PBS to feature Cortez ruin Tuesday night

“The Lost Pueblo Village, A Time Team America Presentation,” will air tonight, Aug. 26, at 8 p.m. on Rocky Mountain PBS (check your local listings.) The show features the Dillard Site, a Basketmaker III site being excavated by Crow Canyon Archaeological Center northwest of Cortez. The show, hosted by Justine Shapiro, filmed on the site about two years ago and tells the story of one of the areas first villages.

The Basketmaker III Period, between A.D. 500 to 750, and was a pivotal time in Pueblo history, one that saw the introduction of pottery, the bow and arrow and cultivated beans (corn and squash had already been introduced during the earlier Basketmaker II and late Archaic periods). In the Mesa Verde region, the Basketmaker III period was also a time of rapid population growth, which archaeologists believe was largely the result of immigration.

The informative show is expected to draw over 6 million viewers tonight and over 6 million viewers online.

Visit www.pbs.org/time-team/home for more information, or to watch the show after it airs Tuesday. Also visit www.cortezjournal.com to read about the Dillard site in Friday’s Cortez Journal.