After the cliff dwellings were deserted by the Pueblo Indians late in the thirteenth century they stood, unmolested by man, for many hundreds of years. The owls and pack rats took them over and enjoyed their security, but from all evidence it was many centuries before men again entered the caves.
The Indians themselves may have intended to return when conditions became normal again but they never came back. There is no evidence that farming Indians ever lived in the Mesa Verde after its desertion by the ancient people. Other Indians came but they were hunters and they seem to have shunned the silent cave cities.
A couple of centuries after Mesa Verde was deserted an important event took place, an event that was to have a strange effect on it at a later date.
America was rediscovered!
Fifteen thousand years after the Indians discovered the continent from the west, white men entered it from the east. A new people blundered into the western hemisphere that had so long belonged to the Indians.
The newcomers were a greedy lot and they began to stretch acquisitive fingers in all directions. Mexico was colonized and tales of wealth among the Indians to the north led the Spaniards into the Southwest. In 1540, Coronado was only 150 miles from the Mesa Verde but he turned away. Other Spaniards came nearer and nearer until at last, in the year 1776, they were at the base of the great green mesa.
On August 10, 1776, only thirty-seven days after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Escalante, a Spanish priest, camped in the very shadow of the Mesa Verde. It seems almost incredible that at a time when the colonists along the Atlantic seaboard knew nothing of the vast wilderness beyond the first range of mountains, Escalante and his men were here in the land of the cliff dwellings. Seeking a short route to Monterey, 10 on the Pacific Coast, they had journeyed northwest from Santa Fe. At last, on August 10, 1776, they camped by a small stream at the base of the La Plata Mountains.
In his diary Escalante wrote:
“August 10. Father Fray Francisco Atanasio awoke troubled by a rheumatic fever which he had felt in his face and head since the day before, and it was desirable that we make camp here until he should be better, but the continuous rains, the inclemency of the weather, and the great dampness of the place forced us to leave it. Going north, and having traveled a little more than half a league, we turned to the northwest, went on a league and then swung west through valleys of very beautiful timber and abundant pasturage, roses, and various other flowers. After going two leagues we were again caught in a very heavy rain. Father Fray Francisco Atanasio became worse and the road impassable, and so, having traveled with great difficulty two more leagues to the west, we had to camp on the bank of the first of the two little rivers which form the San Lazaro, otherwise called Rio de los Mancos. The pasturage continues in great abundance. Today four and a half leagues.”
The small stream beside which Escalante camped that night is still called the Mancos. Only a few miles below his camping place it cuts directly into the Mesa Verde. The former inhabitants of the cliff dwellings had known it well. It had failed them during the great drouth. And now, on August 10, 1776, exactly 500 years after the beginning of that drouth which had caused them to leave the Mesa Verde, Escalante, a man of a new race, camped beside the Mancos, only a few miles from the empty ruins of the cliff dwellings.
Without doubt he saw the great mesa, the Mesa Verde, for it looms high above the Mancos Valley. But he turned away; he was seeking the sea to the west.
During the following three-quarters of a century many other Spaniards must have seen the Mesa Verde for there was much exploration in the region. Sometime during this period the mesa was given a Spanish name—Mesa Verde—the “green table.” The Spaniard who named it is unknown. Possibly he named it after climbing to its summit for from the valley below it is not so evident that the top is flat and eternally green. 11 Could it be that he even saw the cliff dwellings and we have failed to find the record in the musty archives of Mexico or Spain? No, probably not. We must consider that the cliff dwellings were still unseen by modern man.
In 1848, the Mesa Verde, although still unknown, passed from Mexican to American ownership. Slowly the new owners drew nearer. The date of discovery of the now aged cliff dwellings was close at hand.
