From:
Punke, M.L. 2001. Predictive Locational Modeling of Late Pleistocene Archaeological Sites on the Southern Oregon Coast Using a Geographic Information System (GIS). Unpublished Masters Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis: Chapter 4 (Cultural Data), pp.37-60.

Early Oregon Sites

 

     No late Pleistocene and only a handful of early Holocene archaeological sites have been found on the Oregon coast. Fortunately, new information regarding the antiquity of a few early Holocene archaeological sites on the Oregon coast has recently become available. This information may provide important clues regarding the location of late Pleistocene sites in the area. Indian Sands, Blacklock Point, Tahkenitch Landing, and the Neptune locality are the earliest sites thus far dated on the Oregon coast, dating from around 6,900 to 8,600 yr BP, and each provides important details about early settlement practices and adaptation to the local environment (Figure 3). These details provide the correlatory information to be used in the production of the predictive locational model.

     The site located at Indian Sands (35CU67) may represent "the earliest evidence of molluscan resource exploitation so far identified on the Oregon Coast" (Minor 1995:271), with dates of 7,790±70 yr BP (Beta-73004), 8,150±120 yr BP (Beta-66890), and 8,250±80 yr BP (Beta-66891) (Moss and Erlandson 1999:24). The Indian Sands site is located approximately 30 meters above present day sea level on a bluff overlooking the Pacific. Since sea levels were much lower around 15,000 years ago, Indian Sands' position would have been on a topographic ecotone-boundary between the high bluffs of the raised marine terrace and the lower coastal plain which extended from the bluffs to the Pacific Ocean.
     The archaeological assemblage at Indian Sands primarily consists of lithic artifacts, including fire-cracked rock, choppers, cores, hammers, cobble spall tools, and thousands of flakes. Diagnostic artifacts recovered from the site by amateur collectors primarily include leaf-shaped projectile points (Pullen 1982). Bedrock outcrops at the site are basaltic in nature, with some chert intrusions apparent (Figure 5). This implies that the site may have been a raw material source location. Artifacts are spread along the bluff edge for at least ½ mile and landward up to 200 meters.
     The artifacts are found primarily atop a reddish-brown sand surface, possibly an old B horizon whose overlying A horizon has been deflated in most places. Some remnants of the undisturbed, complete soil profile do exist under areas of vegetation towards the back edge of the site. Further work at the site should focus on this relatively intact zone. In certain deflated zones on the bluff there are exposed spodosol layers overlain by thin, horizontally bedded layers of charcoal. This may be evidence of a forest-type environment extending to the edge of the headland in the past.
     A small shell scatter was also discovered at the Indian Sands location, and dates derived from these burned and unburned mussel shells indicate an age of around 8,200 yr BP for the site (Moss and Erlandson 1995:115; Moss and Erlandson 1998:20). Questions regarding the site's antiquity have focused on two primary issues. First, the radiocarbon dated shell was recovered from a deflated context. Therefore, the association between shell remains and lithic materials is not clear (Erlandson and Moss 1996:294; Lyman 1997). Second, there is no concrete proof that the burned state of the shells recovered was indeed caused by human action. Lyman (1997:266) states, "there is no established linkage between burning and human activity-the shell may have been burned by natural fires."
     However, Moss and Erlandson (1998:21) argue for the validity of the site's antiquity and cultural association based on five factors: "(1) the localized and concentrated nature of the shell scatter; (2) its central location within a discrete cluster of stone tools and burned rock; (3) the lack of rounded shell fragments typical of raised beach deposits; (4) the presence of large barnacles, which are common in many Oregon coast shell middens, but extremely rare in noncultural biological deposits; and (5) the relatively high percentage of heavily burned shell, also common in Oregon coast shell middens of unequivocal cultural origin."

     Blacklock Point (35CU75) is considered the "type site" for bluff sites on the Oregon coast (Minor 1993). The vast lithic assemblage found at this site and its location on the edge of a coastal headland, see, make it typical of the "bluff" type of site defined by Ross (1984). Cultural deposits at the location have been found within a distinctive dark, loamy soil referred to as Blacklock Sandy Loam. This soil is typically found atop the consolidated, undulating sands of the Pioneer Terrace (Minor 1993). Underlying the consolidated sand surface are uplifted beach cobbles, consisting primarily of fine and course grained basalt, serpentine, and chert, which may have been used as raw material for many of the lithic artifacts recovered at the site (Minor 1993: Sec.7:2). Diagnostic artifacts recovered from the site by amateur collectors include leaf-shaped, contracting stem, expanding stem, and broad stem projectile points (Pullen 1982). The earliest occupation of the site dates to 7,560 ± 80 yr BP (Beta 62391), based on charcoal recovered during a test-excavation conducted by Minor (1993).

