Ohio's Lost Stone Pyramid Mound: Near Newark, Ohio
The Mound Builders by J.P. McLean 1879
Licking County, Ohio
Perhaps the largest and finest stone mound in Ohio was that which stood about eight miles south of Newark, and one mile east of the reservoir on the Licking Summit of the Ohio canal. It was a composed of stones found on the adjacent grounds, laid up, without cement, to the height of about fifty feet, with a circular base of one hundred and eighty-two feet if diameter. It was surrounded by a low embankment of an oval form, accompanied by a ditch, and having a gateway at the east end. When the reservoir, which is seven miles long, was made, in order to protect the east bank, so that it might be used for navigation, the stones from this mound were removed for that purpose. During the years 1831-32 not less than fifty teams were employed in hauling them, carrrying away from ten thousand to fifteen thousand wagon loads. Near the circumference of the base of the mound were discovered fifteen or sixteen small earth mounds, and a similar one in the center. These small mounds were not examined until 1850, when two of them were opened by some of the neighboring farmers. In one were found human bones with some fluviatile shells, and in the other, two feet below a layer of hard, white fire clay, they came upon a trough, covered by small logs, and in it was found a human skeleton, around which appeared the impression of coarse cloth. With the skeleton were found fifteen copper rings and a breastplate or badge. The wood of the trough was in a good state of preservation, the clay over it being impervious to both air and water. The central mound was afterwards opened and found to contain a great many human bones, but no other relics of any note. All of these mounds, so far as they have been explored, contain earth from a distance- the fire clay having been brought from Flint Ridge, six or eight miles distant.
