The Wittrock Excavations: Implications for the Study of Culture Process within the Initial Variant of the Middle Missouri Tradition

Abstract

The Wittrock National Historic Landmark site is a fortified Mill Creek village in northwest Iowa. Although it has been excavated on four occasions, detailed reports on the two most extensive projects have only recently been made available. The purpose of this article is to utilize data derived from the Wittrock site to inform models of Mill Creek midden formation and Mill Creek culture process recently proposed by Anderson (1985a; 1985b). The article concludes that 1) the Wittrock midden resulted from the “banked house” method of trash dispersal; 2) a series of changes are warranted in Anderson's model of Mill Creek culture process; and 3) the Mill Creek model has a bearing on our understanding of the entire Initial Variant of the Middle Missouri Tradition.