Following in the Footsteps of Gordon Willey, Excavation at the Town of Kasita (9CE1)

Kasita, a Lower Creek Indian town, was settled on a terrace adjacent to the Chattahoochee River near Columbus, Georgia. The town was inhabited by Muscogee speaking Indians between 1715 and 1825. Lawson Army Airfield, a part of Fort Benning Military Reservation, was constructed on top of much of the site in the early to mid 1900s. Because of the immense size of the site, despite the runways and building construction, much of the site still remains intact. Recent runway expansion and improvements and plans would have impacted a large portion of the site where 9CE I was recorded. Panamerican Consultants, Inc. (PCI) was contracted by Fort Benning to assess the potential damage to the archaeological remnants of Kasita and assist the base in reducing any impacts to the culturally and historically important site. After initial Phase ll investigations, the area of impact was reduced from some 52 acres to roughly 12 acres and was confined to a portion of the airfield called Open Area North (OAN). As avoidance of the area was impossible, a large-scale mitigation was conducted by PCI for Fort Benning Military Reservation. During this work over 100,000 artifacts, including 20,000 botanical and faunal remains were recovered, and 348 cultural features were excavated. The results presented in this report describe the materials recovered. features excavated, and interpret the findings compared to known ethnographic works and other excavated Creek sites.