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Show 230 THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE Photograph by O. C. Havens EXCAVATING A KIVA AT PUEBLO BONITO One hundred thousand tons of earth, stone, and blown sand have been carted from the ruins of Pueblo Bonito by the National Geographic Society's expeditions. When conditions are favorable, thirty-five or more Indians, ten white men, and eight or nine horses are busy in the ruins (see text, page 227). Firewood was brought from twenty miles away. Mechanical repairs as well as future commissary requirements had to be anticipated. Our corner grocery at Gallup was separated from our kitchen at Pueblo Bonito by 106 miles of happened-by-chance road. When this road was dry the one-way trip could be made in seven hours; during the midsummer rains our drivers always carried their bed-rolls and a week's rations. But such local handicaps as Nature imposed were speedily forgotten as each was passed. Delays and disappointments were but temporary. Every day brought its share of work and worry; of secret thought toward maintenance of interest and contentment among our Indian workmen ; of planning for the morrow and the week ahead. And every day witnessed some definite progress toward the goal set when these expeditions were inaugurated, four years ago. Previous reports* of The Society's ex- * See the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE for June, 1921 ; March, 1922, and July, 1923. plorations at Pueblo Bonito have dealt more with the progress of excavations than with the nature of the discoveries. In these earlier accounts details of investigation, descriptions and interpretations of the cultural material recovered, have purposely been omitted, for it was felt that further research must certainly add to the story of which they formed but a part. That story has not yet been wholly retrieved, but it is now possible to weave the countless threads of fact and reasonable conjecture into a single fabric of probable truth-to review the daily life of the Bonitians as they lived a thousand years or more ago. Every potsherd, every fragment of worked stone, has its individual meaning. Our task is the faithful interpretation of this mute evidence; our hope, to breathe new life into these cold, inanimate objects. In thus weaving the story of a prehistoric people who have left no written records, many loose ends unavoidably remain ; a bit of patchwork appears now |