The Allen Site - A Paleoindian Camp in Southwestern Nebraska (Electronic book text)

The Allen Site in southwestern Nebraska has nurtured the interest of archaeologists and paleontologists with abundant signs of a long history of human, animal, and environmental activity. Douglas Bamforth focuses primarily on Paleoindian land use represented by the Allen Site and the adjacent smaller sites collectively known as the Medicine Creek Paleoindian sites.

The Medicine Creek sites, located in the central Great Plains, highlight aspects of early Native American lifeways that are obscured by the emphasis in most Paleoindian examinations of large bison kills. Research at Medicine Creek has stressed reconstruction of both the overall regional environment and of local microenvironmental variation, along with human responses to both of these. Advances in analysis and well-preserved remains from the Allen site in particular document the extraordinary range of species that Paleoindian groups harvested in addition to bison and open serious questions about widely accepted reconstructions of Paleoindian land use. In addition, the well-stratified evidence for long-term residential use of the site offers a rare chance to consider patterns of adaptive change over the course of the Paleoindian period.

ContributorsMark Becker, ASM Affiliates, Encinitas, CA Reid A. Bryson, Center for Climatic Research, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI James Chatters, applied paleoscience, Richland, WA Linda Scott Cummings, PaleoResearch Institute, Inc., Golden, CO E. Mott Davis, anthropology department, University of Texas, Austin, TX Jean Hudson, anthropology department, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI David May, geography department, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, IA Thomas Moutoux, PaleoResearch Institute, Inc., Golden, CO Robert Warren, Illinois State Museum Research and Collections Center, Springfield, IL L. Anthony Zalucha, Paleoethnobotanical Consulting, Mount Horeb, WI