Why We Went There

The Topper site is an excellent and undisputed example of a rich Clovis-era quarry site. This makes it a great case study for scientific inquiry — not only for researchers seeking to learn more about the Paleoindian people, but also for those with new theories about when people first arrived in the Americas and what happened to them. Time Team was invited to the site by Al Goodyear from the South Carolina Institute for Archaeology and Anthropology. The Topper site is abuzz with researchers in the summer months and Time Team joined the students, volunteers and scientists from several disciplines, all braving the bugs and the brutal heat in order to get a closer look at America's earliest people.

Topper is one of a handful of sites that threaten to break the long accepted "Clovis Barrier." Archaeologists across the Americas are turning up new evidence suggesting that people were here before the Clovis hunters. Topper's 50,000-year-old date has sparked added controversy as it is not only pre-Clovis, but potentially moves the date for humans in the Western Hemisphere further back than anyone thought possible.

While Topper is in the thick of the pre-Clovis debate, it is also one of the many Clovis-era sites providing data for another theory, focused on the rapid disappearance of the Clovis culture. Dr. Allan West and his colleagues have suggested that an ancient comet fell to earth 12,900 years ago that triggered the mini ice age known as the Younger Dryas. During this time, the Clovis population was highly fragmented and ice-age megafauna like mammoths and the American camel became extinct.

With just three days — and plenty of millennia-old mysteries to tackle — Time Team set out to help in the hunt for the first Americans. From nanodiamonds, to the search for 50,000 year-old stone tools, Time Team aided Dr. Goodyear and his crew in the struggle to bring the story of the ancient Americans back to life.