The first known mention of the Mesa Verde was made in the year 1859. In that year an exploring expedition set out from Santa Fe, under the leadership of Captain J. N. Macomb, to explore certain territory in what is now the State of Utah. Serving as geologist for this expedition was Professor J. S. Newberry and in his geological report he wrote:
“Between the Rio de la Plata and the Rio de los Mancos we skirted the base of the extreme southern point of the Sierra de la Plata. These mountains terminate southward in a long slope, which falls down to a level of about 7500 feet above the sea, forming a plateau which extends southward to the San Juan, the Mesa Verde, to which I shall soon have occasion again to refer.”
Farther on in his report he adds:
“To obtain a just conception of the enormous denudation which the Colorado Plateau has suffered, no better point of view could possibly be selected than that of the summit of the Mesa Verde. The geologist here has, it seems to me, satisfactory proof of the proposition I have before made....”
From the manner in which he spoke of the Mesa Verde it is very evident Professor Newberry voiced a name that was in common usage. This was true also of all the rivers and mountains mentioned in his report. Their names indicate the Spaniards had done a very thorough job of christening the landmarks of the region.
From Newberry’s report it is also evident that he climbed to the summit of the Mesa Verde. His description indicates he must have scaled one of the high points along the northern rim, possibly Park Point, the highest of all. He merely climbed to the summit, feasted his geological eyes on the thrilling view over 16,000 square miles of wilderness, and descended. He 12 was only a few miles from the ruins but he failed to suspect their presence. He does deserve credit, however, for the first known mention of the Mesa Verde and for the earliest modern ascent to its summit.
The first American settlers entered the Mesa Verde region about 1870. Miners, farmers, trappers, cattlemen, even bandits, came pouring into the Mancos Valley and found it to their liking. None of them had ever heard of, or would have been interested in the ruins. To them the past was dead and forgotten; they were looking ahead. They were interested only in taming the wilderness and in keeping their scalps firmly attached to their heads.
At that time the entire region was terrorized by the Ute Indians. Naturally a war-like group they were goaded into a frenzy by the loss of their hunting grounds and they made life miserable for the whites. Adventurous miners and trappers were slain; farming settlements lived in constant fear of the merciless warriors. The situation became acute and soldiers finally were sent in to hold the Utes in check.
To the settlers the Indians were simple hazards to be expected in the conquest of the wilderness. They were merely to be brushed aside. If they resented the brushing process, if they showed a tendency to resist the loss of their ancient tribal homes, it was very unfortunate—for the Indians. The persuasive little leaden pellets of the settlers convinced one Ute after another that it was wrong to resent the loss of homes and hunting grounds. The remnants of the tribe sought refuge in natural strongholds, especially in strongholds where there was nothing desired by the whites.
One of these natural strongholds was the Mesa Verde. Its warm lower canyons had long been the winter home of bands of Utes and they were familiar with every nook and cranny in it. The deep, narrow canyons and high mesas offered sanctuary to the oppressed Indians. The settlers in the Mancos Valley respected this wilderness stronghold and it remained a place of mystery to them. From the time of Professor Newberry’s climb to the summit in 1859, we have no definite record of white men entering the Mesa Verde until 1874.
13
In that year a small party of explorers ventured into the forbidding canyons of the great mesa. The young government far off to the east was endeavoring to learn the extent and nature of its newly acquired possessions in the far west. Small surveying parties were being sent into all parts of the vast unknown land. One of these parties drifted down from the north and entered the Mesa Verde region in the year 1874. In charge of the party was Mr. W. H. Jackson, photographer for the U. S. Geological and Geographical Survey. Jackson and his men were not interested in the Mesa Verde, in fact they had no knowledge of its existence until men whom they encountered in some of the mining camps began to tell of a great tableland filled with mysterious ruins.
