Pueblo Grande Museum To Open New Main Exhibit Gallery

Nov. 20, 2001

The Valley's preeminent museum on Hohokam society, history and culture is preparing to open its completely redesigned main exhibit gallery.

Pueblo Grande Museum will celebrate the "Grand Re-Opening" of its main exhibit, The Hohokam: The Land and the People, at a free public showing on Saturday, November 17 from 10 a.m. to noon. The new exhibit explores Hohokam agriculture, architecture, and arts and will include examples of distinctive Hohokam Red-on-buff pottery, a variety of tools, and jewelry made of shell and stone. The museum is located at 4619 E. Washington St.

The new gallery explores elements from early Hohokam culture, like ballcourts and petroglyphs, as well as later Classic period features. Large, wall-height artifact case displays throughout the gallery help to define theme areas: The Sonoran Desert; Desert Farmers; Architects; Arts and Artisans; and Astronomers. Guests also will learn about the Hohokam canal system, which served as the blueprint for today's canal system.

Photomurals created with natural desert materials will help museum visitors experience desert and riparian landscapes as they might have looked when the Hohokam lived in the Salt River Valley.

Each exhibit area will include "touch" stations where visitors can experience hands-on activities. Two hands-on elements are entitled "making an impression," and focus on how archaeologists study Hohokam materials, such as woven items, that do not preserve well in the archaeological record. Visitors will be able to run their hands over replicated adobe with impressions left by materials to get a sense of the challenges archaeologists face when examining pottery remains. A magnetized display board will provide an opportunity for visitors to test match pottery styles with the era in which they were made.

Visitors to the gallery opening also will have access to the 102-acre museum grounds, where they can explore the ruin of an 800 year-old platform mound possibly used by the Hohokam for ceremonies or as an administrative center. They also can examine an excavated ballcourt, where ritualized games may have been played. The site also includes some of the last remaining intact Hohokam irrigation canals.

Media Contact:

David Urbinato Pager Joyce Valdez

602-262-4994 602-673-5681 602-262-4996