Less than an hour’s drive north of Amarillo is the first of only two national monuments located in Texas. The Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument is well off the beaten path. Driving the well-maintained, two-lane road off Texas Highway 136 from Amarillo gives the feeling of being in the middle of a western movie. As you remember those “thrilling days of yesteryear,” you half expect to see Clint Eastwood as Rowdy Yates appear driving a herd of cattle over the rocky terrain, or the Lone Ranger and Tonto ride by. The hills and mountains are knobby, stony outcroppings. The valleys and canyons are roughly hewn by the passing Canadian River.
This place has seen thousands of years of human history. Indigenous tribes lived here for many years, harvesting small crops from the dry, sandy soil, and the buffalo that roamed freely were a primary source of food, shelter and clothing. Though the land may not appear suitable for supporting much grazing today, there are still large herds of cattle on nearby properties.
However, the archeology of the flint quarries is significant. The area is home to more than 700 stone quarries that are said to have been mined for more than 13,000 years. The colorful stone is known as Alibates flint. The flint is actually agatized dolomite. The Indians used the material to make arrow heads, knives, hide scrapers and other tools. Tools made from Alibates flint were probably used from as long as 13,000 years ago until about 1870.
The uniqueness of the Alibates flint has to do with the colorful nature of the stone. The stone contains quartz crystals, smaller than can be seen with a microscope, but creating the flint’s steel-like hardness. The variety of colors in the flint is from the other minerals found in the dolomite. The colors range from pale gray and white to pink, maroon, bright red, orange-gold and purple-blue. The colors are striped and marbled throughout the raw stone and made for beautiful tools.
Prehistoric peoples harvested the highly prized stone that was a foot or more below the surface by digging it out by hand, with sticks or with bone tools. The quarries would eventually be as much as 25 feet across, and 4 to 8 feet deep. Today, time and weather have filled most of them in, to the point that they appear as ovals with depressions in the middle. Adjacent to the depressions are the chunks and pieces of waste material that were removed to access the valuable flint.
The tools made from the flint harvested here were not only practical, but also beautiful, and they became a source of trade for the natives. Examples of the Alibates tools have been found across the Great Plains and the Southwest, as would be expected, and the flint was also traded across much of what is now the United States for Puebloan pottery, Pacific Coast seashells, Minnesota pipestone and turquoise jewelry.
History reveals that for much of the area’s past, nomadic peoples would gather in the area to use the flint. Archeologists claim that even people of the Ice Age hunted with spears made from the Alibates flint, maybe even taking down the Imperial Mammoth. The Plains Indians, ancestors of the Caddo, Pawnee and Wichita, established villages made of complex rock-slab houses between A.D. 1150 and A.D. 1450.
The dwellings were mostly single-unit family homes, though other rooms were connected for other uses such as food storage. The rooms were either rectangular or semicircular, with low openings requiring one to enter on their hands and knees. Roofs were originally thought to be flat, but recent discoveries reveal that they were pitched at 7- to 9-degree angles, thatched and mortared with clay. By the end of the 15th century, severe drought and raids from other aggressive tribes drove them from the area.
Today, ranger-guided tours of the quarries are available, as is a nice museum and gift shop. The museum features hands-on exhibits of various artifacts, as well as a brief movie about the natives who mined the Alibates flint.
Sources:
1. “Alibates Flint Quarries.” https://www.nps.gov.
2. “Alibates Flint Quarries and Ruins.”
www.texasbeyondhistory.net/alibates/.
3. “NPS Geodiversity Atlas — Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument, Texas.” https://www.nps.gov.
Written by Bill Smith
You must be logged in to post a comment.