|
| |
|
| 28000 |
Earliest settlers cross the Bering
land bridge into North America. |
 |
| 10000 |
Fluted-stone weapon points found
at Clovis, New Mexico, are used to hunt large Ice Age mammals. |
|
| 8000 |
The Bering land bridge is submerged
as ocean levels rise at the end of the Ice Age. |
|
| 4000 |
As Ice Age mammals become extinct,
hunter-gatherer culture develops on the Plains. |
|
| 100 B.C. |
Farming appears among the Mogollon
peoples of the southwest. The availability of this stable food source
leads to the development of permanent pit-house settlements. |
|
| 100 A.D. |
Anasazi culture emerges in the
southwest, marked by advanced basket-making, simple farming and construction
of above-ground adobe dwellings. |
|
| 500 |
Obsidian, copper, pearls and other
materials found in Ohio Valley Hopewell burial mounds provide evidence
of an extensive transcontinental trade network. |
|
| 1000 |
 The
Hopi and Acoma pueblos are established in the southwest.
The Anasazi construct cliff-house communities and large apartment-like
complexes of up to 1,000 rooms. |
|
| 1300 |
The Anasazi abandon their great
adobe cliff dwellings. Incursions by the newly-arrived Apache and
Navajo, coupled with a prolonged drought, are suspected as the cause
of their flight. |
|
| 1490 |
At the close of the prehistoric
period, the people of the West form approximately 240 distinct tribal
groupings and speak an estimated 300 different languages. |
|
| 1492 |
Christopher Columbus arrives in
the Western hemisphere; centuries of cross-cultural exchange begin. |
