Mesa Verde Voices

The peoples of the Mesa Verde region and their descendants have found meaning and guidance in the stars for thousands of years. Storytelling is a big part of the descendants’ lives still today. The stars, moon, and sun are key elements of those stories, and their movement through the sky determine when certain stories are told throughout the year.

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For more information on all the topics discussed in this episode, visit www.mesaverdevoices.org.

For more information about International Dark Sky Parks, visit www.darksky.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio Project in Cortez, Colorado, in collaboration with Mesa Verde National Park and the Mesa Verde Association. This season is made possible through a grant from Colorado Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the American Rescue Plan of 2021.

There are as many names for the stars, planets, and constellations as there are languages and cultures on Earth. In this episode we hear some of the Navajo/Diné and Zuni names for some of the most prominent stars and constellations, and we hear about the 1054 Supernova that resulted in the Crab Nebula which can still be seen via telescope today.

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For more information on all the topics discussed in this episode, visit www.mesaverdevoices.org. For more information about International Dark Sky Parks, visit www.darksky.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio Project in Cortez, Colorado, in collaboration with Mesa Verde National Park and the Mesa Verde Association.

This season is made possible through a grant from Colorado Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the American Rescue Plan of 2021.

Our moon has a consistent and predictable cycle that repeats every month in the same way that it has for billions of years! But this cycle is more than the 29.5-day pattern of lunar phases. In this episode, we’ll hear about the ways humans have tracked the monthly lunar cycle, as well as the lunar standstill, and the significance that eclipses have for descendants of the Mesa Verde region today.

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For more information on all the topics discussed in this episode, visit www.mesaverdevoices.org. For more information about International Dark Sky Parks, visit www.darksky.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio Project in Cortez, Colorado, in collaboration with Mesa Verde National Park and the Mesa Verde Association.

This season is made possible through a grant from Colorado Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the American Rescue Plan of 2021.

Some of the most well-known celestial alignments within ancestral sites correspond with the annual movement of the sun along the horizon throughout the year - especially on the Solstices and Equinoxes.

And one of the most famous is the Sun Dagger at Chaco Canyon.

In this season of Mesa Verde Voices, we'll hear about the ways that ancient people observed and tracked the movement of the sun, the moon, and the stars, as well as how these traditions live on in their descendants still today.

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For more information on all the topics discussed in this episode, visit www.mesaverdevoices.org.

For more information about International Dark Sky Parks, visit www.darksky.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio Project in Cortez, Colorado, in collaboration with Mesa Verde National Park and the Mesa Verde Association

This season is made possible through a grant from Colorado Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the American Rescue Plan of 2021

In 2021, Mesa Verde National Park became the 100th International Dark Sky Park. This designation does more than just preserve the natural beauty of the night sky above the park, it also preserves the cultural bond that ancestral people had with the skyscape.

In season 5, we'll hear about the ways that ancient people observed and tracked the movement of the sun, the moon, and the stars, as well as how these traditions live on in their descendants still today.

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For more information on all the topics discussed in this episode, visit www.mesaverdevoices.org.

For more information about International Dark Sky Parks, visit www.darksky.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio Project in Cortez, Colorado, in collaboration with Mesa Verde National Park and the Mesa Verde Association

This season is made possible through a grant from Colorado Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the American Rescue Plan of 2021

In this final episode of season four, we look into the myth that first drew explorers, archaeologists, and tourists to these desert canyons just a few centuries ago. Where did the Mesa Verde people go? Why did they move on? And why is this myth that they vanished from their ancestral homelands damaging to descendant communities today?

Subscribe, rate, and review Mesa Verde Voices wherever you listen to podcasts, and learn more at mesaverdevoices.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio in Cortez, Colorado with support from the Mesa Verde Museum Association and the National Park Service.

The rock art in the Southwest is as iconic to the region as the cliff dwellings themselves. From animal shapes to handprints to intricate spirals, these petroglyphs and pictographs adorn the landscape leaving messages from hundreds and thousands of years in the past. What do these symbols mean? And what might they still communicate today?

New episodes of Mesa Verde Voices release every Friday. Subscribe, rate, and review Mesa Verde Voices wherever you listen to podcasts, and learn more at mesaverdevoices.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio in Cortez, Colorado with support from the Mesa Verde Museum Association and the National Park Service.

Why did the Ancestral Pueblo people build these world-renowned alcove villages? It’s nearly impossible to go a day at Mesa Verde National Park without hearing someone ask some version of this question. And at the same time, it’s nearly impossible to answer it. In this episode, we explore some of the many theories surrounding this frequently asked question.

New episodes will release every Friday. Subscribe, rate, and review Mesa Verde Voices wherever you listen to podcasts, and learn more at mesaverdevoices.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio in Cortez, Colorado with support from the Mesa Verde Museum Association and the National Park Service.

The stunning alcove villages - such as Cliff Palace - are what originally captured the attention of the first European descendant folks to move through the canyons of Mesa Verde. However, these were not the largest communities in the Mesa Verde region… not by a long shot.

New episodes will release every Friday. Subscribe, rate, and review Mesa Verde Voices wherever you listen to podcasts, and learn more at mesaverdevoices.org.

Mesa Verde Voices is produced by KSJD Community Radio in Cortez, Colorado with support from the Mesa Verde Museum Association and the National Park Service.

In season 4, we’re digging into some of the most commonly asked questions at Mesa Verde National Park.

In this episode, we're talking about how the Ancestral Pueblo people came to be in the Southwest, and how Indigenous and European ways of learning and knowing about the past can complement each other.

New episodes will be released every Friday. Subscribe, rate, and review Mesa Verde Voices wherever you listen to podcasts, and learn more at mesaverdevoices.org.