9Gel62 is a long, narrow site located on Weston-Reeves (or Bull 1s Tongue) Island about 1 kilometer upstream from Wallace Dam and 300 meters downstream from the mouth of Richland Creek. The island is nearly 900 meters long and the site extends along a ridge crest for most of this distance. 9Gel62 was discovered during the survey of the Wallace Reservoir in 1975. The island had been logged in 1973 so that the vegetation at the time of the survey consisted of grass, briars, and small trees. The ground cover and the slash from logging operations made surface collecting extremely difficult. Most of the material gathered by the survey party came from 9 discrete collecting units which were defined by topographic and logging features (DePratter 1976:405). Artifacts recovered indicated that there were many different occupations on the island, but of most interest to archaeologists was Collection Area G, near the middle of the island, where a quantity of Etowah Period sherds and small triangular projectile points demonstrated that 9Gel62 had one of the few Mississippian components in the reservoir. Area G presently covers approximately 1 hectare and was the only portion of the site protected from recent clearing operations. Core tests produced no evidence of an undisturbed midden, but it was thought that intact subsurface features and/or structures might still be present.
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