CLARK N. STURTZ AND HIS CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF MUSKINGUM COUNTY, OHIO Paperback – June 5, 2025

Clark N. Sturtz (1877-1944), a Zanesville, Ohio bicycle repairman, Harley-Davidson motorcycle salesman, amateur naturalist, and collector of antiques and oddities from around the world, was the first individual to make a photographic record of Indian burial mounds, earthen enclosures, and prehistoric village sites in Muskingum County, Ohio. Sturtz sent a set of his photographs to the Ohio Historical Society in 1918 along with a map with numbers keyed to the photographs. The Sturtz photographs were examined and copied at the Historical Society by coauthor James Morton in 1976, but the map that Sturtz had included with the photographs could not be located. This prompted a nearly five decade-long project by the authors to try to relocate Sturtz's sites. Sturtz also excavated at least four mounds in Muskingum County, and by the late 1930s he had amassed the largest collection of prehistoric Indian artifacts of anyone in the county, some of which he found in local mounds or purchased from the individuals who found them. In this book we discuss the 69 sites Sturtz reported to the Historical Society, reproduce Sturtz's photographs, and illustrate artifacts from a number of these sites, including items from Sturtz's four mound excavations. Also included are topographic maps showing the locations of Sturtz's sites and pages from his acquisitions catalog. The book is over 240 pages long and many of the illustrations are in color. Read more