GRUESOME FIND UNEARTHED
Monongahela City Dec. 1916
A gruesome find was made this morning at the former entrance of the old River bridge in the first ward .
Workmen engaged in leveling up the ground and tearing away the stone abuntment, for the widening of the railroad so additiional tracks may be added, unearthed a human skull.
The find was made just inside the excavation where the wingwall formally stood, at a depth of about six feet underground
From the evidence in the surrounding artifacts and shells it was determined to be that of an Indian buried in prehistoric times.
The old wooden bridge was built in 1838 and fill was made to level the wingwall, about four feet added on top of the ground in the area where the skull was found, Indicating the burial was approximatly two and one-half feet below the original ground level
The skull found was in rather a good state of preservation and points to the fact that the site was that of an old indian burial ground
Founded on a graveyard
Monongahela City March 25th 1880
Saturday March 18th 1880, Mr. John R. Gee
Owner of the stone works on Main St.
Passing up the railroad cut near the bridge,
Saw what he thought was an iron ring embedded
in the clay. He gave it a kick ,when to his sorrow
discovered he had shattered the outcropping
of the mouth of a crude indian pottery jar.
Carefully gathering up the pieces, he tenderly
carried the pitcher to Dr. Linn, who painstakingly
restored the piece, the result being an almost
priceless specimen of pre historic pottery.
The jar is in the urn shape, or rather resembling
a water jar with a narrow neck & flaring mouth,
not unlike a modern cuspadore. It is very thin,
without ornament, & if sun baked is remarkably
well preserved. Dr Linn suggested to Mr John Wall
& Mr Gee that this was likely a food depository for
a grave.
With further search these gentlemen
resulted in the exuhumation of a child's skeleton.
The vessel proven to be one such as were put in
the graves of indians, containing enough food to
last the child its passage to the spirit land.
Mr. Culbertson recently found a provision jar at
the paper mill, and Mr. E W. Keller tells us that when
a boy, the falling in banks of the creek frequently
exposed indian graves.
What is true about nearly
every grave found in this area [not in the mounds]
is the fact that they are all the graves of children.
There was once a continuous grave yard along the
river bottom from the site of the paper mill to the
old creek mouth which was then north of the island,
a new effluent having been cut thru the quicksand ,
forming the present channel. Valuable specimens
are coming to the surface with every new excavation.