Jackson was intrigued and although he had little faith in the strange rumors, he decided to explore the Mesa Verde. His guide on the expedition was a garrulous miner named John Moss who claimed to have first-hand knowledge of the ruins. This chapter in the story of the Mesa Verde is extremely vague. There is no doubt that before the time of Jackson’s expedition some of the settlers knew of the Mesa Verde ruins. How much they knew is uncertain. Some of the early prospectors or hunters may actually have seen them. The Mancos Canyon afforded a natural avenue for travel through the Mesa Verde and in spite of the Ute danger, the intrepid adventurers may have used it occasionally. If they did, they could hardly have failed to see the many ruins that clung to the faces of the cliffs far above the river.
On the other hand, knowledge of the Mesa Verde ruins may have come from the Indians. In a little while we will see a friendly Ute Indian giving the white men their first knowledge of Cliff Palace. Perhaps John Moss and the other miners heard of the existence of the ruins from friendly Utes or Navahos.
At any rate, John Moss knew that there were ruins in the Mesa Verde, and in September, 1874, he led Jackson into the Mancos Canyon. The first night they camped on the banks of the river in the heart of the Mesa Verde. A century earlier Escalante had camped a few miles farther up the same stream. Six centuries earlier Indian maidens had filled their water jars from it.
14
No cliff dwellings had been seen and the men were beginning to lose faith in the stories of their guide. As dusk was settling over the canyon, the men stood about their campfire.
“Moss,” one of the men questioned, “where are those ruins that you have been telling us about?”
“Right up there,” Moss replied, with a swing of his arm that took in the whole out-of-doors.
Unimpressed, the men stepped away from the campfire and began to scan the cliffs above. In the bottom of the canyon they stood in the gathering shadows of twilight but far above the cliffs were lighted by the last dying embers of the setting sun. Suddenly the men saw what John Moss had not even suspected when he had said, “Right up there.”
In the topmost cliff was a cave and in it, standing out in bold relief against the shadowy background, were small stone houses. Moss was right—there was a ruin “up there.”
In spite of the growing darkness the men scrambled up the canyon walls. Just as total darkness fell, two of them entered the little cliff dwelling. It was the earliest known discovery of a Mesa Verde cliff dwelling by white men.
The next morning Jackson and his men returned to the ruin and photographed it. Two-Story Cliff House they named it because of a splendidly-built, two-story structure it contained. Excitedly they climbed about the small village, poking into every dark corner. In the debris of the cluttered rooms they found things that aided them in their wild speculations about the vanished people; pottery, corn cobs, stone tools—the Mesa Verde was beginning to give up its secrets.
Today Two-Story Cliff House still clings to the face of its cliff. It has changed little since Jackson saw it and few men have entered it since that fatal day when the Indians left it behind.
Long ago the people of Two-Story House were neighbors of the people of Cliff Palace, the great cliff dwelling toward which we are moving. To them it must have been a metropolis, a great city, the largest they ever knew. It took only an hour for them to trot up the canyon to the larger community. Often the men of the little village must have slung their prized possessions over their shoulders and set out for Cliff Palace on trading and gambling expeditions. It was “big town” to them.
15
Two Story Cliff House, discovered by Mr. W. H. Jackson, in 1874
17
When Jackson was at Two-Story Cliff House he was very near Cliff Palace but he did not see the larger ruin. If he had gone only four miles up the nearest side canyon, he would have found the amazing structure. But he was satisfied with the discovery of Two-Story Cliff House and other small ruins and a narrowly-averted clash with a band of Utes sent him scuttling down the Mancos Canyon and out of the Mesa Verde to safety. Cliff Palace was still unknown but the threat of discovery was coming nearer.
One of the early settlers in the Mancos Valley was Mr. B. K. Wetherill, a rancher. In the eighties he and his five sons were living on a large ranch at the foot of the Mesa Verde. It was a typical pioneer family but in one respect the Wetherills were very different from their neighbors. Throughout all of their years of residence in the valley they had been friendly with the Utes. Instead of persecuting them as so many of the settlers did, they befriended the helpless Indians who were rapidly losing the lands they regarded as their own. Indians were welcome at the Wetherill ranch and the bonds of friendship grew strong.
