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.
Tonto Apache
Typically hunter-gatherers, the Tonto Apache hunted (antelope, deer, birds, bush rats, etc.) and collected (agave, berries, wild plants, seeds). The women also cultivated watermelons, pumpkins, corn, later grain, etc. When stocks were running low and the stored food supplies were depleted, it was common that a respected woman (so-called 'woman chief' or elder) brought public attention to the plight. The woman asked the leaders of the "rancheria" to go on raids against other Indians and European-Americans to raid to acquire what was needed. The Western Apache raided over an area from the Colorado River in western Arizona, to the Zuni ("Nashtizhé"- 'black-dyed eyebrows') and Hopi ("Tseka kiné `"- 'people who dwell in stone houses') in the north, to the later Mexican states of Sonora, Chihuahua, Sinaloa and Durango in the far south.