Bell County Museum curator Stephanie Turnham helped the U.S. Army Operational Test Command mark Native American Heritage Month with an insightful presentation Tuesday on the Gault Site, an archaeological dig located between Florence and Salado.

After a welcome by Mission Command Test Directorate director Mike Nott, Staff Sgt. Robert Guillory, an MCTD research, development, test and evaluation noncommissioned officer, read the presidential proclamation for the 2010 Native American Heritage Month observance. Guillory then introduced Turnham, presenting her with a Native American talking stick that, according to legend, was used in council meetings to preserve order and decorum.

“As long as you are in possession of that stick,” Guillory told Turnham, “you have the floor.”

Promising her talk would not be the typical or stereotypical Native American observance, Turnham took the audience on a brief journey through Paleo-Indian culture as evidenced by findings at the Gault Site, discovered in 1929. Named for the owners of the farm, Henry and Jodie Gault, the site was almost destroyed over the next 60 years by pot hunters, or pay-to-dig artifact collectors, Turnham said.

“Dr. James Pearce, the first professional archaeologist in Texas, conducted the preliminary excavation,” Turnham said, “and uncovered evidence that would turn the Clovis archaeological findings on its ear.”

According to Turnham, the site is a flint and chert quarry approximately 80 by 200 meters long located in the Balcones Ecotone, which is the boundary zone of the Edwards Plateau, Blackland Prairie and Coastal ecotones.

“For the early people of this area,” she said, “the site was a Silicon Valley because flint and chert were used to make both tools and weapons.”

In 1991, some avocational archaeologists found a mammoth jawbone with an arrowhead embedded in it, Turnham said. To date some two million objects have been unearthed. News stories have appeared in the Newsweek, Smithsonian and National Geographic magazines.

“This cache of artifacts is the largest in North America,” Turnham said, “and provides evidence that this continent has been home to humans for more than thirteen thousand years.”

In the late 1990s, Dr. Michael Collins, the lead researcher at the Gault Site project, bought the property, donating it to archaeological conservancy. The former owners live nearby and help keep an eye on it, according to Turnham.

“Dr. Collins and his staff continue to excavate, using optically stimulated luminescence instead of carbon-dating, to document their discoveries,” Turnham said.

Turnham said tours of the Gault Site can be arranged by calling the Bell County Museum at 933-5243 or e-mailing museum@co.bell.tx.us.

Brigadier Gen. Don MacWillie, USAOTC commanding general, presented Turnham with a command plaque, thanking her for supporting OTC’s observance, but only after receiving the talking stick from her.

“This is not the first time you’ve brought an outstanding program to us,” MacWillie said. “Your Women’s History Month presentation on the Sanctified Sisters of Belton back in March is unforgettable, and we hope you’ll join us as often as you can.”

Nott said he was appreciative of the myriad contributions by Native Americans to the overall fabric of American culture.

“It’s events like this one,” Nott said, “that help us understand our history and culture, which is what makes America the great country it is.”