San Fernando Site (Porter Ranch) - excavations in Jan/Feb. 1936 - see Exhibit #1

In January 1936 a foreman at the Christian-Porter Ranch driving a tractor uncovered a number of ground stone artifacts. This 200-acre Ranch was once part of a 54,000-acre grant that comprised the Porter family land holdings in the western San Fernando Valley.

The subject archaeological sites are located adjacent the City of San Fernando, southeast of the intersection of San Fernando Road and Hubbard Street.

The finds were reported to the Southwest Museum, which immediately began a field reconnaissance. An area of about 60 acres was investigated and a number of test excavations were made. Two of the excavations units yielded most of the archaeological remains. There is no general location map.

A number of stone objects, including broken bowls and metates, as well as un-worked stone, were found in well-defined clusters or in “T” shaped piles.

This primary site was interpreted by Walker to be “ceremonial” for want of a better explanation, as there was no evidence of habitation or a cemetery.

The location of the archaeological excavations could be determined only within an area about 1,000’ in circumference currently bisected by the crossing of Hubbard Street and a flood control channel south of the Hubbard Street/San Fernando Road intersection. This entire area is now, and has for a number of years been, completely urbanized with residential and commercial land uses.

Sources: The Walker field notes contain three sketch maps of the site, one of which has various mislabels and apparently incorrectly shows excavation locations, as the “site” letters designations have been crossed out. The most useful sketch map identifies a base line as a street name in San Fernando and contains distances to test excavation locals. There is no general location map. Site excavation photographs were also useful.

Several street names used on the sketch maps (Meyer Street and Celis Street) still exist in the orientation presented in the field notes. In addition, drainage and topographic features also matched the sketch maps.

Sketch map(s) were scaled using Photoshop to match the orientation of, and features on, satellite photographs. This allowed for identification of the general location of excavation units.