Franktown Cave
Franktown Cave is an archaeological site in Colorado, about 25 miles south of Denver on the Palmer Divide. It is the largest rock shelter in the Palmer Divide and holds artifacts from many ancient cultures.
People who hunted and gathered used Franktown Cave for about 8,000 years, starting around 6400 BC, and there is evidence they may have used it as recently as AD 1725. The site is especially known for its perishable items like animal hides, wood, fibers, and corn, along with tools and pottery. It served as a campsite or dwelling at times and sits more than 6,000 feet in elevation, about 198 feet above Willow Creek.
The rock shelter is roughly 131 feet wide and about 65 feet deep in the northern part. It has a lower (south) area and an upper (north) area; most digging and finds come from the lower part.
Over 4,000 artifacts were found in the 1940s and 1950s, including 2,180 chipped stone tools, 234 ground stones, 862 pottery sherds, 351 perishable artifacts, and 791 ecofacts like seeds and shells. Pottery shows cord-marked designs and used mostly local clay. The site also yielded sandals, a moccasin dated to AD 980–1160, and pieces that point to interactions with other peoples.
People at Franktown Cave used local raw materials such as petrified wood, rhyolite, and quartzite for their tools. Corn appears in the record during the transition from Archaic to Ceramic times, reflecting changes in food. Excavations began in 1942 and continued for decades, led by several researchers; the site has faced looting but remains a key example of a Palmer Divide rockshelter.
Franktown Cave was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2006.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 12:14 (CET).