Archeological Investigations — Themes and Context

Movement Between Regions

The bulletin is organized as a geographical tour, not a thematic argument. Fowke moves from the Ozark region of central Missouri to southern Indiana, then Kentucky, and finally Hawaii. Within each state, he proceeds county by county, cave by cave. This structure mirrors the fieldwork itself: a series of discrete visits, each with its own access problems and local informants. The transitions are abrupt—'Crossing the Ohio River from the southern Indiana cave region, the counties of Kentucky … were next visited'—and the reader is left to infer connections. Fowke does not synthesize; he reports.

The Hawaiian section, placed last, is a separate monograph in miniature, with its own house mounds and stone enclosures. The shift from limestone caves to volcanic terrain is stark, but Fowke applies the same method: measure, describe, note disturbances. The movement between regions is less a narrative arc than a cumulative record of what was seen.

Recurring Images: Water, Mud, and Fallen Rock

Three physical conditions recur so often they become motifs. Water is the most persistent: 'the drainage of several large sink holes is through the two openings'; 'the cave is now reached by a narrow stairway 40 feet high' because the original entrance flooded; 'the floor has been leveled and a close pavement of large slabs laid over the muddy portions.' Mud is described as an active agent—'mud has accumulated to a depth of 3 feet on the floor within his remembrance, due to cultivation around the sink holes.' Fallen rock encumbers edges and fills passages; at Saltpeter Cave the floor's 'edges much encumbered with fallen rock.' These are not static backdrops but forces that shape what can be found and how digging proceeds.

The Role of Local Informants

Fowke repeatedly relies on landowners and neighbors for site history. He writes: 'The owner says mud has accumulated … within his remembrance'; 'A farmer living near says he has seen the water from the cave rise until it covered the bottom of the sink hole'; 'The present owners, who have known the cave for a long time, never heard of any such finds.' These voices are quoted without skepticism, but also without elaboration. The report does not evaluate their reliability; it simply records what was told. This gives the text an ethnographic texture—the investigator is as much a collector of oral reports as of artifacts. The reader must weigh the evidence accordingly.

Negative Evidence and Absent Finds

Fowke is careful to note when nothing was found. Of Mammoth Cave in Illinois he writes: 'No one has ever heard of human remains being found anywhere in the cave.' Of Hutchins Cave in Kentucky: 'The present owners … never heard of any such finds.' These statements are as important as positive discoveries. They define the limits of the archaeological record and prevent future workers from assuming occupation where none is attested. The report's value lies partly in these absences—they mark sites that were tested and yielded nothing, saving later investigators wasted effort. Fowke's willingness to publish negative results is a methodological strength.

Readers should approach this bulletin as a field journal rather than a synthesis. Fowke rarely interprets; he describes. The value is in the concrete detail—the depth of mud, the height of a stairway, the name of a farmer. Those interested in the history of American archaeology will find a record of how sites were located, accessed, and documented in the early twentieth century. The Hawaiian section, though brief, offers a useful comparison to the mainland cave work, showing the same method applied to a different landscape.

There’s something tender about Fowke’s careful notes—water stains, broken sherds, the quiet labor of looking. It made me think of a different kind of excavation, one where the wound is the site itself. Bokwala: The Story of a Congo Victim — Themes and Context lingers the same way, a dig into what was left behind.