THE INDIANS

No one knows where the first people in Arkansas came from or when they arrived. It appears that during the last glacial advance about 20,000 B.C., the Bering Strait between Alaska and Siberia was dry land. People crossed from Siberia, following game trails in their search for food. As the glacier receded, more openings were found to the south and the people moved on. Evidence has been found that they reached the southern tip of South America by 6,000 B.C.

The arrival of the descendants of these Siberian migrants in Arkansas cannot be pinpointed. Our knowledge of these early Paleo-Indians indicates the arrival could have been as early as 10,000 B.C. They had brought with them the procedures of processing stone to make weapons: percussion flaking and pressure flaking. Percussion flaking is just what it sounds like. Flakes were knocked off a stone with another stone, bone or wood. A skilled workman could carefully control the size and shape of the flake removed. An edge would be applied by pressure flaking or removing small flakes with a pointed implement, either of antler or bone. Two different types of tools were made and used by the Paleo-Indians; projectile points for darts or spears to hunt animals and fight each other, and scrappers to scrape the animal skins. Arrow points have not been found. The bow and arrow was not used until much later. The projectile points all tended to be lanceolate with a straight base. Almost all had a peculiar feature. On one side, sometimes both, a long flake was removed from the base towards the tip after the other chipping was completed. This fluting took considerable skill and the point could be ruined by one small slip. The practical purpose is unknown. It probably had some religious purpose as no point was considered complete and usable until this fluting was done.

The animals these Paleo-Indians hunted ranged in size from mammoths, mastodons and a king-sized species of bison down through deer to rabbit, squirrels and probably meadow mice and shrews.

By the time these Indians began to populate the Arkansas area, most of the bigger animals such as the mastodon had become or were nearing extinction, due to a change in environment from near Arctic severity to a climate much like todays. The Indians probably had little or no effect on the demise of these large animals due to the size of the animals, the small number of Indians and the crude materials of the weapons.

The question of clothing in the Paleo-Indian period is open. No evidence pointing to the presence or absence has been found. We must assume that before the climate improved some type of covering would be needed in the colder seasons of the year. However, some of the Indians found near Tierra del Fuego at the extreme southern tip of South America by the Spanish in the 16th century appeared to be of this early Stone Age culture and even in that cold climate clothing was scanty to non-existant.