Pio Pico, Whittier, California

The last Mexican governor of California's adobe house is still standing, and presently being renovated by the California State Parks.  The archaeologist in charge, Herb Dallas wants to know if there are other interesting preserved features on the property that can be excavated, to learn more about 19th century life in colonial California.  John Hildebrand and Sean Wiggins (Scripps Institute, Marine Physics Lab in La Jolla) and I did GPR, magnetics and EM surveys at the site.  Here are the GPR maps of one grid that is just full of interesting features.  The midden has been excavated and other features will be dug during the winter and spring of 2001, 2002.   There is LOTS going on in this area, but it is complex because the area has been extensively developed by the city of Whittier's Water Department over the last 100 years.

Here are some of the slice maps placed on the aerial photo of the site.  There are lots of buried pipes, but hidden in this seemingly indecipherable mess are some really interesting archaeological features.

One feature we found of great interest was the historic midden, which showed up nicely on the GPR maps and profiles.  It can be seen below as all the small high amplitude hyperbolic reflections sitting on and within the old channel of the San Gabriel River, which is marked as blue.  It was excavated and found to be lots of metal (probably the origin of the most of the reflections) glass and other materials.