What can be discovered on a walk through the woods? The most obvious answer is trees, but there is so much more to be discovered: wildflowers in bloom, mushrooms, ferns, moss, leaves, acorns, deer, squirrels, chipmunks, invertebrates, soil microbes and even evidence of past human habitation.
Since I moved to Milton in 2008, I have been intrigued by a large rock found on a wooded section of Milton. At some point in time, the rock, now located on private property, was altered to produce the image of human face. What secrets of the past can this unique rock reveal?
The massive, 30×15-foot, flat-top rock was chiseled and artistically transformed by indigenous humans, possibly ancestors of the Cherokee or Muscogee (Creek) Indians who lived in the area as many as 3,000 years ago. Not only is the size of the rock impressive, but the carvings on the rock demand your attention.
Ancestral Indians carved a crude image of a human face on one surface of the rock as well as a silhouette of a buffalo on another surface of the rock. The rock was pitted with a sharp object to create the mane and beard of a buffalo and the rock further chiseled to form the buffalo’s nose and mouth and bearded chin. These features of the rock prompted local historians to call this rock the “Buffalo Rock.” Recognizing the rock’s significance, in the early 1970s, the rock was named as part of the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation…