Preserving a Sacred Site Inside an Urban Landscape: The Gougar Site (11WI64)

In 2013, the Northern Illinois Field Station completed a Phase I survey for High Speed Rail from Chicago to Joliet. The survey corridor provided ISAS with the op-portunity to view the distribution of cultural resources across a wide range of terrain and assess the accelerated loss of such resources within a significant urban area. As a result of the survey, the Cougar Site (11 Wl64) was revisited. The Cougar Site represents a complex Archaic, Contact Period Native American, and Euro-American archaeological site. The Hickory Creek landscape was intensely used for habitation and mortuary activities during prehistoric periods until Euro-American contact marked by numerous previously recorded sites along the drainage. Despite the de-struction of many of these sites, 11 Wl64 remains a partially intact multi-component habitation and mortuary site amid a highly urbanized landscape, principally due to the protection of the Cougar family from the Pioneer Period unti I the present.