(Billings, MT)-Montana State Parks (stateparks.mt.gov) announced today:

What: Pictograph Cave State Park summer program, “Paleoindians In Montana 13,000-8,000 Years Ago.”

When: Saturday, July 14 at 7 p.m.

Where: Pictograph Cave is located five miles from Billings at the end of Coburn Road.

Who: Dr. Ruthann Knudson, of the Montana State University College of Technology in Great Falls’ Native American Studies program.

Thirteen thousand years ago Montana was a very different landscape, with glacial melt water to the north and ice in the mountains. The prairies and plains were teeming with animals. Aquatic and plant resources abounded. In this presentation, archaeologist and historian Dr. Ruthann Knudson will shed light on the people of this time and what we may know of them from studies of Montana sites including Anzick/Wilsal, Barton Gulch, Indian Creek, MacHaffie, and Mill Iron..

Knudson is the executive director of the Friends of the Museum of the Plains Indian, a registered professional archaeologist and an internationally recognized scholar of Plains Paleoindian culture and paleoecology.

This presentation is free and open to the public. Partial funding for the Humanities Montana Speakers Bureau is provided by a legislative grant from Montana’s Cultural Trust and from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Pictograph Cave State Park attracts thousands of visitors annually to its three-cave complex, Pictograph, Middle and Ghost caves, where generations of prehistoric hunters once camped. These caves were the site of Montana's first professional archaeological excavations beginning in 1937. More than 30,000 artifacts have been identified from the park. In the 2011 summer season (May- August) more than 39,000 people visited Pictograph State Park, a 77 percent increase over the year before. In the 2011 summer season (May- August) more than 39,000 people visited Pictograph State Park, a 77 percent increase over the year before.

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