Fire Station Museum

The Easterling Collection

This collection of Indian Artifacts was donated to the museum by Mr.and Mrs. Charles Donald Easterling. Mr. and Mrs. Easterling live on his family's ancestral farm on the south side of the Sulphur River in the northeastern comer of Franklin County. All of these artifacts are from Franklin County and from this one site. The presence of artifacts spanning a 10,000 year period indicates almost continuous human occupancy in Franklin County.

These artifacts were collected near the banks of the Sulphur River by Mr. Easterling. Mr. Easterling is a Junior High Science Teacher in the Talco-Bogata School District and has been a teacher for 25years. He is a graduate of East Texas State University. He and his wife have three children.

For the most part, this collection is of Caddo Indian artifacts. The earlier items are from the nomadic hunter-gatherer stage before the Indians adopted a village lifestyle. The Caddo adopted settled lifestyles in this region. The Caddo population declined through exposure to diseases brought by the Spanish, French and English explorers and traders. The Indians had no natural cure or resistance for these diseases. The last Caddo in this area were removed under the anti-Indian policies of Mirabeau Lamar, President of the Republic of Texas, in the early 1840's.