Sebre Lake Site facts for kids

The Sebre Lake Site is a very old Native American place in Fort Ripley Township, Minnesota. It's known by a special code, 21CW55, which helps archaeologists keep track of important sites. This area was used by people for a very long time, over 4,000 years!

People lived and buried their dead here from about 3000 BCE (that's Before Common Era) until around 900 CE (Common Era). This covers two big time periods: the middle Archaic period and the early Late Woodland period. In 1984, the Sebre Lake Site was added to the National Register of Historic Places. This means it's a very important historical place in the United States. It's special because it's one of the richest archaeological sites in the Nokasippi River Valley.

Why Was Sebre Lake Important?

The Sebre Lake Site was used by Native American people for thousands of years. They didn't live there all the time, but they came back to it often. It was a great spot because it had lots of natural resources.

• The lake nearby offered good fishing.
• The Mississippi River was close, which was like an ancient highway for travel.
• There were open grassy areas, called prairies, nearby. These prairies attracted animals like deer, elk, and bison, which were important for hunting.

Discovering Sebre Lake's Past

People started officially looking into the Sebre Lake Site in 1901. A person named Jacob V. Brower was exploring Crow Wing County and found it. He thought it was an ancient village.

Brower didn't stay long, but he asked local people to find any old items they could. Many of the things found at Sebre Lake are now in Brower's collection at the Minnesota Historical Society. These items include:

• Stone tools: These were used by people during the Archaic, Middle Woodland, and early Late Woodland periods.
• Ceramic pieces: These are broken bits of pottery from the early Late Woodland period.

Later Discoveries at the Site

In the 1930s, some ancient graves were found when people were farming the land. Later, in 1978, archaeologists from Minnesota studied the site more closely. They found more interesting things, such as:

• More ceramic pieces from different cultural groups.
• A projectile point, which is the tip of a spear or arrow.
• Lithic flakes, which are small pieces of stone that broke off when tools were being made.
• Fire-cracked rock, which shows where people had fires.
• Small pieces of bone.

Some houses had been built on parts of the site. The archaeologists talked to the homeowners. One person had a collection of pottery pieces found on their property. These were identified as special types of pottery from the Middle Woodland period.

The Sebre Lake Site has given us one of the biggest and most varied collections of ancient items in the Nokasippi Valley. It's one of only three major places where people lived for a long time in that area.