The Great Mound proved difficult to locate and officially document. Archaeologists began searching for it as early as the 1930s, and some found the site, but it was not officially recorded until 1975. In 1932, geologist Herman Gunter and archaeologist J. Clarence Simpson visited the mound, fifteen years before the state began a system to record archaeological locations. In 1939, historian Mark Boyd referred to the site as the Miccosukee Mound in his article Spanish Mission Sites in Florida. In 1972, archaeologist Jim Miller discovered the Sun Ray Road mound, a smaller American Indian site likely associated with the Letchworth-Love Mounds Complex. In 1975, archaeologist Jeanne Fryman located and recorded the mounds on property owned by the Letchworth family. In 1992, the State of Florida acquired eighty acres of land that became the state park. The site's architecture was significant both to the people who built the mounds and to those who value art, architecture, and history.