As a result of this friendship, the Wetherills began to run their cattle in the Mancos Canyon. At last, white men were welcome in the vast stronghold of the Utes. Deeper and deeper they penetrated into the network of canyons.
As they worked with their cattle the Wetherills began to notice tiny houses standing in caves on the faces of the cliffs. They even climbed to them and as they explored the little villages their interest and curiosity mounted. The houses were merely small stone rooms, evidently built in the caves for security. In the houses the boys found things the ancient inhabitants had left behind, even the remains of the people themselves. They speculated on the origin of their finds but there seemed to be no answers. The objects found seemed to have no actual value so they spent little time in the ancient buildings. Their cattle could not be neglected for the tiny houses in the cliffs.
An interesting tale came to the Wetherill brothers’ ears when they became acquainted with a Ute Indian named Acowitz. 18 In some of the canyons, he told them, were cliff dwellings that were much larger than any they had seen. There was one cliff dwelling that was the largest of all. When he showed them how large it was and how many rooms it contained they were quite sure he could not be believed. No cliff dwelling could be so large.
Acowitz persisted in his claims. Time after time he told the Wetherills of the ruin that was the largest in the Mesa Verde. Dubious but interested, the boys began to watch the cliffs whenever their search for cattle took them into new canyons.
At last Al Wetherill thought he saw it.
He was following the bottom of a canyon in which none of the boys had ever been. Far above, in the highest cliff, he saw the arched roof of an enormous cave. Through the tops of the trees Al thought he saw houses; he could not be sure. Anxious to reach camp before darkness came he did not climb up to investigate. The boys began to consider the claims of Acowitz with less doubt. The cave seemed to exist; perhaps it did contain the largest cliff dwelling of all.
The following winter two of the Wetherill brothers, Richard and Alfred, and their brother-in-law, Charlie Mason, were again in the Mesa Verde with their cattle. Day after day they watched them, often riding the high mesa trails in search of strays. As they rode they remembered the story of Acowitz and the cave Al had seen. Before the winter was over they intended to find it.
One snowy December day in 1888, Richard Wetherill and Charlie Mason rode their horses up out of the Mancos Canyon and began to follow the trail of some stray cattle northward across the mesa top. Snow lay deep on the ground. Soft flakes filled the air. Silently the two forced their way through the heavy growth of pinon and juniper trees. Only the thud of the horses’ feet and the creak of saddle leather broke the silence. Near the edge of a canyon the growth thinned out and they finally rode out into the open.
“Charlie, look at that!” cried Richard, pointing across the canyon.
19
In the opposite wall was a tremendous cave. Filling it from one end to the other, and rising even to its vaulted roof, was a silent city of stone. No snow fell on the ancient city. No storm had touched it through all the centuries. It seemed as eternal as the ageless cliff that protected it.
Framed by the magnificent cave, a thin veil of snowflakes drawn across its face, the silent city cast a spell over the two cowboys. In all that vast wilderness there was no sound but the soft hiss of the snowflakes and the throbbing of the boys’ hearts. Speechless, they sat in their saddles.
At last one of the horses stirred and the spell was broken.
As the first flush of discovery passed, the two boys began to search for a way to enter the ruin. Riding around the heads of two small canyons they were soon above their goal. An ancient trail led down the cliff. Breathless with excitement, they walked into the cave and, as Charles Mason later recounted:
“We spent several hours going from room to room, and picked up several articles of interest, among them a stone axe with the handle still on it. There were also parts of several human skeletons scattered about.”
Once again the great cliff dwelling knew the touch of man. Six centuries after the despairing Indians deserted their home, two flushed, happy men walked into it. A new era had dawned, one that would see strange happenings in the Mesa Verde.
