Paleo Goshen

When you think of the world’s most important archaeological sites, chances are places like Pompeii and Cairo come to mind. But Goshen is home to one of the rarest and most valuable excavations. The Dutchess Quarry Caves atop Mount Lookout tell a story few of the more famous excavations can. It yielded evidence of humans who had lived there 12,000 years ago, making it one of the oldest archaeological sites in the world. But the story doesn’t stop there. Humans have lived in these caves continuously from that early time right through to the 1700s, making them, in the words of reknown archaeologist Robert E. Funk, one of those rare sites that “sample virtually the entire range of human history in the northeastern United States.” Living in the past Archaeologists want world-historical site preserved as a park, By Pamela Chergotis Goshen — Mount Lookout commands a magnificent view of farm country. The dead-flat expanse of black dirt is punctuated here and there by wooded hills and barns. A ribbon of highway passes underneath. For the imaginative visitor, there’s a different view: a frozen tundra dotted with caribou and many strange beasts no one alive today has ever seen — the giant beaver, the mastodon, the flat-headed peccary. Tucked into the side of the hill, close to the summit, are a network of limestone caves. Hunters live there for part of each year, when the caribou migration brings them this way. That’s what life in Goshen was like 12,000 years ago, when its first known human settlers moved in. While the ancient scene is vastly different from the modern, the reasons why this area has always attracted humans haven’t changed much over the millennia (see sidebar, below). The caves constitute one of the most important archaeological sites in the world. They have produced some of the earliest evidence of human occupation in the Western Hemisphere. Archaeologist William Sandy, one of several guides who led groups on a rare tour to the caves on Saturday, said they are older than 99 percent of all the archaeological sites in North America. In addition to their exceptional antiquity, the caves are remarkable in that they have sheltered humans continuously for most of those 12,000 years, from the stone age through to the 18th century. Stratified layers of sediment, which by modern times reached nearly to the ceiling, contain evidence from each phase of human occupation. It is the only site of its kind in the state, and rare anywhere in the world. Most of the artifacts found in the caves were fluted points for hunting spears, which are unique to the Americas. Early hunters chipped long flakes from each side of the point to allow the blood from a speared animal to flow more freely. These points are an important find, with fewer than 50 found in Orange County, “They are the most difficult-to-make stone points ever,” Sandy said. “There are only a dozen people alive today who can make them.” Archaeologists collected these points during their excavations in the 1960s and 1970s and sent them to the New York State Museum in Albany. They also discovered evidence of paleo-Indian hearth fires in bits of charcoal, fire-cracked rocks, and shallow depressions filled with soft earth in the floor of some of the caves. Lumps of red ocher, a mineral used as a pigment, were among the “human debris” found there. In a substance called flowstone breccia, a mineral deposit that forms on the walls of limestone caves, were found the tiny bones of the myriad animal species fed upon by predators, revealing much about what kinds of animals lived in the area long ago. Sandy said flowstone breccia might be compared to the gunk found on the walls of modern frathouses, in which are embedded plenty of little clues about how we live now. Discovery Children have a way of finding all the interesting nooks hidden in their neighborhood, so it is no surprise that kids were the first modern humans to find the caves. Henry Malley of Middletown said that when he was a child, he had played in a large cave on Mount Lookout. He said many artifacts were found when the cave was destroyed by quarrying in the 1930s. Jack Webster, who for many years operated a feed store in Pine Island, was one of the first people to know about the caves. The black dirt kept his natural passion for archaeology well supplied. When local farmers turned up artifacts with the plows, they brought their finds to the feed store, where they were put on exhibit in a sort of ad hoc museum. When the feed store burned down a few years ago, most of the artifacts were destroyed. Webster is very ill and in the hospital now. His wife, Paula, said he spent the last 20 years teaching kids about archaeology, his greatest passion. “The kids are so fantastically interested,” she said. Knowledge of the caves had passed down through several generations of local families, she said. But, years ago, it was something “most people were ashamed to admit,” she said. People who exhibited any interest in archaeology were considered “crackpots” then, she said. “People are becoming more educated now.” Word about the caves eventually got through to Dr. Robert E. Funk, an archaeologist at the New York State Museum, who with D.W. Steadman, a fossils curator at the museum, wrote a book about their findings. The Orange County Archaeological Society started the excavations back in 1964, but still the caves remain one of Goshen’s best-kept secrets. The challenge for archaeologists is figuring out how to protect such a valuable site from vandalism. The site has already been damaged by years of commercial quarrying. The caves that remain are located in a small remnant, about 120 meters long, of the original outcrop that rimmed Mount Lookout. The archaeological society would like to see that remnant, now owned by the county and protected under stand and federal law, made into a public park. They believe it will enable them to both protect the site from vandals while sharing it with the world. At present the site is off limits to the public. Saturday’s tour was made possible when the county granted permission. Ray Decker, an archaeological society member, said Ed Diana is the first county executive to take a real interest in the site. He said that because Diana was once a teacher, he understands the power of a teaching tool like the Dutchess Quarry Caves. If the wildly enthusiastic response of the youngsters on the tour was any indication, the caves will turn many local schoolchildren into amateur archaeologists. Decker said he was both alarmed and deeply impressed by the numbers of people who called to be part of the tour after seeing an announcement in The Chronicle. He hopes this interest will translate into popular support for a park. Saturday’s tour exposed some of the challenges of making the site public. The trail is rocky and grown over with sticky brambles. It’s very steep in places; at one point visitors had to steady themselves by holding onto a rope tied to a tree. To make the site accessible, the county would have to build more secure paths. And there would need to be a visitor’s center to interpret the site. The archaeological society offers memberships to the general public. For information about getting involved, call Harold Decker at 355-7681 or e-mail decker@warwick.net.