Sierra May Have Oldest ‘Home’ in North America

Archeologists searching for cultural artifacts in a remote Sierra Nevada valley have unearthed a prehistoric settlement that they believe may be the oldest example of a human shelter in North America.

Digging at the proposed site of a hydroelectric project outside of the tiny Alpine County town of Bear Valley, 140 miles northeast of here, workers found what appears to be a floor and fireplace built perhaps 10,000 years ago.

If the antiquity of the find is supported by radiocarbon-dating, a process that will take 90 days, it would be the oldest known structure on the continent. An 8,000-year-old site near Hells Gap, Wyo., currently contains the oldest structure, according to Robert Bettinger, an associate professor of anthropology at UC Davis.

While the new find could be the oldest example of a human shelter on the continent, it would not be the oldest sign of human activity.

Bettinger and Vance Haynes, a University of Arizona geologist, said there have been many 10,000- to 12,000-year-old discoveries of tools and other evidence of human presence from Nova Scotia to the Mojave Desert.

In addition, French scientists last summer found evidence that humans have lived in South America at least 32,000 years. This suggests that humans at least passed through North America on their way from Asia over what is now the Bering Strait.

Melinda Peak, an archeologist at the private firm that made the new find, Peak & Associates in Sacramento, said the site consists of a flat patch of packed earth resembling “some kind of prepared floor” as well as “positioned stones and charcoal.”

Anthropologists reacted cautiously to the announcement of the Sierra Nevada discovery, and most withheld comment until more details emerge. In the past, potentially promising new finds have been discounted after detailed study.

But if the Sierra Nevada find is confirmed, it may add greatly to knowledge about prehistoric human activity, Bettinger said.

“If it is a house floor,” he said, “it would be the oldest house floor in North America almost by a factor of two.”

In addition, Bettinger said, “it would tell us about settlement patterns in a time we don’t know much about settlement patterns.”

How Life Was Organized

Scientists could learn such things as how people organized their lives, how often they moved from one area to another and whether they regularly migrated back to the high-altitude site after the area’s heavy snowpack cleared in the spring.

“This also suggests a wider spread of man (throughout California),” Peak said. “In the past, finds this old were made mostly in desert areas.”

Ann Peak, the company’s chief archeologist and Melinda’s mother, told the Associated Press that the discovery may show “that there was fairly intensive use of land in California by the Indians beyond 6,000 to 7,000 years ago, which is really the oldest most other California sites firmly indicated.”

Spear points also found at the site closely resemble similar tools previously dug up at Clark Flat, about 35 miles away, Melinda Peak said. Carbon-dating indicated that the Clark Flat finds are 11,000 to 12,500 years old, she said.

She said she believes that the new find could be from the same period because “the geologic sequence of the (surrounding earth) layers suggest it is that (old).”