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Display containing artifacts in the Noren Collection

THE NOREN COLLECTION with the help of Bureau of Land Manage-
ment (BLM) Archeologist Greg Haver-
Al Noren, an employee of the U.S. Forest stock, to catalog the prehistoric part of
Service, worked throughout California. He the collection. Archaeology interns sup-
collected rocks, minerals, and artifacts all of ported by both BLM and FECM cata-
his life. In 1943, he was assigned to the loged 4,147 artifacts. These include pro-
Inyo National Forest until his retirement in jectile points, engraved tablets, metates
1954. He continued to live in the Eastern and manos, shell beads, pendants, and an
Sierra until his death in 1974. intact arrow with a historic metal arrow-
head.
Noren suspected that the Bristlecone Pines
in the White Mountains are very old Most of the prehistoric artifacts had been
prompting him to contact researchers who framed in 37 handmade wooden display
confirmed that some Bristlecone Pine trees boxes. The boxes were carefully disas-
in the White Mountains are among the old- sembled so each artifact could be indi-
est living things on earth, nearly 5,000 years vidually inspected, documented and
old. placed in a protective plastic bag. One
frame was left intact to be used for inter-
In 1990 Bill Michael, then Director at the pretation of the collection. Some of the
Eastern California Museum, learned that frames had labels describing the general
Noren’s large collection of artifacts was in location of where the artifacts were col-
danger of being sold at swap meets. Mr. lected such as “Inyo and Mono County”,
Michael contacted the family and negotiated but many had no location information.
a price for the entire collection. The mu- After the cataloging was complete, a
seum was short of funds so the Friends of searchable database was prepared to al-
the Museum raised the sufficient money for low researchers to analyze the collection
the purchase. The collection was returned and to provide educational opportunities.
to Inyo County intact and has been stored at The future of the Noren Collection will
the museum ever since. be discussed further in an upcoming
edition of the FECM Newsletter.
In 2015 a project was undertaken by FECM,

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