Title

ASA001-490

Creator

Charles Clayton Howe

Preview

Creation Date

6-1-1954

Description

BLACK CANYON AND INSCRIPTION CANYON (SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY, CALIFORNIA), 1949-1968 AND UNDATED (BULK DATES 1949-1958)

338 negatives: ASA001-364 – 701

Box 2. Box 6: 26 degraded negatives ASA001-408, 412, 427, 431, 434, 435, 436, 442, 443, 453, 468, 469, 471, 472, 473, 475, 512, 514, 515, 516, 532, 553, 556, 561, 626, 670

Twenty-seven sub-series in chronological order

Howe led many ASA trips to Black Canyon and Inscription Canyon, a small arroyo at the north end of Black Canyon (Pederson, 1956/1984; Howe, 1980). He found the bird petroglyph that ASA adopted as its logo; the bird is about 20 feet above the road and has a wing-span of over two feet (Pederson, 1953/1983). The petroglyph is unique in the area although a similar bird petroglyph occurs 120 miles away (Haenszel, 1972/n.d.). In 1953, the ASA posted a sign, “This is Black Canyon,” telling visitors about the canyon and asking them to “live in peace with this extraordinary place” (ASA, 1953/1984).

Charles LaMonk donated several of his reproductions of petroglyphs in Inscription Canyon to ASA (ASA LaMonk Nos. 9, 10, 14, 35, 38, 40, 69, 77 prepared in 1954 and ASA LaMonk no. 46 prepared in 1964).

Photographs include some taken in Inscription Canyon. This collection has no photographs of the ASA trip in June 1966 to attempt to repair damage by vandals (Howe, 1966).

Black Canyon, June 1, 1954
10 negatives: ASA001-490 – 499

Sub-series contains the following items:

ASA001-490 petroglyph. The photograph was published as Plate 35 in A prehistory of Black Canyon (Howe, 1980); plate caption states that the petroglyph suggests a basket and pestle. LaMonk donated to ASA his reproduction of this petroglyph at site SBr-322 (ASA LaMonk No. 77, prepared in 1954). ASA001-473 is a very degraded negative of a photograph of the same petroglyph taken in 1953.

Rights

The images in this collection are copyrighted. Images may be displayed, copied, or used for personal study only. Written permission to reproduce an image for electronic or print publication may be obtained from California State University San Bernardino's Pfau Library Special Collections.