Susquehanna River Petroglyphs: Secrets in the Stones

By Melody Yesilonis, The Londonderry Science Consortium, Harrisburg, PA , Grade 8

 "I was interested in this project because I love art and learning about Pennsylvanian History.  I heard that hardly anything was known about the petroglyphs in the Susquehanna River near the Safe Harbor Dam and I wanted to help and try  to find some information out about them. My hypothesis is that, by looking  at the angles in  the petroglyphs, this experiment  attempted to find out if the petroglyphs  could have been carved by the same person. The results of the experiment showed that some of the petroglyphs could have been made by the same person because similar angle measurements were found in the petroglyphs. “Man” two and “Man” three have close angle measurements and are both stick carvings. So they could have been made by the same person.  Whereas, “man” one has very different angels and is carved in block style. It was probably not made by the same person. “Thunderbird” one and two may have been made by the same person because of their similar angle measurements.  Seven different “animal” petroglyphs were measured. Six of petroglyphs were on the same the rock and had the same block like 4 leg style. I think that these six petroglyphs were some by the same person or a group of people who all used the same style of carving. The seventh animal carving was on one of the rocks on display in the State Museum. It is not done in the same style and does not  have the similar angle measurements. So it can be concluded, that it was not done  by the same person who did the other animal carvings."

Using ScionImage Imaging Software to Measure the Angles found in the Petroglyphs. Collecting Digital Images with a Sony Mavica-95 Digital Camera, tripod and flood shadow light source.

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