Excitedly the two cowboys scrambled about the ruin, prying into every corner, appraising the many strange things they found. Acowitz had been right; it was tremendous. They could never hope to find another ruin as large. Throughout its entire length the cave was full of houses; simple stone rooms with small, high doorways and few windows. Here and there among the houses were mysterious circular, subterranean rooms that the boys could not understand. At the south end of the cave was a four-story structure that touched the cave roof; in the third-story room was a beautiful painting in red and white. At the north end a terraced structure also rose to the cave roof; in it was some of the best masonry in the entire cave. On an upper ledge at the back of the cave was a long row of smaller rooms. In them the boys found corn cobs, tassels and shucks. Under flat rocks, where rats had not found them, 20 were a few grains of corn and some brown beans. Instantly the boys knew the ancient people had been farmers.
In the center of the cave was a graceful round tower. Every stone in it was carefully rounded to fit the curve of the wall and the entire tower tapered uniformly toward the top. In the tower was the finest stone axe the boys ever found. But the use of the tower puzzled them.
The ruin was in a sad state of repair. Roofs had fallen; walls had partially crumbled. Courts and passageways were choked with fallen stones, adobe mortar and broken roof beams. Rat nests filled the darker corners and a mantle of dust and cobwebs lay over all. Out of this jumble the once-proud city raised an unbowed head. Only minor parts had fallen. The greater part of it remained as the Indians had left it. The crumbled parts spoke of age and the forces of decay; the unbroken walls gave mute evidence of the skill of a vanished people.
In order to see the great ruin as it was on the day of discovery we must go again to Charles Mason’s description, published in the Denver Post in 1917, for, because of its condition, he developed a strange theory.
“The final tragedy of the cliff dwellers probably occurred at Cliff Palace. There is scarcely room to doubt that the place withstood an extended siege. In the entire building only two timbers were found by us. All of the joists on which floors and roofs were laid had been wrenched out. These timbers are built into the walls and are difficult to remove, even the little willows on which the mud roofs and upper floors are laid were carefully taken out. No plausible reason for this has been advanced except that it was used as fuel.
“Another strange circumstance is that so many of their valuable possessions were left in the rooms and covered with the clay of which the roofs and upper floors were made, not to mention many of the walls broken down in tearing out the timbers. It would seem that the intention was to conceal their valuables, so their enemies might not secure them, or perhaps the people were in such despair that property was not considered.
21
“There were many human bones scattered about, as though several people had been killed and left unburied. Had Cliff Palace been abandoned, as has been suggested, and the timbers used in other buildings, all movable articles of value would have been taken away, instead of being covered and much of it broken and destroyed unnecessarily.
“It seems to me that there can be no doubt that the Cliff Dwellers were exterminated by their more savage and warlike neighbors, the men being killed and the women being adopted into the tribe of the conquerors, though in some cases migrations may have become necessary as a result of drouth or pressure from outside tribes.”
While it would be difficult to prove Charles Mason’s theory that “The final tragedy of the cliff dwellers probably occurred at Cliff Palace,” some of his other ideas were sound. The results of many years of intensive research by leading scientists show that he did a shrewd bit of forecasting when he suggested that “migrations may have become necessary as a result of drouth or pressure from outside tribes.”
After exploring Cliff Palace for several hours, the two cowboys, flushed with excitement over their discovery, decided to search for more ruins. Climbing out of the great cave, they mounted their horses and, in order to cover more territory, separated. Mason rode off to the north, while Wetherill went to the north and west. Mason’s search was fruitless but to Richard Wetherill goes credit for the second discovery of the day. After a short ride he came to a small canyon and, seeing no ruins along its western wall, rode around the head of the canyon and turned back to examine the eastern cliffs.
Immediately the discovery came. Within a hundred yards of the head of the canyon was a long, low cave and in it was another great cliff dwelling. While not as large as Cliff Palace, it was in a better state of preservation. This ruin, later named Spruce Tree House, has since proved to be the best-preserved large cliff dwelling in the Mesa Verde.
