History Colorado has awarded Ekaterini Vlahos and Michael Nulty, of the University of Colorado Denver, a 2019 Stephen H. Hart Award for their recent work documenting the Lowry Pueblo, a national historic landmark west of Pleasant View off County Road CC.The project utilized Light Direction and Ranging (LiDAR) scanning and close-range photogrammetry to thoroughly document the above-ground, standing prehistoric architecture at Lowry Pueblo.
Three-dimensional images and Historic American Buildings Survey drawings also were created.
The data provides an accurate baseline to monitor deterioration of the pueblo. It also provides the public and students a way to view the ruin without visiting the site.
Vlahos is director of CU Denver’s Center of Preservation and Nulty manages the center’s state-of-the-art digital technology, including interactive website construction, SketchUp 3-D site maps, virtual tours and similar tools.Partners included the CU Denver Center of Preservation, Bureau of Land Management, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument and CyArk, a nonprofit organization that digitally records and archives the world’s most significant cultural heritage sites.
The Center of Preservation Research is “dedicated to the study, preservation and sustainable use of the built environment and cultural landscapes,” according to its webpage.
The Hart Awards are History Colorado’s premier celebration of archaeology and preservation projects that are worthy of statewide recognition. An awards ceremony was held on Feb. 4 at the History Colorado Center in Denver.
The Lowry Pueblo National Historic Landmark is a Puebloan “Great House” that contains 37 rooms, eight kivas and one Great Kiva. Archaeologists have dated the construction and occupation of the site to the 11th century, about 1,000 years ago.
