A century and a half ago, most “authorities” considered Native Americans to be in the Western Hemisphere about 3,000 years before present. Findings in New Mexico ended that. In 1908, a flash flood occurred on Dry Cimarron River. The Folsom phone operator lost her life but was a hero, saved over 20 lives downstream by staying at switchboard giving out warning until flood washed her away, though a number of lives were lost in the flood.
Some months later a black cowboy (ranch foreman) named George McJinkins rode past the newly exposed wall of the riverbank and saw exposed bones in the wall of the stream bank. A son of slaves, he was self-educated but of significant intellectual ability and widely read. He believed this site should be excavated. He tried for the rest of his life, but he died before research began. There was no archaeological agency in the new state of New Mexico. Finally in the 1920's the Denver Museum excavated the site (finds now in Denver, not New Mexico). I knew a cowboy who as a young man, living near Kiowa School, would ride about 12 miles horseback to the site and in some manner took part. McJinkins may have butchered Buffalo on the Texas plains as a young man, anyway, he knew the bones he saw in the riverbank were something special. It turned out that it was a kill site of Taylor Bison, half again as large as current Buffalo and now extinct. In the excavation scientists found a spear point embedded in a rib of one of the animals, making it certain that this was a Paleo-Indian kill site. There was no carbon dating yet, but this is a very volcanic area with volcanic ash deposits both above and below the kill site. Through chemical analysis, scientists determined which volcanoes were represented and they dated from that to about 10,000 years before present. This totally upset the study of paleo Indian studies in North America. Now it has been re-dated to about 8,000 years before present, after the end of the Ice Age but still ancient.
Since then, Blackwater Draw between Clovis and Portales was developed as a Mammoth kill site, dating to about 10,000 years before present. A college classmate in 1963 spent a summer as a volunteer at this site and did a formal report in my undergraduate research site on this excavation. Both sites used spears instead of bow and arrow. Now it is assumed that bow and arrow were not widely used in the Americas until around 3,000 years ago. At least three atlatls have been found in dry caves in New Mexico, so it is not that far back. Both the Folsom and Clovis cultures have now been found and recognized from central Mexico to Canada. Other sites, including Sandia Cave near Albuquerque have been argued as being older, but Folsom and Clovis stood until very recently as the two oldest accepted paleo Indian cultures in North America. In 2021 human footprints were found in Lake Otero in the White Sands, and with organic material about them which dated to about 22,000 years before present, which really set back the presence of humans in North America.
Pit houses and very small corn cobs were found in the San Francisco River valley in SW New Mexico which carbon dated to before 400 AD. These were farmers in the area. Now correctly known as Ancestral Pueblo, though still incorrectly called Anasazi, (Athabaskan word meaning ancient ones). By 1,000 AD farmers were widespread in the area. The Boy Scout Troop saw a pre-pottery site in a 2014 Historic Trails trip dating to around 1,000 AD. Dating by dendrochronology (tree ring) is accurate to a year or two as to when a timber used in the construction was cut. Sunset Crater volcano erupted in 1064 AD which caused abandonment of some villages, and new ones established. Chaco Canyon center is from around 850 to 1300 as, with a site in Guatemala, one of two greatest pre-Columbian astronomical sites in the Western Hemisphere. Pottery was introduced from the South from around 1000. Basket work, woven feather blankets, pit houses to above ground dwellings all were present before that. Trade existed from Mexico for living tropical birds and other items, to the Pacific coast area for seashells. Turquoise from New Mexico was traded to Mexico and other areas. Apparently, some indigenous conflict also was present, as an excavation at Rattlesnake Ridge, north of Cuba, with its destruction dated to around 1250. Pueblo Bonito at Chaco Canyon had the largest number of rooms of a structure until 1880’s New York City. It was abandoned in the early 1300’s, possibly due to drought. Most of these people moved to major river valley’s during and after this drought.
Explanation: The word “Pueblo” means “town” or “village” in Spanish. As part of the rearrangement of status in Northern New Mexico following the Pueblo revolt of 1680, the native American farming communities were granted “town” or Pueblo status by the King of Spain, most of them between 1700 and 1720. This included the farmland, grazing land, and access to forested areas for firewood and construction materials. Thus, they had the same legal status as the Spanish towns being established in New Mexico. This legal status continued under the Mexican government and was recognized under the international treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. None of the other Native American reservations have this status. The Bureau of Indian Affairs insists that this is not significant, but the BIA has been more flexible on some land grant claims of property taken from Pueblo land in the past than it has been with some other Native American peoples.
Five languages coming from this civilization still exist in New Mexico. Piro and Tompiro were lost, though spoked until after the revolt of 1680. The Hopi in Arizona also predates the newcomers. As a living language is necessary to preserve a culture, the pueblo people have done an excellent job of maintaining their identity.
Newcomers
Sometime after 1420 Athabaskan speaking peoples arrived from Western Canada. These include the Apache, which seem to have been in and around the Oklahoma panhandle around 1540 from best Spanish records, and the Navajo, though they claim to have arrived earlier. However, the Navajo dialect can still communicate with Alaska natives, so this earlier date is suspect. The first dated raid of Apache on the Pueblo’s was in 1527. The Ute and Kiowa were already to the North and East of the Rio Grande settlements. With the acquisition of the horse, the Ute to the North of Taos moved out on the plains and became the Comanche. The combination of Athabaskan, Ute, and Comanche almost resulted in the destruction of both the Spanish and Pueblo settlements. That will be discussed later.
Of currently occupied Pueblo (town) communities, Third Mesa Hopi, Acoma, and Taos were established prior to or around 1330. In 1540 when Coronado explored the area (and spent two winters on the Westside of Albuquerque) there were 56 reported Pueblo’s. Coronado State Monument above Bernalillo is the best example of these historic but abandoned communities open to the public.
All but two of the currently existing Pueblos are matrilineal. The five living Pueblo languages are very alive, with Keres having been taught in the Bernalillo schools some years ago and Towa required of Jemez men in order to participate in community ceremonies.