Night was approaching so Richard made no attempt to enter the ruin. Turning back, he met Mason at a prearranged spot near Cliff Palace and they camped for the night.
22
The following morning the two men set off to explore the ruin Richard had seen. Misjudging their direction, they turned too far to the west and within a short time found themselves on the rim of one of the deepest canyons of the Mesa Verde. The ruin for which they had been searching had eluded them but instead of being disappointed, the two men were elated. At the foot of the cliff, almost under their feet, was a third great cliff dwelling.
This ruin was not as large as the two they had found the day before but it was much larger than any they had seen previously. In the center of the cliff dwelling was a tower, the tallest in the Mesa Verde, and because of this outstanding structure, the cowboys named the ruin Square Tower House.
For a time the two men sat on their horses, looking down on the ruin and discussing their discoveries. During the past few years they had seen many small cliff dwellings in the Mancos Canyon and in other canyons to the south. Now they had moved to the north and in two days had discovered three cliff dwellings that dwarfed all the others. Off to the north and west they could see still more canyons and they felt quite sure that countless ruins were yet to be found. The importance of their discoveries was all too apparent, so without pausing to search for more ruins, or for the cattle they had originally sought, they hurried back to the town of Mancos and spread the news of what they had found.
Upon hearing of the amazing discoveries, John Wetherill decided to investigate for himself. With three companions he made his way to Cliff Palace. Near the south end of the ruin, just back of the painted tower, one of the subterranean rooms was in perfect condition except that the roof was missing. After cleaning it out carefully, the boys stretched a canvas over it and the room served as their home for a month.
It was a strange use for the ancient room. Six hundred years earlier it had been a sacred ceremonial room, a kiva, where reverent priests had conducted their ceremonies. Now it was merely a living place for men of a different race. The cowboys built their fire in the same firepit where the priests had built theirs centuries earlier. They stored their food and possessions on the same ledges where the priests had kept their ceremonial things. They slept on the floor, exactly where the 23 tired priests had slept during their long ceremonies. The boys had no knowledge that they were profaning a place of worship. It was not until many years later that they learned they had lived in a kiva, one of the ceremonial rooms of the ancient people.
During the month they spent in the ruin John Wetherill and his three friends searched endlessly for the things they knew were buried under the debris. In the houses, under the dust and fallen roofs, they found the utensils and tools the women had once used. In the kivas they found the ceremonial paraphernalia and tools of the men. Everywhere were the objects that had been used in the daily life of the people. It became evident that the ancient people had deserted their homes, leaving in them the things they were unable to carry. Perhaps they had intended to return and had left most of their possessions behind.
Far back in the cave where there were no buildings the most exciting discovery was made. In this part of the cave the roof was too low for houses so the inhabitants had used it for a trash room and as a roost for their flocks of domesticated turkeys.
As the cowboys dug through the accumulated trash they suddenly found themselves face-to-face with the ancient Indians. For some strange reason fourteen bodies had been buried there in the trash. Natural processes had mummified them so perfectly that in some the normal expression of the faces seemed to be preserved. It was a thrilling discovery for there, except for two things, were the Indians. In only two ways did the mummies differ from the cowboys themselves. Only the moisture and the spark of life were missing. If they could have restored those two things the men would have found themselves confronted with the actual builders of the cliff dwelling they were exploring.
Centuries earlier sorrowing relatives had buried them there in the back of the cave. The dry earth and trash drew the moisture from the flesh and, finally, only bones and dried tissues remained. Nothing was missing except the spark of life and the moisture. Everything else was in place; the bones, flesh, skin, eyes, internal organs; all were there, only very, very dry. Long hair still hung about the shoulders of the mummies and in it were the mummies of ancient lice which had once formed a happy population.
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John Wetherill found fourteen mummies in Cliff Palace. It was a fitting climax to his first venture in archeology. Of the five Wetherill brothers, John was the one who developed the greatest interest in the ancient cultures. For many years after his first work in Cliff Palace he was actively engaged in exploring the Mesa Verde and nearby regions and making their features known to the world.
