Feature Article
Mesa Verde Centennial
Colorado's oldest National Park turns 100
Story and photos by Eric Lindberg
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| Doris Tsosie, weaver
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Black clouds mass over Navajo Canyon, blotting out hopes for a dazzling sunset. Thunder crackles into the gusting wind, sending ravens hurtling down the canyon. For a few primal moments nature has her way. But the winds die, and as if on divine cue, a single sunbeam pours through a gap in the cloud cover. The ancient cliff dwelling below is instantly drenched in sublime saffron light.
Such moments have unfolded here countless times over the centuries; few of them witnessed by humans. Aside from the nearby trio of German tourists and the sandstone structure below me, nothing else in this 30-mile pan-orama hints at human presence. But 800 years ago the canyon was bustling with people.
This pristine tableau is likely what Teddy Roosevelt had in mind in 1906 when he designated this 52,000-acre maze of canyons and mesas a national park. With a single signature, more than 5,000 archeological sites, including the famous cliff dwellings, gained protection from looters, developers and unbridled tourism.
In 2006 Colorado 's Mesa Verde National Park turns 100. For a select few, though, the bond with this land reaches back much further in time.
To Native Americans of certain pueblos and reservations scattered across New Mexico and Arizona, Mesa Verde is a link to the past. Eight centuries ago, this was the home of their ancestors.
Myron Gonzales is a Tewa native from New Mexico's San Ildefonzo Pueblo. He's part of a delegation of Native Americans meeting here with park officials to discuss future preservation of these sites. At Square Tower overlook, I ask Myron the question that's puzzled archeologists ever since they began poking around these crumbling dwellings and pit houses: What happened to the former inhabitants who abruptly vanished around 1300 A.D.?
Myron smiles and says there's no mystery at all. “We're still here, alive and well. We never went away. We just moved south.”
Many Native Americans believe Mesa Verde was the “middle stop” on a long migration path linking the early Pueblo people to modern Indian culture. Myron and his neighbors are the current generation of an ancestral lineage reaching back many centuries. Formerly called Anasazi, these ancient people are now referred to as Ancestral Puebloans.
Early the next morning I stand alone on the rim of Soda Canyon, waiting for the first tour of the day to Balcony House. A Swainson's hawk spirals slowly out of the canyon and drifts south on rising thermals. In the stillness, it's not difficult to imagine a morning similar to this one 800 years ago as the village below me stirred to life. The domestic sounds of community, of sleepy voices, yelping dogs and the gobbling cry of tame turkeys melds with the smell of wood smoke as the day begins.
Six other tourists join me, and we follow Ranger David Franks into the canyon. These guided tours began in the 1930s and are the only way to see most of the cliff dwellings. Fifteen minutes later we're standing inside Balcony House as he begins his talk.
“Although the Ancestral Puebloans lived on the mesa for 700 years, they occupied these cliff dwellings for less than 100 years before leaving. Why? Take your pick: drought, resource depletion, invaders, maybe the urge to find a better place. The truth is, no one really knows.”
We crawl through narrow passageways, climb tall ladders between levels, and peer down into subterranean kivas—ceremonial rooms where the people gathered for prayer, ritual and council. At a large terrace we pause to take in the sprawling canyon view.
“Mesa Verde is a window into a culture very different from ours,” David continues. “They spent their lives pursuing the basics: shelter, water and food. But the evidence they left behind—the pottery and architecture, their agriculture—points to a sophisticated society.”
Climbing out of the canyon, I drive back up the mesa to Far View Terrace to meet a Native American who has been coming to the park for decades.
If 80-year-old Doris Tsosie has any opinions about the first residents of Mesa Verde, she's keeping them to herself. But as an expert rug weaver who has been creating and selling her rugs in the park for close to 30 years, she is an icon. She seems wistful as she recalls earlier days here, a time of horseshoe games and potlucks under the piñon trees.
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| Randy Duckapoo and Cynthia Yazzie, potters
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A weaver since the age of eight, Doris refers to herself as a Diné, which means “people” in Navajo. She sits at a loom in the gift shop surrounded by her rugs depicting traditional designs in rich natural hues. “I like meeting tourists from all over. But I do get some funny questions, like how many rugs do I weave in a day.” She patiently answers that question by explaining it takes several weeks to create the typical handwoven rug.
Out on the patio, Doris' daughter, Lulu Wilson, a Navajo jewelry maker, sells delicate silver bracelets and earrings embedded with turquoise and red coral. Like her mother, she enjoys meeting visitors. “Some tourists once asked me, are you Anasazi? I told them yes, I'm the last one.” She giggles. “I think they believed me.”
Starting from the park museum at the edge of Chapin Mesa, I descend to Spruce Tree House, the only cliff dwelling accessible without a guided tour. The steep path from the dry mesa top into the shaded gorge provides a clue as to why these building sites were chosen. Often close to water seepages, the canyons are cooler in summer and protected from wind and cold in winter.
Spruce Tree House blends with its setting in a way that modern structures rarely achieve, as though sculpted by the elements rather than by human hands. Blackened rock ceilings hint at countless cooking fires, and centuries-old wood timbers still hold walls upright.
Twenty-five minutes further down the trail lies another mystery. At Petroglyph Point, enigmatic figures and symbols are scattered across a rock panel, tapped out by artists, dreamers and scribes. These carvings have held their stories through centuries of harsh weather. Today we can only guess at their meaning.
Hiking back to the canyon rim, I stop at Spruce Tree Terrace, where artisan couple Cynthia Yazzie (Navajo) and Randy Duckapoo (Hopi) sell their etched pottery and wood carvings. We trade stories of families, ancestors and dreams.
“My family built these places,” Randy tells me. “They lived here, sang and danced, grew corn, and called this place home.”
He pauses and looks beyond the parking lot to the canyon. “These places touch me deeply. They remind me to keep life simple, to remember who I am and where I came from. They help me not to hang on to the negative, but instead to keep the positive close.”
Few non-Native Americans can claim a historic connection to Mesa Verde, but Florence Lister is an exception. She came here as a graduate student in 1939, and returned with her archeologist husband 14 years later.
“I was the camp cook,” Lister recalls. “That's what archeologists' wives did in those days. At night I worked on the Indian pots and cherts, and during the day I cooked. We certainly didn't rough it. It was quite civilized here in the ‘50s.
“At dusk the Navajo workers would put on dances for the visitors around a real campfire—not one of these phony gas things—and then pass the hat. Sometimes a local rancher from Mancos would ride up to the fire, rear up his horse, and thrill the children. He was advertising his trail rides into the canyon.”
She pauses, and her brown eyes drift to some private recollection.
“I could sit there and look down Navajo Canyon toward Shiprock and reflect on Mesa Verde long ago.”
In today's park some things have changed. Evening campfires no longer crackle in the amphitheater. The Navajos who danced and sang around that fire are long gone. So are the old rancher and his horse from Mancos. And to protect the fragile habitat, hoofed animals no longer carry tourists into the canyon.
But much remains the same as Florence's, or even Randy's, ancestors would have remembered it. Ravens and vultures still drift across the ridges. Coyotes yip and howl on moonless nights. The fragrance of piñon and juniper sweetens the dry mesa air after a summer squall. And thanks to park service protection, the cliff dwellings and archeological sites will be here for another hundred years and beyond.
Eric Lindberg is a Lakewood-based travel writer and photographer who has written for EnCompass on numerous occasions.
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