Lunchbox Lecture: Pawnee Archeology

Date and Time

• Tuesday, Sep 15, 2026  12pm - 1pm

Location

Details

The people of the Pawnee Nation have lived in Oklahoma since 1873, but their homeland is Nebraska, where they resided for many centuries. Much of their story has been told through archeological investigation combined with oral tradition. Retired Nebraska State Archeologist Rob Bozell has spent years studying this history, and he’ll share what the records reveal at the Nebraska History Museum during September’s Lunchbox Lecture on Tuesday, September 15 at 12 pm.

The Pawnee originally came from far south of Nebraska, migrating to the Central Great Plains more than 1,000 years ago. What started as small, scattered farmsteads and hamlets across much of Nebraska eventually grew into widely scattered family groups that coalesced into huge earthlodge towns, home to thousands of people by the 1600s. Archeological work at these places has revealed a fascinating record of Pawnee technology, architecture, subsistence, ceremonial practices, and social structure.

Special thanks to the Nebraska State Historical Society Foundation for providing funding for this event series and the recording to broadcast on LNKTV.

About Rob Bozell

Bozell is a native of midtown Omaha where he still lives. After earning BA and MA degrees at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, he spent over 40 years as an archeologist and much of that as Nebraska State Archeologist. His professional interests include past foodways, paleoclimate, fur trade era archeology, Indigenous archeology of the past two thousand years and working with tribes on repatriation and historic preservation. He has authored a variety of technical reports, journal articles, book chapters and research monographs. He retired from the NSHS a few years ago but remains active in historic preservation consulting.