Elk Pass obsidian

Elk Pass obsidian comes from a small alpine talus field near the Cascade crest in the Goat Rocks Wilderness of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, about 25 km south of Mount Rainier National Park, at roughly 2,040 m. Nodules 7 to 20 cm long weather out of rhyolite talus beside the Pacific Crest Trail, and three areas of flaking debris near the ridge top form the recorded quarry, site 45LE286. It is one of only about a dozen geochemical obsidian sources known in Washington, and its use was local: sourced artifacts stay within about 52 km, almost all in the upper Cowlitz River watershed, which the Forest Service archaeologist links to the home range of the Taytnapam (Upper Cowlitz) band. Hydration and radiocarbon evidence point to use from at least the middle Holocene into the last thousand years.

Obsidian nodules in a talus field made mainly of rhyolite, on a north-south ridge forming the divide between Lake Creek and the Clear Fork Cowlitz River, about 500 m west of the Cascade crest. The source was characterised by X-ray fluorescence (Hughes; Skinner, Northwest Research Obsidian Studies Laboratory).