FREMONT INDIAN STATE PARK AND MUSEUM

The Museum

    At the visitor center, a short film describes the Fremont people and how the village at Five Finger Ridge was discovered during construction of Interstate 70. Thousands of artifacts excavated from the village are on permanent display. Special programs enhance museum collections, and include rock art tours, atl atl competitions, pottery-making workshops, and art exhibits featuring works of local artists. The museum store carries high quality books, maps, and Native American-themed crafts.

The People

    The Fremont Indians were agriculturalists who lived from about A.D. 400 to 1300 in north and central Utah and adjacent parts of Colorado, Idaho, and Nevada. The Fremont who lived in Clear Creek Canyon are thought to have come from hunters and gathers who previously lived in this location, and were also influenced by the Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) who introduced corn and pottery, making year-round settlements possible.

    Resources in Clear Creek Canyon, with its ample water and marshes, resulted in different subsistence needs than in other Fremont areas. Eating of cattails, marsh fish, and birds meant they did not have to grow as much corn, gather as many seeds, or hunt as many deer to survive. In their spare time they made jewelry and items used for trade, and created numerous rock art panels. We do not know if creation of the panels was a leisure activity or if they were emotionally or spiritually compelled to craft them. Social organization (probably through uniting extended families) was needed to build pithouses, mine obsidian, and gather necessary food.

    The name Fremont comes from Native American sites near Capitol Reef National Park, discovered in 1928 along the Fremont River (named after John C. Fremont). These sites contained artifacts and structure types that were consistently distinguishable from Anasazi sites. It is doubtful that all bands were known by one name or that one language was spoken by all of the people now classified as Fremont.