Lake Scott State Park
Lake Scott State Park is the site of a ruined Taos Pueblo. The Taos arrived in western Kansas in 1664. After having escaped the Spanish colonial rule in New Mexico. They formed an alliance with a group of Plains Apache. The Taos Indians built the protective pueblos and an irrigation system from a nearby spring to water their crops. The settlement, known as El Cuartelejo, was occupied for 20 years before the builders returned to their home territory. The pueblo was reoccupied in 1696 by a group of Picuri Indians. The Picuris were compelled to retreat to their homelands in colonial New Mexico ten years later.
Chetro Ketl
As the Basketmaker III people improved their farming techniques during the 8th century, the well-watered areas of the San Juan Basin became densely populated. Greater crop yields necessitated the construction of above-ground storage facilities, which were the first large-scale construction projects in the region. Fagan identifies this as the beginning of the first pueblos, "ushering in a period of profound social tension, population movements, and political change." In his opinion, "by 800, there was no going back. The people of Chaco and elsewhere were locked completely into economies based on maize and bean cultivation." Archeologists refer to the period starting as the Pueblo I Period. By the early 10th century the large pit-house settlements had been supplanted by modular construction that later served as the foundation for the Ancestral Puebloan great houses. This marks the beginning of the Bonito Phase. During the 10th century, Chaco's population was swelled by a steady influx of immigrants from the San Juan River, approximately north. Fagan notes, "Within a few centuries, as rainfall became more irregular and life less predictable, the Chacoans embarked on a cultural trajectory that melded ancient traditions with new ideas that were to crystalize into a brilliant and short-lived Southwestern society."