Doctoral Dissertation: Folsom Adaptive Systems in the Upper Gunnison Basin, Colorado

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Under the supervision of Dr. David J. Meltzer, Brian Andrews will analyze data gathered from five Folsom period sites located in the Gunnison Basin. The Folsom period dates from approximately 10,800 to 10,000 years ago, and is most often characterized by relatively small groups of highly mobile bison hunting peoples. This characterization is based on decades of work that focused on large bison kill sites in the Great Plains. Recent work in several areas of the Rocky Mountains, including the Gunnison Basin, suggest that not all groups of Folsom people may have practiced this highly mobile lifestyle. This project will seek to understand the differences between Folsom behavior seen between the traditional Plains setting and the mountainous Gunnison Basin. Were Folsom people as highly mobile in the mountains, or did they stay in one place for longer periods of time? Did they focus on hunting bison and other large game in the Basin, or did their diet consist of a wider variety of foods? Did they spend all year living in the Basin, or did they move in and out seasonally? Analysis of Folsom sites in the Basin will help answer these questions.Much of the research will focus on the artifacts recovered from the Mountaineer site, located atop a high mesa. This site is much larger than typical Folsom occurrances, and was likely occupied on multiple occasions. Evidence of a structure suggests that it may have been occupied for much longer periods at a time than were other Folsom sites. Stone artifacts suggest that a wide range of activities took place during occupation, including food and hide processing and tool manufacture. It also appears that the site was used to monitor the movement of game in the valley below. Other sites that will be examined are much smaller than Mountaineer, and likely represent the activities of smaller groups of people performing specific tasks, such as hunting animals, gathering plants, or acquiring raw materials used to make stone tools. The ultimate goal of the project is to describe how Folsom groups lived in the sometimes harsh climate of the Gunnison Basin at the end of the Ice Age in North America. This research will provide a more complete understanding of the variability present in an archaeological 'culture' that covered much of western North America, and will offer general insight into how people adapted in multiple ways to different and challenging climatic and environmental settings. The involvement of undergraduate, junior high and high school students, and local amateur archaeologist groups in the excavation and analysis of the Mountaineer site ensures that the insight gained and lessons learned of prehistoric human adaptation to dramatically different conditions than at present will be shared with a wide audience.