It was during the final stages of the last ice ages that humans entered the Western Hemisphere. There currently continues to be debate over the specifics of this migration. The exact dates and the routes these earliest inhabitants followed are the subject of continued research and speculation. But scholars do agree that these early populations entered North America across a land bridge at what is now the Bering Sea. They spread slowly southward into North America by at least 12,000 B. C. Most archaeologist feel these early travelers arrived in the southeast around 11,500 years ago.

These Paleoindian peoples organized themselves into small very mobile bands. They were somewhat nomadic as they moved from place to place as resources of one encampment were depleted and new supplies sought. These people were proficient hunters and kept themselves supplied with a large variety of tools related directly and indirectly to this vocation.

During the Early and Middle stages of the Paleoindian period, these small bands of hunters are thought to have usbsisted primarily through hunting now extinct animals such as mastodon and bison. Excavations in the neighboring state of Tennessee in 1979 recovered mastodon bones bearing obvious butchering marks.

Obviously, the populations of these earliest inhabitants did not live exclusively on these extinct animals. Undoubtedly, they practiced a mixed foraging strategy that included smaller game, fish, and a variety of plants.

With the climate changes brought about by the ending of the Ice Age, many of the larger game began to become extinct. Their extinction may have been hurried by intense hunting. This would force the people living in the later stages of this period to rely on the other facets of the patterns of subsistence.

Archaeological evidence suggests that interior waterways began to become the center of ecosystems for these early inhabitants. The waterways provided ease of travel and communication. Additionally, the rich soil of their flood plains would lead eventually to the development of agriculture.

One of the major sources of dating the various sources of development in the indigenous people of North America is through the stone tools and projectile points. To see a chart describing the various points (many of which can still be found in Gordon County) as well as the dates and periods they represent, Click Here.

Somewhere around 10,000 B. C., these inhabitants developed the Dalton Point. (see link indicated above). This development is considered to be the transition between the Paleoindian and the Archaic Periods. These points indicate an adaptive pattern that points to later cultures. These points were capable of being re-sharpened into a variety of tools,k such as scrapers and awls. Additionally, with the Dalton point there are a larger number of special function tools such as the woodworking adze.