Archaeology in San Juan County Robert Hosier
After visiting with many of the residents of San Juan County over the last seventeen years, I have been duly impressed with their concern that the archaeological artifacts and, in too many cases, the reports of scientific information gathered were not being returned to or remaining in San Juan County — the place of origin. There is a strong opinion that these materials were being taken from the area to build up big eastern colleges, and even museums of other countries, instead of being used to assist the people of the county. Some people feel that many of these archaeologists were an elitist group who gave no thought to helping build a research center here but were interested only in having residents of San Juan raise funds for them to perform archaeological excavations. I found a small group of residents who only voiced an opinion against the archaeologists as justification for their own destruction of sites in order to sell the artifacts. Fortunately, ninty-five percent of San Juan County residents want the Anasazi sites, artifacts, and reports of information gathered from excavated sites to become a part of an archaeological research center that future archaeologists can use as a reference center. This research center should have laboratories, a library, and a repository to preserve all materials for future use. It seems that the residents of San Juan County and the archaeologists have similar views as to how sites, artifacts, and reports should be treated. Now they differ only in how 45
