Footprints in Time: A History and Ethnology of the Lenape-Delaware Indian Culture

A History and Ethnology of The Lenape-Delaware Indian Culture

Written and Illustrated by Alan E. Carman

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Copyright 2013 Alan E. Carman.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

ISBN: 978-1-4669-0742-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-0740-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-0741-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011962476

Trafford rev. 09/09/2013

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Part I

Populating the Western Hemisphere

Chapter 1 A Polarized World

Chapter 2 Ice Age Hunters

Chapter 3 Ice Age Hunters

Chapter 4 The Post Glacier Period

Chapter 5 The Woodland Periods

Part II

The Lenape-Delaware Indian Culture

Chapter 6 The Lenape Origin

Chapter 7 Ancestral Homelands and Tribal Locations

Chapter 8 Family Responsibilities

Chapter 9 Clans and Phratries

Chapter 10 Villages and Dwellings

Chapter 11 Gathering, Gardening and Food Preservation

Chapter 12 Hunting

Chapter 13 Fishing

Chapter 14 Shellfish Gathering

Chapter 15 Stone Materials and Mining

Chapter 16 Tools and Weapon Making

Chapter 17 Cordage and Its Use

Chapter 18 Hide Preparation and Clothing

Chapter 19 Pottery Making

Chapter 20 The Indian Pipe

Chapter 21 The Dugout Canoe

Chapter 22 Sweat Baths

Chapter 23 Marriage and Divorce

Chapter 24 Spiritual Beliefs

Chapter 25 Aging, Death and Burial

Part III

Chapter 26 European Contact and Ownership of Land

Chapter 27 Wampum and Tomahawks

Chapter 28 Kieft and the Pavonia Massacre

Chapter 29 Penelope

Chapter 30 The Silver Peg Leg

Chapter 31 The Beaver Wars

Part IV

Chapter 32 Brother Onas

Chapter 33 The Frontier Wars

Chapter 34 The Missionaries

Chapter 35 The Final Sanctuary

Chapter 36 The Lenape/Delaware Today

Index

Bibliography

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

To substantiate my research project the support data is obtained from many sources. The most valuable archives for authenticity, were the eleven eyewitness accounts from four different nationalities, which either had contact with the Lenape or recorded observations made by others. Over many years those chronicles have withstood scrutiny and exhibit a pattern of consistency and reliability.

Contemporary researchers Herbert C. Kraft, William W. Newcomb and C. A. Weslager were my principal sources to confirm these early documents. Special recognition and appreciation is reserved for the late Herbert C. Kraft of Seton Hall University for his critique, suggestions and constructive criticism of the manuscript. The staffs of many libraries especially the New Jersey Library in Trenton, New Jersey who granted me access to prayer an out of print books and documents on the early contact period.

All of the research and fieldwork to accurately portray the Lenape culture was accomplished over a 58 year period. As a professional wildlife artist dependent each illustration provides visual description of their daily activities. All who salvage cultural artifacts from the earth’s archives share a common bond. The author was fortunate to experience this process with my son, Robert and personal friend, Steve Moyer and the late Howard Radcliff.

There are no words to fully appreciate my late wife for her infinite patience in processing my thoughts and writings into acceptable reading material. With loving memory I dedicate this book to Jane Carman.

INTRODUCTION

At the end of the twelfth century, European powers began a new age of discovery. Their monarchies were eager to acquire the untapped wealth of the Orient and commissioned sea captains of various nationalities to seek shorter sea routes to the Indies.

The historic discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus compelled other seafarers to also explore its northeastern coastline. Ascending the rivers, they were the first to view the pristine wilderness, a panorama of natural and seductive beauty which stretched as far as the eye could see.

Upon penetrating the forests, it was evident they had invaded and living community, for many invisible eyes watched the newcomers and guarded silence. Although most intelligent beings had long ago rejected the ancient mythology of the dark ages, some still believe that the forest primeval with the dominant of elves, spirits, dragons, giant and demons.

Captain’s observations recorded in ship’s logs were ambiguous, viewing this new continent as a primordial wilderness, untouched by human hands, existing in its original grandeur.

But, as all-aspiring as these descriptions seem, they were misleading. They failed to mention that the New World was anything but unexplored, and hidden beneath the forest canopy lay unmistakable evidence of human occupancy.

