The Immense Journey: Loess Hills Cultural Resources Study, 2011

Known as one of North America’s natural treasures, the Loess Hills is also one of our country’s archaeological gems. This unique landscape harbors hundreds of well-preserved earth lodge dwellings and palisades villages built by ancestral Plains Indians. The descendants of these early Iowa farmers were first described in the journals and accounts of 18th- and 19th-century travelers and explorers. Celebrated artists, such as Karl Bodmer and George Catlin, forever fixed the vibrant life ways of these people in our mind’s eye. The historical legacy of the Loess Hills lies in a rich archaeological record.