He retired a couple of years ago after 43 1/2 years at Dean Foods in Darien but still works part time at Sullivan’s Foods. He loves to paint houses and is an avid weightlifter, having done more than 2,000 repetitions of 40 pounds in the bench press.
However, nothing occupies his time, his mind and his heart more than scouring fields and creek beds for American Indian artifacts.
(Add breaking Walworth County news updates to your Facebook page by visiting www.facebook.com/walworthcountytoday and clicking the Like button.)
His collection of about 1,200 pieces includes arrowheads, knife blades, scrapers, ax and spearheads, drills, grinding stones, nutcrackers, weights for fishing nets and fragments of pottery, many of them believed to be between 3,000 and 7,000 years old.
Howden has mapped out four major artifact-hunting areas, but he has stumbled upon his prized trinkets throughout the Big Foot Prairie. Sharon and other sites in Walworth County have produced a bounty of items, as have locations near Richmond, Alden and the nearby Piscasaw Creek in McHenry County.
“Every piece is something good,” Howden said. “I ask myself every time, ‘What do I have here?’
WORLD RECORD HOLDER WEIGHT LIFTING