12,000 years before the Vikings the rovers landed in Newfoundland, and later, when Christopher Columbus set foot in San Salvador (Bahamas), people of the Ice Age had crossed over from Asia to North America. From these ancient travelers, generations of primitive societies involved who penetrated into the most distinct reaches of the America. As unimportant as their migration from the old to the new world teams, it had far reaching consequences. They were the first people to extend the range of human dynasty on earth complete by entering the Western Hemisphere. Over the millennium, they evolved into the race of people Christopher Columbus called Los Indos, those we know today as the Native Americans.

As the Europeans traveled further into the interior of North America, they were confronted with huge prehistoric earthworks rivaling those created by artisans of the old world in Europe. Who had built these gigantic earth then complexes? Where did the occupants go?

Many years later, archaeologist turned back the layered sediments of earth like the well-worn pages of a book and from the underground archives came the answers to the mystery surrounding mankind’s presence in North America. Besides the physical evidence hidden beneath the ground, further proof lay on the surface.

Stretching across the continent with this extensive network of Indian path which led to all four points of the compass. They linked the Great Lakes with the Gulf Coast and crossed intermittently from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans. These were the routes which the path finders took to reach quarry sites, to connect their communities, get to hunting grounds, go through mountain passes, and most of all, they provided access routes for native traders to barter their wares. Due to their method of walking single file, these ancient, worn paths were rarely over 18 inches wide. It is remarkable that these trails later became wagon tracks and eventually some sections of our national highway system.

Thus, what the white man considers a New World was to the Native Americans, an Old World. Only the contemporary historians, as accomplished writers, made it otherwise.

Generations of hunters and gatherers claim the fertile river valleys, built their communities along coastal areas and engaged in gardening. They had taken advantage of the continental natural resources and enjoyed its rich bounty of foods. One hundred and fifty million white-tail deer roamed America at that time, their main source for meat and clothing.

My story traces their footprints across the continent and centers on a culture which occupied a four-state region of the Northeast. These people were known as the Lenape. The initial written documentation describing their way of life was supplied by eleven seventeenth century observers from four nationalities. In the next century, religious missionaries recorded their changing society as it faced the tide of immigration flooding into their homelands. Without their written information, this book could never have been completed.

It was the Lenape’s fate to clash with four European civilizations which resulted in warfare, disrupted lives, a decline in their culture and eventually eviction from their ancestral homelands. From Henry Hudson’s journey up the river that bears his name in 1609, until the cessation of hostilities in the war of 1812, two hundred and three years personifies the settlement of America. In the West, the clash between settlers, the military and Plains Indians only lasted a mere eighty-eight years.

As you progress through this book, you will feel a common bond leaking our way of life and the legacy left to us by the Native Americans. When the Lenape name appears, you will associate them with the name of town, streets, bridges, creeks, rivers, parks and our nation’s landmarks. The abundance of food available in today’s supermarket such as vegetables and grains, plus many forms of medicine, were given to us by our predecessors.

Above all, when you analyze their way of life, you will see the love of family, a respect for elders, and an ingrained reverence for the traditions of their forefathers. You will sense the reciprocal bond forged between the American Indians, their Creator and nature, one that dictated their every move and life.

Since the Journey to Their Final Sanctuary, the Lenape’s Footprints in Time, are now covered with the dust of almost four hundred years.

This is their story.

PART I

CHAPTER 1

A Polarized World

Archaeologists have spent many years attempting to trace the origins of the diverse Indian groups who we recognize as Native Americans. Most of the scientific community now accepts the fact that the ancestors of today’s Indians originated in Asia thousands of years ago from Old World Indian culture. Those Asian hunters provided the wellspring of life for all future American Indian civilization. For thousands of years after entering the Western Hemisphere, those nomads penetrated into the further—most breaches of two continents. In doing so, they earned the distinctive title as the First Americans.

Several attempts have been made to associate the artifacts of these first Americans with the Stone Age or early Paleolithic period, between twelve thousand to thirty-five thousand years ago, these hunters made their epic journey into North America.

The mystery which surrounds the arrival of primitive people in North America has proved to be a never—ending story. To properly understand what transpired, it is necessary to reflect on a period of time when our planet was experiencing drastic changes in its geological composition.

