Two thousand years ago, a large village stood here and extended north across Highway P, while an open-air market lay off Highway 79 where O'Fallon's sewage treatment plant is located. Associated with these communities were earthen burial mounds. To the people who once lived here, the four cardinal directions were an important part of everyday life: the east was the direction of the Sun, the color red, sacred fire, blood, and life and success; the west was associated with the Moon, the souls of the dead, the color black, and death; the north was associated with cold, the color blue and purple, and trouble and defeat; and the south was associated with warmth, the color white, peace, and happiness. This site and these mounds are sacred to Native Americans.
