Artifact patrols increase at lake

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has stepped up patrols along Beaver Lake, searching for people digging up artifacts that are exposed on the shore as waters have receded.

The lake has dropped 10 feet during the drought, which began last spring, and more people are seeking arrowheads, darts, points and stone tools, said Jared Trammell, chief park ranger at Beaver Lake.

Taking the ancient relics from public lands owned by the Corps is illegal, and violators could be prosecuted on felony charges, he said.

“We definitely are looking for them,” Trammell said. “We’ve seen it range from people just walking around picking up things to people digging holes looking for things.”

Most people stroll through the exposed shoreline in search of the artifacts, he said. But others use metal detectors to find old coins, buttons and other artifacts.

The problem arose afterthe lake’s “conservation pool” level dropped this summer. The conservation pool is the normal level of a lake that allows for additional water from rainfall and snowmelt before flooding occurs.

Beaver Lake’s conservation level is 1,120 feet. On Friday, the lake measured 1,1010.6 feet.

The penalties for digging up artifacts on public land can run as high as a 10-year prison sentence and a $250,000 fine, Laurie Driver, a spokesman for the Corps,said in a news release.

“When individuals pursue what they consider a harmless hobby digging or picking up artifacts, they are destroying the past,” Driver said in the news release.

“This can wipe out centuries of human experience. Many just don’t realize the harm they are doing. Others, unfortunately, care more about profit than preserving the past.”

Archaeologists have found evidence of civilizations 10,000 to 12,000 years old while excavating sites by the lake, said Jerry Hilliard, a station assistant at the Arkansas Archeological Survey at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.

He said they’ve found Paleo-Indian artifacts from the Clovis to the Woodland and Mississippian cultures.

Hilliard said most people combing the lake’s shoreline are “relatively innocent in what they think they’re doing.”

“They’re looking for some kind of keepsake. But they arestill damaging the site.”

Hilliard said some looters go further, however, digging in bluffs along the lake and in caves. They have also used heavy equipment such as backhoes to seek artifacts, he said.

“It’s a problem for the loss of history,” he said.

Beaver Lake was built in 1963, when the Corps dammed the White River as part of a federal flood-control project. Thousands of acres were submerged when the lake filled, including most of Monte Ne, a turn-of-the-century resort area.

Monte Ne was founded by William “Coin” Harvey in 1900 and featured the world’s largest log hotels at the time, according to the Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture. Harvey, a presidential candidate for the LibertyParty, held his 1932 party nomination there.

The tower of the old Oklahoma Row hotel and Harvey’s tomb remain on land and were placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978. An area on the northwest edge of the lake is still referred to as Monte Ne.

That area now draws artifact hunters armed with metal detectors, Hilliard said.

“People are looking for coins and buttons and anything else they can find there,” he said. “It becomes a problem whenever the water goes down.”

Trammell said the Corps will prosecute those who dig for artifacts on the lake.

“People think it’s harmless hobby digging,” he said. “But it’s not.”

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 15 on 02/17/2013

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