Most of us have seen the remarkable photographs of Earth taken by both Russian and American astronauts. They appear in books, magazines and on TV, and they capture our planet in all of its magnificence with landmasses and oceans scared by cloud cover. When we reflect on these images, it gives us the feeling of serenity, even a sense of security, because it remains on our only sanctuary in the universe. Imagine if you will, our planet would have looked sixteen thousand years ago have astronauts been able to photograph its surface.

It would appear much like current photos, no except for a massive canopy of ice covering the northern masses and a similar, but smaller ice mass encasing the bottom part. This icy phenomenon was one of the frigid signatures of the Pleistocene epoch, a one million year period of intermittent glacier activity which not only altered the surface of the continent, but it’s polarizing effects decimated three quarters of all life on earth.

Worldwide glaciation remained a mystery to climatologists until 1941. At that time, a Yugoslavian mathematician, Milutin Milankovitch, at the age of sixty-three, completed a thirty year project to determine the cause of global glaciation. From his mathematical theory on radiation, he determine the cause of how the ice responded to the change in solar radiation at different latitudes and his graphs depicted their latitude over six hundred and fifty thousand years. Geologist welcomed his theory but the results gained from carbon dating techniques repressed his findings. By 1965, his theory had few supporters. It was not until 1976, when study of deep-cores drilled from the floor of the Indian Ocean, proved Milutin Milankovitch’s theory was correct¹.

In essence, in the past five hundred thousand years there was a repeated cycle of ice age occurrence every hundred thousand years. It was due to variations and the elongation of the Earth’s orbit itself. This is known as Orbit Eccentricity and is due to the gravitational pull of the surrounding planet on the orbit of the earth. There is a strong possibility that our planet will experience another ice age approximately five thousand years from now. A sobering thought to say the least, because even though the Pleistocene Period ended ten thousand years ago, we are still living in the last interglacial period since the Ice Age. Frozen reminiscence of glaciation still linger in Greenland, in the Arctic and Antarctica as deadly reminders of our frigid past.

Although the Ice Age took its toll on living things, suffer major events occurred which produced more favorable outcomes. The anatomical development of man unfolded as his species became the new, intelligent creatures on earth in order to be this human was written to serve is apprenticeship by passing through the evolutionary corridors of prehistory. Eventually, he shed his look of beastility and became the life form which dominated Europe, Asia and Africa. Due to abnormal geological conditions created by the Ice Age, man journeyed from the Old World to the New expanding, expanding the range of the human dynasty on earth.

Other event this era was the appearance of the horse, camel and elephant. These animals succeeded in multiplying and spreading across the world’s land masses. Because so many species became extinct during the Pleistocene, the fact that man survived, is an excellent tribute to the adaptability of the human race.

How was the geological surface of the earth altered to permit man to migrate from one continent to another? To visualize an Ice Age scenario, let us draw back a little further in time to one hundred and fifteen thousand years ago. A mere 2.8°F decline in global temperatures started the first is to appear. The formation of a glacier, with its built-in weather system is one of nature’s rare phenomenon. The formation of accumulated snowfall is a slow process. Layer upon layer of ice is stacked in till it becomes extremely heavy. Not only does the ponderous weight depress the Earth’s crust, the dense concentration causes the glacier to move. It grows in thickness from the center, and after thousands of years, the buildup can reach several miles in height. In doing so, the glacier produces its own weather system, generating raging blizzards across its surface and expelling frost-laden winds southward which will polarize land hundreds of miles beyond its southern margin.

Like a giant white octopus, the tentacles of the glacier reach out, engulfing the land in its lethal, frigid embrace. Slowly, by fractions, then feet, yards and miles, its forward motion forces every living thing to flee before its menacing form. It sweeps over mountains, carving through solid rock and shearing off mountain tops, swallowing valleys, gliding across the frozen bodies of water and gorging out forests, rendering them into matchsticks. Like a huge bulldozer, it scrapes up dirt, gravel and large boulders, transporting them hundreds of miles. The area is frozen hundreds of feet deep, and beyond this, tundra exists only lichen, moss and coarse grass. This region is where flora and fauna still exist. Still further south, grasslands stand to the spruce forests and the surface of the earth retains some degree of normalcy.

At their peak, glaciers covered one-third of the earth’s surface and converted one-third of the water into ice. From a scarcity of water to replenish the oceans, sea levels dropped an amazing three hundred feet or more. In effect, they produced a massive, worldwide, ebb tide. This condition occurred periodically throughout the Pleistocene epoch, depending on the rise and fall of global temperatures.

