ARCHAEOLOGY OPEN HOUSE THIS WEEKEND

WICKLIFFE, Ky. The public will have a chance to get a first-hand look at on-going archaeological excavation work at Wickliffe Mounds this weekend.

An open house will be held from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

The cost is $3.50 for adults, $3.25 for senior citizens ages 55 and older, and $2.50 for children ages 6-11. Children younger than 6 years of age will be admitted free of charge.

This is the fourth year for the open house.

Wickliffe Mounds was formerly a privately operated tourist attraction and museum whose main draw was an unearthed Indian burial ground strewn with skeletons. It is now owned by Murray (Ky.) State University.

The site is considered one of the best-preserved examples of mound-building, Mississippian Indian culture in America.

Murray State, Southeast Missouri State and Southern Illinois (Carbondale) universities have formed a consortium called the Middle Mississippi Survey.

"We are focusing on archaeological research in Southeast Missouri and Western Kentucky," said Carol Morrow, archaeologist at Southeast Missouri State and one of the founders of the consortium.

The consortium is sponsoring a field school this summer, which involves excavation work at Wickliffe Mounds and some survey work in Southeast Missouri by more than 20 students from the three universities.

Wickliffe Mounds was once the site of an Indian village, which housed 500 to 1,000 people for about 300 years. The village was abandoned around the year 1250.

Morrow said the students involved in this summer's field school will be on hand for the open house Saturday.

Also scheduled to be on hand are flintknappers, who make stone tools and arrow heads; and an Indian-story teller.

Morrow said Wickliffe Mounds used to be "a really tacky tourist attraction." But since being donated to Murray State, director Kit Wesler has turned the site into "a really first-rate research place and a living-museum type of place," she said.