The Early Minnesotans - Part I

By Patrick McLoughlin, Archaeologist

The peopling of the Americas persists as one of the most publicized, controversial, and intriguing issues in all of American archeology. Amidst the speculation and debate, however, there is little doubt that hunters and gatherers moved in small bands across Beringia into the Alaskan Peninsula by ca. 15,000 years ago. It was not until after 14,000 years ago that glacial retreat opened an inland corridor from Alaska to the Great Plains, and we find successful colonization in the heart of America about 12,000 years ago.
 

Route of first Americans into America from Asia

By 12,000 years ago, all of southern Minnesota and most of the central part of the state was free of glaciers and covered, for the most part, by open spruce parkland that contained coniferous trees and grasses. The last massive sheets of glacial ice continued to migrate north of Minnesota, and by ca. 11,200 years ago the coniferous forests were being replaced by deciduous species. Simultaneously, with the recession of Lake Aggasiz, open oak forests spread over large portions of the northwestern and north central sections of the state. By about 11,000 years ago a new oak-elm forest penetrated the southwestern corner of the state and spread rapidly northward and eastward. Both Red and Jack pine along with a mix of birch and elm replaced the spruce forest in the southeastern corner of the state.

Environmental setting during Clovis times	Wooly Mammoth

 Those quickly retreating spruce forests were favored by many now extinct large mammals like mammoth and mastodon, giant beaver, giant ground sloth, horses, and camels, and modern arctic animals, including musk ox and caribou. The disappearance of some of these large mammals at the end of the Ice Age has been attributed both to overkill by human predators and to the dramatic post-glacial climatic change reflected in the changing vegetation regimes. Of course there are no definitive answers but we do know that these magnificent creatures of the Ice Age co-existed for a time with the first Americans or Paleoindians, as they are commonly called.

Hafted Clovis point

Archaeologists use the artifacts left behind by these early inhabitants to distinguish individual groups. The most common artifacts found and used as clues are projectile points and other stone tools. Based on excavations where such tools were found in association with extinct mega-fauna, we know that humans occupied North America since at least 12,000 years ago. The earliest occupations are associated with the Clovis fluted-point complex first identified in the southwestern United States (Clovis, New Mexico) where these spear points were found in direct and undisturbed association with extinct Pleistocene-age mammoths. Clovis culture is now recognized as existing throughout most of the lower 48-states, southeastern Canada, and Mexico.

Bone foreshafts and shaft straightener	Clovis points

Clovis points are well-made lanceolate points. They are fluted, or flattened by removal of large flakes, on both faces of the lower half of the piece and show grinding on the lateral edges and base (probably done for hafting purposes). The Clovis toolkit also included triangular end scrapers, triangular bifaces with convex bases, and bone foreshafts (see photo). Unlike later Archaic and Woodland cultures, Clovis toolmakers were very selective when it came to raw material for stone tool manufacture. They were clearly biased towards the highest quality stone (i.e. chert or flint) and were master flintknappers.

Clovis point variation	Scraping tools used by Clovis hunters

Unfortunately Clovis sites are hard to find. Evidence of Clovis occupation usually comes in the form of isolated projectile points or tools that are typically found in plowed fields, on upland divides, or raised landforms within interior valleys. In fact, no Clovis materials have been recovered from a buried context in Minnesota.

The Clovis culture lasted only about 300-500 years leaving researchers to marvel at how rapidly they populated the entire North American continent. This leads to many more questions concerning the size of the founding population and their apparent level of mobility in addition to whether they actually were the earliest inhabitants of the New World. While there are a few New World sites that may be older than 12,000 years and older than Clovis, evidence for pre-Clovis peoples in the New World has yet to be well substantiated and the majority of “Clovis first” supporters have yet to be swayed.

It is clear that the Clovis people had a highly adaptive technology that allowed for the exploitation of a very large and diverse geographic area during a period of extreme climatic change and biotic reorganization. In response to the changing climate, which was becoming warmer and drier, they adjusted their weaponry and settlement patterns. In the Rocky Mountains and the adjacent Plains they became what we know today as the Folsom culture. Folsom groups, along with other later Paleoindian cultures, were very successful and efficient hunters of now extinct forms of bison………………but that is another story……………..stay tuned for Part II of the Early Minnesotans.