It was a strange month the four cowboys spent in Cliff Palace in that winter of 1888-89. In the midst of a silent snow-covered wilderness they lived in and explored an ancient city that was unknown to the civilized world. Centuries earlier it had sheltered the Indians. Now it sheltered the newcomers. Untouched by wind and snow they pried into the secrets of the ancient people.
Within a short time after discovery the great ruin received its name. Some of the early writers gave Richard Wetherill credit for christening it but in later years John Wetherill gave the credit to Charles Mason. In all probability we shall never know who deserves the credit but we may feel sure the name indicates the feelings those early explorers had about the greatest of all cliff dwellings.
Cliff Palace was the name they gave it, an inspiring name for the greatest structure the Mesa Verde people ever built. It is not especially appropriate for the great ruin was never a palace. Instead, it was a small city, the dwelling place of hundreds of people. But the name was the choice of the men who first explored it and it reflects their feelings toward the ancient structure.
Now we must pause for a moment. The story of the discovery of the cliff dwellings would not be complete if we were to go further without admitting that there are some uncertainties. Many years after the events we have just witnessed were a matter of record, other men came forward with claims that they had seen Cliff Palace before 1888. Even the various Wetherill brothers did not agree entirely in their stories about the discovery of the ruins. As a result, there is a certain amount of confusion concerning the events of those early days.
But the two events we have just witnessed can be accepted without the slightest doubt. Jackson was in Two-Story Cliff 25 House in 1874, and Charles Mason and Richard Wetherill were in Cliff Palace in 1888. No one has ever questioned the claims of these men.
Jackson was travelling with a scientific party sent out by the government. He photographed Two-Story Cliff House and other small cliff dwellings in the Mancos Canyon and in the following year published the pictures and descriptions of the ruins in a scientific report. So to Jackson goes credit for the discovery of the first small cliff dwellings of the Mesa Verde. If John Moss, who was Jackson’s guide, or other early explorers were in the ruins before 1874, no record has come down to us.
It is equally certain that Charles Mason and Richard Wetherill were in Cliff Palace in 1888, for they announced their discovery immediately. The account which has been given here has come directly from written records left by Charles Mason and John Wetherill, and from personal interviews with the two men.
In 1935, Mason visited the Mesa Verde for the last time. In spite of his 74 years he was active and alert and the events of the early days were clear in his mind. We drove along the canyon rims and without hesitation he pointed out the cliff from which he and Richard Wetherill had first seen Cliff Palace. For an hour we sat in the sun as he recalled the events of that day, December 18, 1888, when he and Richard had sat there on their horses, gazing in amazement at the great ruin.
“We had heard of Cliff Palace before we saw it,” he said. “A Ute Indian, named Acowitz, had told us about it and we had always hoped to find it. The Utes were afraid of the ruins because of the spirits of the old people that they believed were in them. If we wanted to keep the Utes out of our camp we just put a skull up on a stick and they wouldn’t come near.”
Remembering the problems they had with their cattle, he added, “Hunting cattle in those days was no easy job. They were as wild as deer and the country was rough. Once we spent a week chasing them and all we got back to town was an old cow and her calf. We shot lots of them like deer and packed the meat out.”
In 1932, John Wetherill visited the Mesa Verde. As we strolled through Cliff Palace he told of the month he and his three friends had spent there in 1888-89. He pointed out the kiva where they had lived, the spot where the beautiful stone axe had been found and the place where they had discovered the 26 fourteen mummies. He recalled that all of the roofs had been torn out, just as Charles Mason said, and he remembered that they had found more baskets in Cliff Palace than in any other cliff dwelling.
Then, pointing across the canyon, he said, “That’s where Richard and Charley were when they first saw Cliff Palace.” The bold cliff at which he pointed is called Sun Point today, and it was from this same point that Mason said he and Richard Wetherill first saw Cliff Palace.