Following the same week when, the glaciers advanced and retreated throughout the Ice Age. So much water with inverted into ice, that land bridges were exposed, stretching between continents. The coastal regions now extended to continental shelves. Had cartographers been able to map the land masses of the world, they would have appeared much larger than today’s continents.

Glaciers extended into the valley of the Missouri and Ohio rivers. In Europe, ice covered northern England, Western Denmark and Germany. They extended into Russia as far south as Moscow. The expose continental shelf linked the Malaysian Peninsula of Asia to Australia, and Great Britain was connected to northern France.

The most important land bridge to appear in relation to this story was called Beringia.² It linked Siberia to Alaska by a connecting Isthmus which joined the coast of Asia to the northwestern corner of North America. At the time the plain was exposed, it measured thirteen hundred miles long, from north to south. Today it lies beneath the bearings straight, at a depth of twenty-five fathoms of seawater. It separate Siberia, the Chukchi Peninsula, from Alaska and the Seward Peninsula—a mere distance of fifty-six miles.

The Bering Strait shows variable depth of one hundred and eighty to three hundred feet and is bordered on the north by the Chukchi Sea. In recent years, geologist became convinced that sometime at the beginning of the Pleistocene Period, Beringia once hovered well above sea level, connecting Asia to North America. As a result of down-warping of the Earth’s crust, it sank below sea level where it remains today.

By exposing the Beringia land bridge, nature created a natural corridor into the Western Hemisphere. Its configuration resembled a two-way fun all accepting flora and fauna from both continents. Dramatically speaking, this connection became a giant stage for human performance. The primitive cast of characters were the actors, unaware of the script they would follow. By merely acting out their daily lives, these Ice Age wanderers introduced the first stirrings of civilization into the North American continent. Their only adversities were nature and the wild animals that existed in North America. Wildlife quickly learned that due to man’s superior intelligence, he was a threat to all living things. They would slink away before his advances, for with a weapon in his hands, man with the deadliest of all predators.

Notes—Chapter I

1.   Gribbin, John, —Another Ice Age, Scientists Tell Why. Science Digest. Pg. 73

2.   Haag, William G., The Bering Strait Land Bridge. Scientific America. Pg. 24 W.H. Freeman Company, San Francisco, CA.

CHAPTER 2

Ice Age Hunters

Most scholars agree on How, Where and Why, Ice Age people made their epic journey into the Western Hemisphere. When, is the most ongoing topic of heated debate among professionals. The theory that the first people entered North America via Asia is not a new concept, for as early as 1590, a Jesuit, Fray de Aconta, suggested this, and today most archaeologists accept it as factual.

Geologists believe that Siberia was largely free of ice during the Pleistocene period. For many years, American archaeologists had studied and analyzed Russian attempts to unravel the mystery of where the people in Siberia who migrated to America, came from.

Russian archaeologists have uncovered two sides in Siberia (Ulalinka), that produce modified quartzite pebble tools with an early date of 690,000 B.P.¹ At Ust mil II, extinct mammal bones and artifacts have been uncovered which dated to 31,500 and 3,500 B.P.²

The most likely places of original migration are sites in the Aldan region of eastern Siberia. Artifacts found there are plausible Proto—types for the finely—chipped bifacial weapon points found in America. North of the Aldan sites, near the present day shoreline of the Arctic Ocean, lies another site with occupation dates of 11,500 and 8,500 B. C. These people were at the right place and time to make the migration and this route is probably the one taken by early travelers to North America. ³

One of the most convincing bits of evidence comes not from archaeology, but from physical anthropology and geology. Not all Native Americans show obvious features of the Mongoloid people of Asia. The characteristics would be: course, straight black hair, light brown skin, brown eyes with epicanthic eye folds, sparse facial hair, high cheek bones, and a high frequency of shovel-shaped incisor teeth. Infants in both Asia and America sometimes also develop the Mongoloid Spot, a purplish discoloration of the lower back area. The close proximity of the Asian and North American land masses the just and Asian origin for the first Americans. As previously stated, today, only ninety km, (fifty-six miles), separate the two continents.

Sometime before 8000 B.C., or previous to the last continental glacier’s retreat, it was possible to walk across the land bridge when it exposed. Several opportunities to migrate across Beringia, seventy-five thousand to ten thousand years ago, has been the subject of lively debate between geologists. The process of glacier advancement and retreat, induced by unstable global temperatures, created a time sequence for the exposure and closure of Beringia by the water.

