Not gone but forgotten: resurrecting the East St. Louis site

The East St. Louis site was the second largest city in the Mississippian world. While removal of its mounds during the nineteenth century led many to believe that the entire site had been destroyed, scattered investigations since 1987 have shown that intact areas do remain. Today, the planned construction of a Mississippi River bridge and interstate connector through East St. Louis is spurring the most extensive investigations of a Mississippian mound center since those at Cahokia in the 1960s. This paper summarizes ITARP’s decade-long investigations performed in preparation for this project at East St. Louis and at nearby prehistoric settlements.