Mosby's Grave

A couple weeks back I took a ski up Dean Stone Peak - a spot that I have been eyeing almost my entire life. Growing up near the base of Pattee Canyon, before the development known as Mansion Heights, the neighborhood kids and I used to make daytrip expeditions towards the Peak always turning around on a short summit referred to in my high school days as the "Knoll". Different than the intoxicating memories of my teenage years, my youthful memories of the Knoll consisted mostly of looking for arrowheads, as I had once heard that the Blackfeet once used the Knoll as a lookout and when they saw people emerging from Hellgate Canyon they would race down and attack.

I always liked to think that such a lookout would have been a very strategic position to watch from as newcomers to the valley, enamored with the expansive view, wouldn't think to look at such a sharp angle. Also, from this position the Blackfeet could guard against people using Pattee Canyon to escape the valley and effectively sneak past them on their way to the buffalo. 

One day, likely looking for arrowheads, we discovered a memorial, buried beneath the grass and nearly undetectable unless directly above it, of someone known as Arthur Mosby. Thus, before the Knoll, and after whatever the Blackfeet called it, this hill was known, to us youthful adventurers, as Mosby's Grave.

On the trek up Dean Stone I noticed a trail heading down to, as the map indicated, Spanish Peaks Drive and then decided to come back with my dad and do a little shuttle leaving one car on Spanish Peaks Drive and another at the trailhead on Pattee Canyon Drive. Yesterday we did that hike and when passing below the Knoll I mentioned to my dad that as kids we discovered Mosby's Grave and he, of course, is fully knowledgeable about Mosby and even taught me that a popular street in town, Artemos, is actually a conjunction of Mosby's name! What a fun little hike it was and to learn something too was extra special. If only I could find an arrowhead and learn a little more about what the Blackfeet might have called the lookout.

I wonder if the folks that live up there today are descendants of either Mosby or the Blackfeet. Hopefully they know a bit of the history, although they can't know all of it...wink wink.

A couple more pics from the outings:

P.S. strangely I always remembered the grave as saying, "Arthur B. Mosby" and according to the internet his name is Arthur James Mosby. Hmmm. Maybe a fact-finding expedition is in store.