Katherine Wells, 2019 National Heritage Award for Lifetime Achievement!

Katherine Wells
Founder – Mesa Prieta Petroglyph Project
    It's been a labor of love, and it has certainly been labor! Multi-media artist Katherine Wells moved to New Mexico in 1992 and purchased 188 acres on Mesa Prieta, north of Espanola and Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo that turned out to have more than 10,000 petroglyphs on it. Immediately she realized that this heritage treasure needed to be protected and in 1999, with help of local archaeologists and neighbors, she started the nonprofit organization, Mesa Prieta Petroglyph Project (MPPP). The mission of the project was not humble – to record ALL of the petroglyphs and other human-made features on Mesa Prieta’s 22,000 acres and to educate the local community of
their importance!
    In 2007, the significance of the concentration of images on her land prompted Katherine to donate 156 of the acres she owned to The Archaeological Conservancy for their perpetual protection. This donation became the Wells Petroglyph Preserve. Katherine's amazing stewardship of her small part of Mesa Prieta was rewarded by the American Rock Art Research Association: in 2005 she was presented with their Conservation and Preservation Award. And in 2014, she received the Richard Bice Award from the Archaeological Society of New Mexico for Archaeological Achievement.
She and her colleagues started the Summer Youth Intern Program (SYIP) in 2001 – a two week program during which a dozen Native American and Hispano youth from area
schools learn the techniques of scientifically recording images on the mesa. The
Program, now in its 14th year, received the first Education Award from the American
Rock Art Research Association in 2008. In 2011, the National Take Pride in America
Award for Outstanding Public-Private Partnership with the Bureau of Land Management
was awarded to the Program. Supporters quickly donated enough funding to send five
interns to Washington DC to receive the award and to spend five days touring our
nation’s capital.
      In 2003, Katherine’s vision was for another educational program to be taught in area
schools. The 4th (now through 7th) grade curriculum entitled “Discovering Mesa Prieta:
The Petroglyphs of Northern New Mexico and the People Who Made Them” is being
used in more than a dozen area schools including Pueblo and charter schools from Los
Alamos to Santa Fe to Taos. The interactive STEM-based (science, technology,
engineering and math) curriculum is presented to about 200 students a year who are
taught heritage ethics and archaeological stewardship. At the conclusion of the studies,
students participate in a docent-led tour to the Wells Petroglyph Preserve; for many this
is their first exposure to images their ancestors may have made hundreds of years ago.
In 2014, a grant from the NM Historic Preservation Division enabled a Hispano
component to be added to the curriculum. In 2006, the Santa Fe Community
Foundation awarded the curriculum the very prestigious Piñon Award for Educational
Service. And in 2008, the curriculum was awarded the First Annual Education Award
from the American Rock Art Research Association.
     Katherine’s preservation efforts began to extend well beyond the confines of the Wells Petroglyph Preserve as she realized the huge archaeological heritage existing on the entire mesa. Under her leadership, MPPP has expanded dramatically. Today, some 100 volunteers work with various aspects of the Project.
     Some 100 public, private and school tours on the Wells Petroglyph Preserve are led by trained docents, frequently by Katherine herself. Over 1000 people a year participate in tours including interested locals and tourists who learn about the importance of this vast cultural legacy to the State of New Mexico.
     About 20 trained adult volunteers work in ten teams on large parcels of private land on the mesa, scientifically recording images and documenting everything human-made
found on the rugged mesa. To date about 80,000 petroglyphs have been recorded, of an estimated 100,000 total for the entire mesa. The data are electronically archived
on the Project’s multi-level GIS data base as well as in the Archaeological Resource
Management Section at the Laboratory of Anthropology in Santa Fe. In addition, digital data are uploaded to professionally managed servers across the nation.
     The twelve mile long, largely privately-owned Mesa Prieta has been identified as the
largest petroglyph site in New Mexico. Its uniqueness is enhanced by the
representation of four cultures dating back 10,000 years. The Archaic People were the
first to use the mesa for hunting and gathering purposes from about 6000 to 1000 years
ago, followed in about 1200 AD by Ancestral Pueblo people – ancestors of today’s
Northern Rio Grande pueblos. When the Spanish arrived at the southern terminus of
the mesa in 1598, evidence of their use of the mesa was left in images and historic
artifacts. Euro-American images include WPA glyphs and peace signs from the 1960s.
     Today, Katherine remains invested in all aspects of the Project. She particularly enjoys interacting with area youth in the two educational programs. Her efforts now primarily focus on gaining financial stability for the Project so that it may continue long into the future. All of the 20 years Katherine has contributed to the Project have been as an amazing, generous, dedicated, hard working volunteer.
 
Founder, Guardian, Visionary: Katherine Wells truly is all of these and more.