Big Bone as a State Park
Big Bone again resurged in popularity for paleontologists and archaeologists in the twentieth century. The University of Nebraska State Museum funded expeditions to Big Bone in the 1930s. Staff from the William Behringer Museum in Covington (now the Behringer-Crawford Museum) dug test pits in 1959. At the same time, efforts by local groups pushed for the creation of a state park to protect the area surrounding the lick and archaeological sites.
The Big Bone Lick Historical Association purchased over 16 acres of land in the 1950s to create a park. In 1960, Kentucky established Big Bone as a state park and historic site and opened it to visitors. The Department of Parks built a shelter house and picnic areas, purchasing over 150 additional acres in 1962 (Layne 1987; Warner 1998:353).
In 1959, shortly before the creation of the park, Ellis Crawford (current namesake to Behringer-Crawford Museum) met with paleontologist C. Bertrand Schultz to discuss new investigations at Big Bone. In 1962, a field crew from the University of Nebraska arrived to conduct a large-scale excavation. At the same time, they hosted an international geology convention that focused on Pleistocene era animals found at Big Bone. The excavations found remains of bison, cows, deer, dogs, horses, and pigs along with bones of bison, elk, mammoth, mastodon, and caribou. They also uncovered a site that is thought to contain an early salt works, dating to the early nineteenth century. Since then, Big Bone has again become a tourist destination, offering hiking trails, museum exhibits, campgrounds, and tours (Layne 1987; Warner 1998:353).