Gowlett—1984 Table

75,000-62,000 open

62,000-55,000 submerged

55,000-48,000 open

48,000-44,000 submerged

44,000-10,000 open⁴

Today the consensus of opinion among geologists is that Beringia remained open during the stadial periods of glacier advancement but with submerged during warmer interstadials. Further studies indicate that much of Siberia was ice-free during the Pleistocene.

The changes in sea levels were not the only problem facing migrating Asiatics. One of them was not monumental, but a deciding factor which controlled seasonal movements.

During the winter months, in northern latitudes, the Bergingia land bridge would have been shrouded in semi-darkness, broken only by Erie Northern lights which variegated, colored streamers danced overhead-a formidable route to cross. Because Beringia was originally sea bottom, the unfolding landscape was probably a series of soggy areas, intermittent with small mounds and devoid of trees. Temperatures were well below zero, tundra vegetation was dormant and there was no combustible material for a fire. Even herds of animals had moved south to a more hospitable climate which would provide them with sustenance. We can only surmise that crossing Beringia in the winter was a definite risk, especially when facing the towering glaciers on the other side of the plain.

It was a different story with the coming of spring when life was renewed and the barren land exploded with life. Yellow poppies and saxifrage burst forth colonizing an otherwise drab terrain. Millions of migratory birds and animals started their long journey to their nesting area and grazing lands. These places provided meat and eggs, while seal rookeries supplied meat and skin for clothing. Spawning fish probably also supplemented their diets. When large caribou herds were on the move, hundreds of hooves cut deep furloughs into the soil of Beringia. In their wake-came the hunters.

Animal studies tell us that all creatures probe the outer limits of their environment. In a crisis situation, they leave one habitat in favor of another in order to survive. This simple explanation, provide the answer to Why these people left one continent for another. The daily need for protein is an unlikely motivation to inspire primitive beings to discover a new continent. Yet, this is what happened, and they never realize that in the course of their daily hunting pursuits, they crossed through the unseen portals of a new world.

Once they were across the grassy, steppe-tundra of Beringia, they were faced with two massive ice sheets on the Alaskan side. The Western sheet was known as the Cordillerean and the Eastern sheet was known as the Laurentide. At times of maximum glaciation, these two high walls of ice may have converged, preventing any passage by humans or animals. When the glaciers retreated, two ice-free corridors stretched southward from Alaska. One of these passages may have gone around the coast, north of Brooks Range, then south, down the Yukon Valley into the Mackenzie River Valley. It continued south along the eastern slope of the Rockies to the Dakotas. This twenty-five mile wide corridor opened onto the Great Plains of North America.

Some archaeologists believe people who took this route probably traveled south along the Rocky Mountains, and then penetrated mountain passes which led to the great basin and the Pacific Ocean. A small, but growing minority, believe Asiatic people entered North America before fifteen thousand years ago.

New archaeological sites show occupational dates as far back as thirty-five thousand years ago. Scientists speculate that at some time before this date, after crossing Beringia, the people could not cross the inland route due to glaciation and took the other passage south, along the narrow continental shelf of the Pacific Ocean which bypassed the Great Plains. It is possible that they reached the tent of South America by eleven thousand years ago, a distance of 13 kilometers or eight thousand miles.

Data entered from the efforts of archaeologists have established a realistic profile on the basic life of these human. It is believed that there never were large scale migrations who crossed Beringia, but small, hunting and weathering bands, probably not exceeding fifty family members of all ages. Adept at fire-making for cooking, they did not know farming or pottery making.

Clothing was obtained from the hides of wide for writing of animals; however, the soft, fleshy hides of caribou frequently was used to line their jackets, clothing and head wear. The hair of these skins contains microscopic hollow spaces which acted as insulation against the cold and presented loss of body heat. The hides were treated with mammal oil and made into boots which were worn with the hair inside against the beat. They were waterproof and warm, preventing frostbite. Animals also provided sinew for thread, bone awls and sewing needles.

Visualize these ancient people crossing Beringia, threading their way over the steppe-tundra, skirting the numerous ponds and small lakes. Their Mongolian features were evident by their high, cheek bones, brown skin and almond-shaped eyes. Male hunters were strung out as advance scout and protected the families. Their faces were sculptured by the elements and reflected the hardship of ice age living. Their life expectancy was only thirty-five to thirty-nine years, if that.

