Did you know there’s an indigenous rock shelter accessible to the public just off Route 100??

I stumbled upon it a few months ago while doing some other research (frankly, this seems to be how I discover everything cool!)

This one is from the Late Archaic period (that’s about 3,000 years ago) and has been the subject of at least three archeological excavations.

So, let’s investigate it, shall we?

The first excavation took place in 1929 and was conducted by Leslie Verne Case, at the time the Chairman on the Committee of Indian Remains in Westchester County. (What a title!) 

He wrote an article on this dig in the October 1929 Quarterly Bulletin of the Westchester County Historical Society and describes the shelter and its location as follows: 

This Algonkian [sic] rock shelter is located two miles from the Hudson River about due east from the village of Ossining. It is one-half mile south of Echo Lake and is near the intersection of the townships of Ossining, Mt. Pleasant and New Castle, but just within the Ossining township. It is about midway between the Saw Mill River Road and the Bronx Parkway Extension now under construction. It is located at about 300 feet elevation above sea level.

The shelter is formed by a great monolith torn by glacial action from the cliff of Fordham gneiss above it. This Archaean ridge extends in nearly a due north and south direction and falls sharply to the east to the Pocantico River a hundred feet below.

Clear as mud right? You can find it from these directions no problem.  

Anyway, Mr. Case was clued on to this site by a Mr. Henry M. Schnarr, who reported that he found fragments of pottery and bone chips more or less on the surface. Case went and found that “A brief inspection clearly proved that the work had not been systematically done and a few hours’ work brought to light” many other artifacts, such as projectile points, scrapers, pottery and a paint pot coated on the inside with a red powder.

Case also noted that this shelter was one of three in the area, the other two famously having been used in the late 19th century by the legendary Leatherman (Google him if you don’t know the story).  Alas, in the intervening century, the other two shelters have been demolished by “the march of time, real estate developments and private enterprises” as Case put it, but one can imagine that they likely held similar artifacts within.

A few years later, some Scout leaders from Troop 44 did some unofficial digging around and found more artifacts, as reported here in the February 23, 1933 edition of the Citizen Register:

Fast forward to 1982, when an archeologist named Stuart Fiedel spent two seasons excavating the site with his SUNY Purchase students.¹  Digging down deeper, and using more modern techniques than Case or the Scout leaders had, Fiedel and his group found an assortment of artifacts from a variety of eras, the oldest being Archaic, but also included were more recent pieces from the Transitional and Woodland periods.  Based on the variety of tools he discovered, Fiedel drew the conclusion that the site had been used for many thousands of years.  The remnants of fire pits and pottery shards were also found, along with bone fragments from deer, turkey, turtle, snake, fish, as well as shells from hickory nuts.

But the most exciting find was a collection of 17 points stashed in a crack in the back wall of the cave.  Some were fully formed, while others were unfinished, but they represented an assortment of styles and uses. Fiedel became convinced that they were the work of a Late Archaic toolmaker who had secreted his cache for some future use.  I could go on and describe the differences seen between the Lackawaxen and Taconic points, the parallel blade edges and hafting notches found thereon, but I shall restrain myself. However, I’m sure you’ll agree that the image of this Late Archaic craftsman, sitting in this very cave, patiently working his bits of chert and quartz and slate into elegant tools is pretty heady stuff.

One thing Fiedel notes in his article is that 95% of all artifacts are perishable, being made of bone, antler, wood and natural fibers.   So, to be able to find anything after all these thousands of years is quite the accomplishment.  It also illustrates how extensive indigenous settlements were in this area, long before Henry Hudson et al showed up.  It’s a concept that I have to really work to get my mind around, to unlearn the belief that European explorers “discovered” America.  Because while they may not have known of it, the people who had been living here for thousands of years obviously did.

And just because I made the effort, here’s what the view from inside the rock shelter looks like. Thousands of years have caused this cave to fill up with dirt and leaves, but imagine what it could have looked like before all that silt flowed in. As it was, I could almost sit up inside to take this picture:

¹ _{“A Late Archaic Cache from the Ossining Rockshelter” by Stuart J. Fiedel. The Bulletin and Journal of Archeology for New York State, Number 88, Spring 1984}