It is quite true that other men have claimed they were in Cliff Palace before 1888. Not a shred of documentary evidence has been found to support these claims, however, so credit for being the first modern men to enter the greatest of all cliff dwellings goes to Charles Mason and Richard Wetherill.
During the years that followed the discovery of Cliff Palace, the Wetherills and other men discovered hundreds of cliff dwellings in the canyons of the Mesa Verde. They found, also, that the mesa tops were dotted with additional hundreds of ruins. As a result of these discoveries the fame of the Mesa Verde spread and within a short time many men were digging in the ruins.
The period following 1888 is the sad chapter in the history of the Mesa Verde. From the very beginning it was apparent that digging in the ruins was a profitable business. The Wetherills sold their first collection for $3000 and the word spread that artifacts from the ruins had actual cash value. Charles Mason indicated this only too well in his article published in the Denver Post on July 1, 1917. The article was signed by four of the Wetherills and without doubt gives a fairly accurate picture of what happened in the Mesa Verde following the discovery of the ruins.
In referring to their second expedition Mason wrote, “This time we went at it in a more business-like manner. Our previous work had been carried out more to satisfy our own curiosity than for any other purpose but this time it was a business proposition.” And in referring to a still later expedition Mason stated, “In spite of the fact that all of the cliff dwellings had been worked over two or three times, we succeeded in making a very good showing.”
27
The Wetherills themselves took a number of collections of artifacts from the cliff dwellings. Most of these collections are now in museums and since the Wetherills kept notes on their findings the material has real scientific value. In 1891, Baron Gustav Nordenskiold, a young Swedish archeologist, excavated in a score of the cliff dwellings and took a splendid collection back to his homeland. Soon after his return home Nordenskiold died and the collection was sold to a museum in Finland, where it rests uneasily today. In addition to the Wetherills and Nordenskiold, many other men worked in the ruins and they probably carried away an equal amount of material.
As a result of all this early work the ruins were well cleaned out before the area was made a national park. A number of cliff dwellings have been excavated by archeologists in recent times and little material of any importance has been found in them.
Even though the Mesa Verde could only be reached by a thirty mile horseback trip, it was visited by a surprising number of people in those early years. Some came only to see the ruins but many came to dig and on the return trip the packs often bulged with things taken from the ruins. Priceless artifacts which had so long been unmolested were thoughtlessly carried away.
As a result of these visits, however, the fame of the Mesa Verde grew and finally public sentiment came to its aid. Gradually there developed a realization that the ruins should be preserved for all time and made accessible to all people.
The first effort toward this appears to have been made in 1886, even before the discovery of Cliff Palace and the other large cliff dwellings. In that year a group of Denver people called attention to the need for a national park to preserve the ruins of the Mesa Verde. Five years later the Colorado General Assembly addressed a memorial to the Congress and in 1894, two petitions were sent to the Congress urging that a part of the Mesa Verde be preserved as a national park.
As the years passed, the agitation continued but little was accomplished. In 1897, however, the attention of the Colorado Federation of Women’s Clubs was directed to the problem and 28 a committee of fourteen women was appointed to spearhead the fight. Three years later the committee was expanded into the Colorado Cliff Dwellings Association, an incorporated organization dedicated to the struggle for the preservation of the ruins.
With grim determination the women worked, both with officials in Washington and the Ute Indians whose reservation included the Mesa Verde. After years of disappointments their efforts were crowned with success for on June 29, 1906, the Congress passed a bill creating Mesa Verde National Park.
At last, after six hundred empty years, the cliff dwellings were again in the care of men who were interested in their well-being. These men were of a different race and their feelings toward the cliff dwellings were far different from those of the people who had built them. To the ancient people the cave structures had meant home and security. To the new caretakers they were a milestone in the story of mankind and as such they should be preserved for all time.