers from their ranch near Mancos, Colo., had
discovered the famous cliff-dwellings of the Mesa Verde; had
gathered and sold several collections from these and other prehistoric
ruins. It was the hope of finding new ruins for exploitation that led
Richard Wetherill to Chaco Canyon in October, 1895, accompanied
by S. L. Palmer, his future father-in-law, and family. During the
next few weeks the two men amused themselves by digging for
curios, and both were successful. Palmer retained his share and
later lent it for display in the public library, Hutchinson, Kans.
(personal letter of June 8, 1921, to the National Geographic Society).
From Albuquerque after leaving Chaco Canyon, Wetherill wrote
so enthusiastically of collecting possibilities at Pueblo Bonito that
B. Talbot B. Hyde, of New York City, agreed to substitute a season
there for one previously planned for the Marsh Pass region, northeastern
Arizona (McNitt, 1957, pp. 109-113). This proved to be
the first of four expeditions, 1896-1899, financed by the Hyde brothers,
B. Talbot B. and Frederick E., Jr., and directed from New York
by Prof. F. W. Putnam, then curator of anthropology at the American
Museum of Natural History. Although the Hyde brothers had
previously purchased one or more archeological collections from
Wetherill, they stipulated that, this time, excavations should be pursued
under supervision of a recognized authority. The annual reports
of the Museum do not state that Professor Putnam visited the scene
of operations before 1899, but he was personally represented each
season by his assistant, George H. Pepper.
