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Show CASTLE VALLEY TIMES -0UF? TIMESCastle Valley, Utah - Volume I, Number 9 - October 15, 1992 - Noses for News Former Neighbors Leave Traces in Castle Valley Early Castle Valley inhabitants lived in pit houses, partly subterranean. The town of Castle Valley may only be five years old, but this valley has been continuously occupied for at least 6,000 years. Archaic points dating back to 4,000 BC. have been un- to 300 B.C.) and later the Ute and These homes were dug three to seven Shoshone. Here the tribes traded not only stone, pottery, and beads but also their knowledge and skills. There is evidence that they influenced each other in their craft work. It is also likely that there was a fair amount of inter- feet below the surface, with raised earthed, telling us about our predeces- sors. Shards of pottery turn up in the garden. Arrowheads in the orchard. Oil-shale beads and bone awls in the backyard. In fact, several families have dug up treasures from the past while laying their foundations for the future. This valley was an important marriage. walls supporting mud and stick roofs. They would enter from above, climbing into them on ladders from the top or through openings in the side. Well insulated for all seasons, the people NEIGHBORS, Cont. Page 4 entrance through roof V below ground surface roof timbers .1----..., clayor .1‘-‘2-.‘ adobe ‘ " covering spoke of a well-traveled wheel of trading routes for many Native American tribes living in the Four Corners area. Of those, the Anasazi, Fremont, Ute, Piute, and Shoshone have all left evidence of their occupation and their intermingling. At times the valley was briefly shared among two tribes—the Anasazi and the Fremont (1,100 Origin of Castle Valley Castle Valley is one of several northwest-trending “salt anticline valleys” in southeastem Utah and 1. southwestern Colorado. The salt that is responsible for the formation of Castle Valley was deposited in seas that covered the region about 300 million years ago. Sediments up to about 5,000 feet thick, now named the Paradox Formation, were deposited by these seas. The sediments were 75 to 90 percent sodium chloride (table salt) interlayered with shale, gypsum, and limestone. The salt was less dense (weighed less) than other rocks of the region and when subjected to pressure from overlying rocks, flowed sideways to form bulges, then rose buoyantly into the overlying rocks to form domes called anticlines. The salt continued to flow into these anticlines until it was about 10,000 feet thick. 300 million years ago: seas deposited salt layers. fire as... linear & horizontal timbers , BASKeTmaKeY‘ F'l‘l'hOuse Greg Nunn. with Heather upd ht san stone slabs Sediments deposited across the region as the Castle Valley anticline was rising are either thinner or missing over the anticline, because the anticline’s surface was higher than adjacent areas. Rocks of this age are exposed in the cliffs that surround Castle Valley—predominantly sand- and clay carried from the LaSal stone, mudstone, and shale—deposited Mountains now cover the central part in a coastal plain environment between a shallow sea to the west and the ancestral Rocky Mountains to the east. By about 5 million years ago the region had been uplifted over a mile and was eroding. Channels of ancient streams that crossed the Castle Valley anticline can be seen as scallops or “bites” in the Porcupine Rim. When moving ground water came in contact with the salt in the Castle Valley anticline, it dissolved the salt and carried it away. As the salt was removed, the crest of the anticline 250-25 mllllon years ago:salt squeezed upward, doming overlying rocks & land surface. collapsed, creating Castle Valley. Geologically recent movement on a fault along the southwest margin of Castle Valley—and sink holes where the surface has collapsed—are evidence that the salt continues to be dissolved from under Castle Valley. Sand, gravel, of Castle Valley to depths up to several hundred feet, and debris washed or fallen from the steep walls of the valley covers most valley margins. One evidence that thick lowdensity salt underlies Castle Valley is that the attraction of gravity is a small but measurable amount lower than normal. A ZOO-pound person standing in the center of Castle Valley weighs a few hundredths of an ounce less than if the valley were underlain by sandstone. —Don Mabey Present: after entire region u lifted, groundwater dissolved part of the sa t and overtying rocks collapsed, forming Castle Valley. CASTLE |
