DIGGING UP THE PAST: ADVANCE MAN SPENT DECADES COLLECTING INDIAN ARTIFACTS

ADVANCE, Mo. -- Paul Corbin has never found an arrowhead he didn't like. Nor a spear point, clay bowl or any other prehistoric Indian artifact, for that matter.

The basement of his small Advance home is crowded with more than a thousand arrowheads, spear points, stone axes and clay bowls and pots, some of them dating back nearly 10,000 years. The newer artifacts date back about 800 years to the days of the mound-building Mississippian Indians.

A former door-to-door salesman, Corbin, 86, has spent much of his life digging in the dirt of his nearby farm or in the upturned earth of neighbors' farms. The result, he says, is one of the larger collections of Indian artifacts in the nation.

He recently donated about 300 of his most prized artifacts to the Missouri Department of Conservation, which plans to use them in a new nature center that will be built in Cape Girardeau County North Park. Construction on the $7.3 million project could begin early next year with completion by June 2003.

Missouri Conservation Department staff visited Corbin's home earlier this summer and boxed up the artifacts they plan to house in the nature center. The boxes are still in Corbin's basement, along with the hundreds and hundreds of artifacts that weren't chosen by the conservation department staff.

"We want to make sure we have all the paperwork for him before we take possession of it," said A.J. Hendershott, outreach and education regional supervisor for the department.

Hendershott helped pick out the prized pieces. He said the pieces help tell the story about man's interaction with nature.

His enduring passion

They also tell a story about Corbin, who has a tireless enthusiasm for unearthing the past. He's had other hobbies, everything from making wooden sundials to crafting gemstone jewelry. He's raised bees, too. But collecting Indian artifacts remains his constant passion.

Old age and a broken hip suffered in a fall six months ago have slowed him down. But his eyes sparkle when he speaks of the Indian artifacts he has found.

"I found my first arrowhead when I was about 12 years old," said Corbin, who grew up on a 48-acre farm on a backwater slough about six miles from Advance. He later found a tomahawk stone at the family farm.

He began actively collecting Indian artifacts in 1950. Area farmers helped out. Corbin said farmers often paid him with Indian artifacts unearthed on their lands for handling their tax returns. A lot of artifacts surfaced on Advance area farms in the 1950s and 1960s when farmers leveled their fields for irrigation, he said.

One of his favorite finds is a small stone bowl that once held face paint. He found it when he helped his grandson lay a water line.

His collection of pottery includes bowls bearing handles shaped like frogs, bears and other animals.

He also has stones shaped like hockey pucks. They were used in an ancient Indian game.

Hendershott said Corbin did more than just collect ancient artifacts. He also kept meticulous records of where he found them, an important consideration for any museum exhibit, Hendershott said.

"I think they were rather impressed," Corbin said.

To Corbin, there's a simple reason for the sheer size of his collection. "I never knew when to stop," he said.