Abstract

Presence of several Lower Paleolithic sites dated between 200,000 and 500,000 years BP in Siberia suggests that a similar level of technology should be expected in northwestem North America. Dates on wood and bone from Central Alberta indicate that the ice-free corridor was always open before about 22,000 but closed until about 11,600 BP; the Northwest Coast was also heavily glaciated during that period, but could easily have been traversed before then. Native oral histories suggest that people occupied the region when it was more glaciated; perhaps in refugia. Many geneticists agree that the great diversity of mtDNA lineages indicates that initial occupation occurred soinetime before 20,000 BR. Some linguists have proposed that the great linguistic diversity in the American suggests an antiquity of 40,000 years. But archaeologists have the most reliable clock. Artifact assemblages lacking bifacial projectile points have been reported froin deeply buried geological contexts dated between 30,000 and 14,000 BP in Yukon, Alberta and Nebraska. Now is the time to embark on a concerted search for more early sites, and this quest should incorporate new approaches, such as human hair, which is datable and can provide ancient DNA.