[3]Average of three out of four dates. Libby’s second date disregarded as widely out of line.
[4]Two samples gave identical results. Cultural identification as Clovis based on single spearhead is doubtful.
PALEO-INDIANS, BIG GAME HUNTERS, DISCOVER A NEW WORLD (50,000? to 8,000? B.C.)[5]
Man probably discovered America as early as 50,000 years ago and gradually occupied the two continents in the succeeding millenia. The first discoverers of the New World were of Mongolian racial stock as are the American Indians. They crossed from Siberia to Alaska over an existing land bridge, over ice, or possibly by wading or by boat over the shallow sea in the wake of mammoth, mastodon or musk ox herds on whose flesh they lived. Following in the path of the huge animals, they made their way possibly up the Yukon from its mouth to the divide, thence down into the Mackenzie Basin, and along a great river where now exist a chain of lakes and so into the [Mississippi] Valley.
The migrants trailing each herd doubtless traveled in their several ways in [family] groups, uniting from time to time to trap and kill one of the great shaggy beasts. When the animals stopped, the families bedded down nearby in the most sheltered spots available taking care not to lose touch with the herd. These were wanderers, not explorers, nor were they seeking new homes; they were hunters that traveled where the herd led.
Fig. 1. [Archaic] [flint] drill, [stone] hammer, and flint scraper as used in Archaic [period] and their modern steel counterparts. (B.B.)
Fig. 2. Paleo-Indians attack a mired-down mammoth. (B.G.P.)
