After the Pawnee Nation was forced to move to Indian Territory in Oklahoma in 1873, what is likely the same tract of land they used for their annual hunting trips was purchased by a local cattle rancher. The property passed hands twice, and the Pawnee people’s hunting camp remained almost untouched. When the current landowners bought the farm in the 1960s, they and the previous owners shook hands, ensuring that the Pawnee Tipi Ring Site and Golden Spring Beach (as it’s known now) would be preserved. In 2013, the current landowners connected with the Kansas Historical Society during the Archaeological Training Program, where private citizens can bring their artifacts to local archaeologists for analysis.



Dr. Jack Hofman, an anthropology professor at the University of Kansas, led test excavations of the site between 2013 and 2016. His team discovered that the remains of the Pawnees' tipis were still almost entirely intact. In contrast, nearly all tipi ring sites in Kansas have been destroyed due to land cultivation; it’s rare that private landowners would have chosen to preserve an archeological site like this one.

At the landowners’ request, Kansas’ State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) listed the property on the State Register of Historic Places. The state then sent a nomination to the National Register of Historic Places in 2018, where the Pawnee Tipi Ring Site and Golden Spring Beach is currently under review.

Matt Reed, Tribal Historic Preservation Officer for the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma, explains that his office has been loosely involved with the project in the past, and hopes to continue their relationship with Kansas' SHPO in the future: "I have been in contact with [the archaeologists] a couple of times beginning late last summer and have a trip scheduled for this month to visit the site in person. I hope that my office and the Nation can work with the archaeology team and the State of Kansas very closely on this project, as well as all future projects involving Pawnee cultural sites."



Referring to the site’s remarkable physical impression on the land, Kansas SHPO archeologist Tim Weston explains, “You can tell there’s something odd about it [if you visit the property]. You can see several shallow, circular depressions spread out through the pasture. Even with no background or training in archeology, you could look at it and think, I wonder what’s going on here?”

The site is historically significant as a rare remnant of the Pawnee Nation in Kansas, and it is almost entirely pristine. In fact, the only part of the site that was moved is still on the property. Stones that once lined the Pawnees' tipi rings were utilized in the construction of a barn nearby. When archaeologists began excavating the area, they found similar stones buried beneath some of the rings, indicating that the Pawnees would have reused the site year after year.