The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is studying two industrial sites in Big Bend Ranch State Park in far west Texas that are located within 500 m of each other.  Each facility has an associated small settlement.  The candelilla wax factory was established around 1914 and operated through 1921, while the cinnabar flotation mill and retorts were built in 1939 and were in operation as late as 1944.

We suspect that some of the houses in the earlier settlement were reoccupied during the later cinnabar processing period.  The challenge is to distinguish artifacts dating to the 1910s from ones dating to the late 1930s and 1940s.  Depression glass and Fiesta ware (beginning in 1936) would be indicative of the later occupation, and some bottle marks also can be limited to one or the other of these time ranges.

Please advise me of other artifacts with spans of production that allow for the distinction of these early 20th century time periods.

Margaret Howard, Archeology Survey Team Leader [log in to unmask]