By RHEA-FRANCES TETLEY
Staff Writer
Lake Arrowhead Elementary School fourth-graders visited the Mountain History Museum and Indian Rock Camp during a field trip on early California History on Tuesday, Nov 5.
Half of the students went to Rock Camp first with their teachers and explored the meadow, where the Serrano Indians would camp for part of each summer on their yearly travels from the desert to the various elevations of the mountain following the ripening of their favorite foods, such as acorns for flour and fruits and berries. At Rock Camp there is a trail that passes many large rocks, where the Indians ground the acorns and made deep metate pits into the stone that can still be seen today. While that group was at Rock Camp the other group was at the museum.
At the museum, the docents allowed the students to actually grind some acorns on smaller rock metates, so they could imagine being an Indian child do this activity to make “flour” out of acorns. Sheila Arnett, who taught the kids how to grind in the metates, was impressed by how much the kids already knew about the Serrano Indians, which is a credit to their teachers. She enjoyed how their faces lit up when they learned they were going to get the chance to grind acorns in a metate themselves.
A student filling out his scavenger hunt paper. (Photo by Rhea-Frances Tetley)
At another room in the museum, the students learned all about the lumbering industry from Rita Spiegel, who told about the several different periods of logging and the change in the tools they used, as they transformed from oxen, mule and horse-powered tools to the mechanical tools of steam-powered sawmills and, as the years passed, the trains that transported logs to the sawmills. There was quite an advance in the lumbering industry in the 65 years from the 1850s to 1915, when the last of the sawmills closed, as the mountain area became a tourist destination, instead.
Next, there were lessons about some of the animals that live in the San Bernardino Mountains. This year has been Smokey Bear’s 80th birthday, so the museum was fortunate to be able to display a deer, bear, fox, racoon, squirrel, bobcat and numerous ducks and birds that frequent the mountain area. The taxidermied animals are on loan from the county museum, enabling the students to be able to really see the animals, as in the wild they will not stand still for a really good look. Also, the museum has numerous hands-on exhibits of pelts (fox, beaver, skunk, opossum and bear), feathers, antlers, footprint plaster casts and other facts and items about the animals. Then the students shared their wildlife encounters here on the mountain with the docents. John shared that his friendly dog was once sprayed by a skunk, so he doesn’t like skunks.
At the museum, all students got a chance to go on a scavenger hunt in the museum, letting them wander independently through the museum finding the various unusual or odd items in the museum, such as a fox wearing glasses, an apple on the top of an owl’s head and a flying Canadian Goose with a feather in its beak.
They also discovered some interesting facts about Lake Arrowhead history during the scavenger hunt such as the name of the first excursion boat on Lake Arrowhead and what the village looked like before the McDonald’s restaurant was built and what the bottom of the lake’s water outlet tower looks like. When they turned in the scavenger hunt papers, museum manager Cindy Burnett was thrilled to allow them to select their special winning gifts.
The students ate their lunches and then switched locations. George said, “I had the greatest fun!” Laura said, “I’d never been here before and wish I had; this is wonderful. I liked touching the fox fur.” Some of the boys tested their knot-tying skills and several learned how to tie a figure eight knot, and then proudly challenged their friends.
After the students left, the docents commented on how polite and engaged the students had been. As they boarded the busses, they yelled “We had fun” and “Thank you” and waved goodbye to the docents, as the bus pulled away.
The Mountain History Museum offers free field trips and group tours of the museum for groups during the winter while they are closed to the public. Call (909) 744-8625 and leave a message with the date and the topic or era of history you are studying for a free tour of the museum, and they will get back to you soon to make the arrangements.
One of the students learning how to use a metate. (Photo by Rhea-Frances Tetley)
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