If there calloused hands nestled long, stone tipped spears, each point constantly shifting toward the east like the needle on a compass. They remained on a temporary campsite only long enough to kill game, butcher and draft fights. When the meat was exhausted, they moved on, following the game herds in the endless ritual of self preservation. The difficulty of their journey took its toll and some of the old and sick died and were buried in wayside graves.

On the eastern horizon, is—covered mountain ranges loom to obstruct their progress. Yet, the deeply-wretched trails made by the constantly moving animals leads through misty valleys covered with small lakes created by melt water from the surrounding is field. Just as the foraging game followed a river system south, so did the hunters. Eventually, both emerged from the mountain recesses and beheld what no human being had ever seen, the vast, North American grasslands. This prairie of waving grass extended as far as the eye could see, and its spacious reach appeared to touch the sky.

These ancient hunters had penetrated the Gateway, into North America. In time, this new world would prove to be utopia. There was unlimited fresh water and meet, immense prairies, forests, deserts, jungle, swampland, marsh, bays, rivers, lakes and streams and towering mountains teaming with animal life. In addition, a choice of cold or mild climate—a land of plenty, offering all things to all people.

When they crossed Beringia to North America, it is estimated the wild animals numbered fifty to one hundred million. The land bridge made the interchange of flora and fauna between the continents possible. Elephant—like mammoth and mastodon and bear originated in the Old World and migrated into North America. The horse and camel originated in the Americas and traveled to Asia. Horse, Lammas and ground sloths migrated to warmer climates in South America. Archaeologist cannot agree on the reason that caused the eventual mass extinction of the large mammals called megafauna, but some believe it was overkill by relentless hunters. Others believe global weather variations altered their food supply, critical to animal survival. Whatever the cause, the mammoth, mastodon and cave bear died out in Europe shortly after contact with man.

In the Western Hemisphere, the mammoth, mastodon, ground sloth and certain types of elk and bison became extinct after man entered both continents. If man, as a predator, was not entirely responsible for their extinction, he was certainly a contributing factor.

There was a vast array of elk, moose, musk oxen, mountain sheep and goats, Buffalo, pronghorn, caribou, Whitetail deer, mule deer, grizzly bear and puma. Also dire wolves, saber tooth tiger, American lion, armadillo—like glyptodont, mammoth, mastodon, camel, L, horse, ground sloth, woodland musk oxen, four-pronged antelope, tapir, giant peccaries, mountain deer and giant beaver.

By today’s standards, Pleistocene animals were a collection of giants. Cervalces, a moose-elk, featured and eight foot spread of antlers, and the beaver at three hundred pounds, was as big as our present—day black bear. Eighteen feet high, Ruscon’s ground sloth, weighed three tons. When standing erect, it was as tall as a giraffe, yet moved at a snail’s pace. The giant mice and resembled out Western long-horn steer, its horns measuring six feet from tip to tip.

The most dangerous and powerful predator was the huge, short –faced bear. It was one third larger than the Alaskan Brown bear, our largest carnivore. The Imperial mammoths stood fourteen feet high at shoulder level and had to tusks which curved inward. Much larger than today’s elephant tusks, they acted like an immense scythe, sweeping grass up for the animal to consume. The smaller woolly mammoth had course, shaggy hair. In comparison, the mastodon had short, reddish hair. Our present—Gay Gray Wolf is only half the size of the Ice Age dire Wolf, and the panther was larger than our African lions of today. An additional menace was the saber-tooth tiger with protruding, eight inch dagger-like canines. The fact that man survived in this oversized world of giants, is a miracle in itself.

The late Wisconsin glaciation reached its maximum around 16,000 B. C., and afterwards started a slow retreat north. From the gradual warming trend of this interglacial period, a huge meltdown began and the glaciers released vast quantities of water. It poured in torrents from the receding ice sheets. The force was so furious, it in largest river valleys and created new lakes with the overflow. By 8000 B. C., the levels of the oceans of the world had returned to approximately that of today. These rising seas, inundated coastal shelves, and in the process sealed off Beringia under twenty-five fathoms of water, obscuring all traces of the passing of man and beast.

Succeeding generations of hunters and gatherers who