In 1849, the Corps of Topographical Engineers commissioned Lieutenant James H. Simpson to undertake the first survey of Navajo country in present-day New Mexico. Accompanying Simpson was a military force commanded by Colonel John M. Washington, sent to negotiate peace with the Navajo. A keen observer, Simpson kept a journal that provided valuable information on the party's interactions with Indians and also about the land's features, including important pueblo ruins at Chaco Canyon and Canyon de Chelly. His careful observations informed subsequent military expeditions, emigrant trains, the...

Anasazi, the Navajos' name for the "Ancient Ones" who preceded them into the Southwest, is the nickname of Richard Wetherill, who devoted his life to a search for remains of these vanished peoples. He discovered the cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde and Kiet Siel and the Basket Maker sites at Grand Gulch, Utah, and at Chaco Canyon he initiated the excavation of Pueblo Bonito, the largest prehistoric ruin in the United States. His discoveries are among the most important ever made by an American archaeologist.