What makes Range Creek almost unique in the West is that most of the archaeological sites obtained by the state are pristine because the Wilcox family vigilantly protected the land from pothunters and vandals since acquiring it more than 50 years ago. Though public roads provide access to the canyon in places, passage through much of it has been off-limits to the general public because the property is gated and privately owned.

That has kept Range Creek much as it has been for hundreds of years.

"The sites are not damaged at all" on the ranch property, said Jones. "There are not names scratched in the rock art panels. Nobody's dug holes in the pit houses." Bullet holes do not mar the cliff walls, and trash does not litter the landscape.

"I didn't let people go in there to destroy it," the 74-year-old Wilcox told the Associated Press. "The less people know about this, the better."

"The way I kept it," Wilcox said, a visit is like being the first white person there. "There's no place like it left." Even near his former ranch complex — a picturesque Western setting with a few homes, several weathered log outbuildings and pasture — one can see skeletons exposed under dry ledges, he said.

In addition to the villages and other treasures on the land itself, the parcel controls access to more than 100,000 acres of nearby federal land, much of it under study for wilderness status. Part of the Desolation Canyon Wilderness Area is accessible above the mouth of Range Creek, near its confluence with the Green River.

Remarkable discoveries

Much of Range Creek, with its year-round stream, open canyon floor and dramatically steep and colorful cliffs, is believed to have been inhabited a thousand years ago by pre-Columbian cultures that archaeologists call the Fremont and the Anasazi. Three radiocarbon tests carried out so far date village and rock shelter sites to between 1000 A.D. and 1200 A.D. An analysis of projectile points and pottery, using dates of known styles, shows the same range.

The finds include individual pit houses, villages, arrowheads, shafts, granaries, pottery, basketry and scattered rock art, the latter often representing otherworldly human figures, pecked spirals and sheep figures. All are found in areas that are at times green and pasture-like and at others mostly barren, with sparse desert vegetation, such as cactuses and brambles.

But always life-giving Range Creek is nearby.

Teams of volunteers and archaeologists have been documenting the sites, so far recording about 200. Of these, 50 are in the lower area beyond the ranch boundaries, and many of these have been raided and damaged by vandals.

Most of the rest are basically pristine, said Metcalfe, the University of Utah archaeologist, who has been in Range Creek working on the site for most of the past two months.