Oldest human occupation in North America?

The U of O Archaeology Dept has discovered a site in eastern Oregon that dates back to 18,000 years ago making it the oldest confirmed site for human occupation in North America. A minimum of two dating techniques were used to confirm the age of the site. Radio carbon testing on tooth enamel from a pleistocene camel that went extinct 13,000 years ago helped confirm the a timeline. Also, the fact that human made tools were discovered with blood residues from an extinct bison under an ash layer from a volcanic eruption of Mt. St Helens. Volcanic ash is very accurately aged because of its known decay rate for radioactive isotopes.

This new discovery pushes back human occupation of North America by about 5000 years. It may also put a new twist on how humans got here....

I remember being taught as a kid that human occupation of the New World was well after the close of the Pleistocene (about 10,00 years ago). Boy-Howdy! They're continually moving that time line back a few centuries!

Now that is interesting! Thanks for bringing this up. I'm gonna have to look this up.

Guys what species of man would that be then? There has been a lot talk about that too...

What about the fossilized footprints of some species of human
I bet they are older

Crow Magnum.

“ Oldest human occupation in North America? ”

Prostitution?

Another massive money pit of research....

Nah, that wasn't invented until the day after Congress was created.

They’re bound to find evidence of racism in all that important research.

It was even noted in the article (7-7-23 Oregonian) that Native Americans have been saying all along that we've been here much longer than given credit for.

What I like about the U of O's work on the project is they didn't rush off and report the news at the outset. They spent nearly a decade testing and re-testing with cutting edge scientific methodology to get the results. Then they invited peer reviewal of their work before publishing anything. That tends to get the respect of other anthropologists working in the field.

I am always curious about the location of the find and how it fits into the way the men were making their living (hunting ,gathering ,etc) in short why were they there at that place. Any info on that aspect ?

The 1st humans in the southern US came from Europe...down the north Atlantic coast.

But, the largest influx came around/across the Gulf of Mexico from expansion of populations in South and Central America.

Southeastern US natives were very culturally connected to the Maya and Aztecs.

How did they get to South America? From the West or the East?

Bwaaahahahah

Clovis Period is considered to be 12,000-14,000 years ago....so at least that long

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solutrean_hypothesis

My take is a bit controversial I guess, but I stand by it. It goes like this: for as long as there have been people (say within a few thousand years more or less), they have been everywhere on earth that is habitable and accessible to them.
I know, we only have “objective evidence” going back so far. Doesnt matter. People being people, they explore. And with people able to survive the polar regions, they can drop down on any continent.
And there are more reasons I feel this way. But I am not going to write an academic paper here.
Just remember, 30 years ago if you said people had been in what we now call “the Americas” 20,000 years ago you would have been laughed out of any academic community. Not any more.
People are people, and they like to explore. And they can survive about anywhere other than Antarctica with technology available thousands of years ago. I don’t need objective evidence to feel comfortable with that position.

They deserve reparations

The Topper Site in South Carolina has dated human occupation to ca. 50,000 years ago.

This pic of the site shows it near some rimrock type shelter and was near an ancient dried lakebed.

Large studies testing native American DNA shows that there was no pre-Columbus intrusion of European DNA into their genome. So, if early Europeans came to our continent they did not leave a genetic legacy.

My guess is that this date of human occupation has not stood up to the rigor of modern testing techniques.

That's what I thought

Very interesting

Good research BP. Puts in place popular ideas about humans in the Americas before ~ 18,000 years ago and about Euros being here before Columbus (other than the Vikings for a very short period about 1,000 AD). Seen these debates before where science gets in the way of good story.

I was referring the Denosian Man vs Cro-magnum Man species

Me too.

Unless they've been recently refuted studies I've saw show that American Indians have 1/3 European DNA pre Columbus.

Donner: Quote the reference to the peer reviewed study that shows Amerindians were 1/3 Euro pre-Columbus. If they were then they would look like black Americans are today: some are black, some are brown and some are proper white etc. with other physical characteristics. Why: so much Euro in them over the last 400 years. Now look at where they came from in Africa and those people are proper black.

Donner, I don't remember where I read it, but the source was very credible and basically said that with advances in testing methodology the idea of a pre-Columbus admixture of European DNA into native Americans had finally been put to rest. Zero authenticated cases out of hundreds of pre Columbus Indian remains that had had their DNA tested. I just read this within the last year or so.

The sea level back in those days was over 350 feet lower than today. I would imagine a huge amount of sites are currently under water. It was an amazingly different world back then and in the timeline of earth wasn't very long ago at all.

Oldest Human Occupation of North America ??? It sure wasn't a Demonrat!!!

I'm guessing the oldest occupation as either farming or hunting. I know this is a boring guess.

My bad...I should have stated "site occupation". As for what they were doing they left clues...ie: Bison antiquas bones and camel teeth. I think it is safe to say that 18,000 years ago all humans were hunter- gatherers. Agriculture came along about 7-8000 years later.

Undoubtably there are sites across the Americas that would have been occupied by man....but arid eastern Oregon had great conditions to preserve their leavings for us to study later. And like somebody said above, ocean levels were way different then and surely lots of campsites are now occupied by octopi and ling cod.

The wolly Mammoth went extinct only around 10,000 years ago.
Fresh Mammoth must have tasted pretty good.

Interesting find . Sadly when I read the headline the first thing I thought of was now there will be another group wanting reparations for something

Here's an article, there is a lot of articles from the 2013 era that cite a university of Copenhagen study that explored old DNA and showed it to contain Western European heritage
https://sciencenordic.com/anthropol...-native-americans-with-europeans/1393344

Always trust the science

Good Donner. Gotta look at this a little more.

Earliest occupation and sustained habitation are two completely different things but should not be conflated. Both are interesting and worthy of study IMO.

18,000 years ago! Reparations are going to cost us a fortune!

Uhh, how is that true when the earth is only an estimated 6,000 years old?

Estimated by who? Not anybody that believes in science.

Lots of websites that say it. Do you believe the Bible?

https://www.google.com/search?q=how...IA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#ip=1

Hmmm....and those dinosaurs?

I suspect everything to do with the evolution of man is much earlier than has been proven, simply because before there is a large population, the chances of finding a fossil record from it is very, very low. Very specific conditions need to exist to preserve specimens. The exact spot has to be found too, if there is only one.

Keith

Imagine what has been lost under the ocean after it rose following the ice age.

Not long ago, I can’t remember where, there was an article on the oldest traceable native in America. I think it was an Indian in Montana. His genetics went back a loooong way and lo and behold he has South Pacific DNA.

Osky

LOL.

If I remember my history correct, the Spanish pasted through this way in the 1500's, they had Polynesian slaves.

The solutrean hypothosis has not exactly been proven
Its a cool concept but to think it was north americss first peoples is far fetched

Solutrean and clovis bifaces are simular but so are so many other stone tools

Let the bible lead us spiritually; but leave it to science to understand the world around us. Maybe both have a place?