Parish Council President, John Floyd and landowner Bill Havelka (left) listen to the Field School student presentation July 23 in the Religious Education Building in San Patricio. Havelka has been associated with the school program for the entire eleven years of its existence.

A unique Christian outreach effort has come to end in San Patricio, TX but the results of the endeavor are amazingly significant. A small south Texas parish ”welcomed the stranger” as bible teaches (Deuteronomy 10:19.) Their decade long hospitality enabled a study in which findings conclude that at times a variety of ethnic groups, Native American, Spanish/Mexicans and Europeans lived together peacefully in the area (something heretofore unknown.)

It all began eleven years ago when TAMUCC Anthropology professor Dr. Robert Drolet wanted to establish an archeology field school program to better instruct his students on methods of gathering archeological data and interpreting what they have found. The focus of the project was to be the study of the archaic peoples of the Nueces River Valley, the Aranamas, from late prehistoric period (AD 1100) until approximately 1820. These people were an agricultural pre mission group whose population declined sharply by the 1840’s. The Field School Program was to be sponsored by Texas A & M University and the Corpus Christi Museum of Science and History. Students would live in tents in a private campground and study area land features all day. ”Field schools are about science, and the living conditions are primitive,” said Drolet. One accommodation to modern life was to provide a place to eat one hot meal a day, there were no restaurants or fast food places around.

Being new to the area, Drolet didn’t know exactly where to begin. That was before he met the parishioners of Saint Patrick Mission in Old San Patricio. The church is close to Fort Lipantitlan, thought to be one of the earliest sites of human habitation in the area. An initial meeting was held with priest in charge, Father Jose Salazar. He was agreeable and thought it a good thing for the parish to take part in the study. ”Dr. Bob” thought if the parish would just lend their kitchen facilities to the kids, they would take care of the rest. Parishioner Joan Bluntzer, director of religious education and volunteer at many levels gently asked, ”What will you be cooking?’’ ”Oh, some stew or a pot of beans,” Drolet answered. ”Stew in July?” Joan replied. Dr. Bob said, ”She didn’t say anything but I could tell she wasn’t having any of that!”

A plan evolved for Bluntzer and other parish ladies to shop for the food and cook a daily meal for the students. They prepared simple nourishing meals; home style cooking that was greatly appreciated by the students. Sweet tea, lots of vegetables, chicken, hamburgers with gravy, and red Jell-O were some of the favorites. Over the years, several different parish ladies have volunteered their time but the support has always there. ”We look forward to when the diggers come every summer,” said Bluntzer.

Addressing the parish and community group on the final night of the field school, Drolet said, ”The ladies, Joan, Cindy and Audrey have kept us alive with the food they cooked. We would never have made it without them. We are also very grateful to Fr. George (Fr. George Pappally, present priest in charge) who has supported our work. I can’t express in strong enough terms what the church has meant to our efforts.” Drolet also thanked Dr. Robert Bluntzer who granted students exclusive access to his land for use as a base camp every year’ and the many other landowners who generously allowed students to study areas of their land in the river valley. A number of the landowners are also members of the parish. ”The church will always be open to help with this kind of work,” said Fr. George. I was inspired to see how hard they worked and with such determination. It is a wonderful piece of human history that they have uncovered.”

”What our decade of work has documented is a 2800 year sequence of Native American settlement that preceded European contact. We have found evidence for the first historic communities associated with Spanish/ Mexican* and surviving Native groups living peacefully together. We also find evidence of European contact dating to 1795 -1820. This is in a different context from what we see in the Franciscan Missions. These are people voluntarily living together in communities peacefully, trading goods and exploiting natural resources for food and habitation. ”We believe this has changed history,” said Drolet. Students followed with presentations and analysis of the year’s findings of cultural material: pottery sherds, lithics, and bone and shell samples.

*Archeologists refer to Spanish/Mexican to indicate Spanish-speaking people of Mexico before the State of Mexico was formed.