Guadalupe River of Texas

Guadalupe River of Texas

Introduction

The Guadalupe River runs from Kerr County, Texas to San Antonio River on the Gulf of Mexico. The river is a popular destination for rafters and canoers. Larger cities along the river include New Braunfels, Kerrville, Seguin, Gonzales, Cuero, and Victoria. The Guadalupe has several dams along its length, the most notable of which forms Canyon Lake northwest of New Braunfels (www.absoluteastronomy.com).

The human history of the Guadalupe River site is closely tied to its natural setting at the head of San Antonio River, a short, narrow secondary River that takes its name from the Guadalupe River. Archeologists often emphasize how local landscapes changed through time, but few sites in Texas are situated in such a dynamic locale. Due to sea-level change and the remodeling power of the combined Guadalupe and San Antonio rivers, the immediate landscape encountered by the aboriginal peoples who visited the site was seldom identical from generation to generation (www.edwardsaquifer.net). Their campsite lay on higher ground overlooking the upper stretches of the River and the Guadalupe River delta. Simple dugout canoes would have given them ready access to a rich array of resources from the the salty open River, to the brackish upper River, to the freshwaters flowing down the rivers, as well as from the dry and marshy lands flanking the waterways (www.edwardsaquifer.net).

History

The river was first called after Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe by Alonso de León in 1689. It was renamed the San Augustin by Domingo Terán de los Ríos who maintained a colony on the river, but the name Guadalupe persisted. Many explorers referred to the current Guadalupe as the San Ybón above its confluence with the Comal, and instead the Comal was called the Guadalupe. Evidence indicates that the river has been home to humans for several thousand years, including the Karankawa, Tonkawa, and Huaco (pronounced like Waco) Indians (www.texasbeyondhistory.net).

The Guadalupe River site was first recorded in 1966 by avocational archeologist E. H. (Smitty) Schmiedlin of Victoria, Texas, and given the name “Heyland site” after the landowners of that time. It was reported to be a shell midden that sloped gradually downward from the edge of the Beaumont Formation on the east to the recently dredged Victoria Barge Canal on the west, and covered an area of about one acre. A few small looters' holes were noted across the site, and a small artifact collection was made including stone tools, aboriginal pottery, glass, and worked shell (www.texasbeyondhistory.net).

A year later, Cecil A. Calhoun, another active avocational archeologist of Victoria, filed a highly entertaining, updated site record form in which he described falling into a nest of juvenile rattlesnakes from which he somehow managed to escape without a bite. Included on the form was a detailed description of a test pit he excavated. At that time, Calhoun described the site as a “marine shell midden” covering an area measuring 500 ft long by 100 ft wide. He noted that about half the locale had been disturbed by looting, and that a ...