     Tahkenitch Landing (35DO130) represents a different sort of early occupation on the Oregon coast (Figure 7). Indian Sands and Blacklock Point are archaeological sites known for their lithic components and their locations on bluffs many meters above present sea level. In comparison, the Tahkenitch Landing site was discovered at the base of a small sandstone knob, only slightly elevated above present day Tahkenitch Lake, and the archaeological assemblage recovered from the site is extremely diverse (Minor and Toepel 1986).
     The earliest occupational level at the site, a dark brown loamy sand deposit called Component I: Stratum 4A, has provided radiocarbon dates of 7,960 ± 90 yr BP (Beta-14870) and 6,880 ± 80 yr BP (Beta-11202), as reported in Minor and Toepel (1986:39). Geomorphological reconstruction of the area (McDowell 1986) indicates that sometime before 3,000 yr BP, the site would have sat next to a small, river-fed estuary directly open to the sea, which lay more than a kilometer away. As sea level rose to near present-day levels, windblown sand accumulated in the area, damming off the estuary and eventually creating freshwater Tahkenitch Lake. However, at the time of occupation, Tahkenitch Landing would have been located next to the estuary on the boundary between the former coastal plain and the bedrock uplands. This ecotone boundary position "may have afforded some advantages to prehistoric occupants in terms of access to a variety of hunting and foraging environments" (McDowell 1986:102).
     Lithic artifacts recovered from this level include one scraper, one graver, three hammers, one chopper, and one sandstone abrader (Minor and Toepel 1986:104). One land mammal bone, one pinniped bone, as well as the remains of marine fish (n = 628) and birds (n = 251), were recovered from Component I (Minor 1995:270). Identification of sculpin, tomcod, hake, and flatfish remains among the faunal assemblage indicates fishing in an estuarine environment (Aikens 1993:147). In addition to terrestrial and estuarine based economic practices, open ocean subsistence activities may have been practiced: "The considerable representation of hake in the assemblage could be taken to suggest, however, that people may have fished to some extent in the open ocean as well; hake rarely enter estuarine environments, more commonly schooling near the ocean bottom" (Aikens 1993:149).

     Located on a high consolidated Quaternary dune surface near the bank of Gwynn Creek in central Oregon is 35LA3, the Neptune site (Barner 1982; Zontek 1983). Reports of late Holocene house pits and midden deposits originally drew Oregon State University excavators to the site in 1973 (Lyman and Ross 1988; Minor 1986), but it is the dark, organic layer below the midden deposits that is of interest to this predictive modeling project. From this lower stratum came lithic flakes, non-diagnostic artifacts, and charcoal that produced a date of 8,310±110 yr BP (WSU-1644) (Lyman and Ross 1988:98). Unfortunately, a full report for the site has not been published. Because of this, questions regarding the validity of the radiocarbon date and the nature of the association between the charcoal and cultural materials have been posed (Minor 1995). Response to such challenges indicate the date was indeed valid (Lyman 1997:264) and that the dated charcoal and cultural materials were collected from the same stratigraphic layer (Lyman 1997:265).

     Although not on the coast, the Marial site (35CU84) also may provide useful data for this predictive modeling project (Schreindorfer 1987). Located near the confluence of Mule Creek and the upper Rogue River in Curry County (Figure 9), the site lies on an ancient river terrace approximately 400 feet above sea level on "one of the few habitable areas in an otherwise steep, narrow river canyon environment" (Schreindorfer 1987:85). A date of 8,560±190 yr BP was procured from materials located directly below the lowest level at the site, component 6.
     Recovered from this level were a number of leaf-shaped projectile points similar in style to those recovered from some lithic, or "bluff", sites on the Oregon coast, such as Blacklock Point (Schreindorfer 1987:85). This similarity in point styles is especially interesting considering the new radiocarbon dates for Blacklock Point and Indian Sands, which fall into the same time-frame as the Marial site date. In terms of inland adaptation, this site has good potential for informing us of what type of landform might have been occupied by peoples utilizing riverine resources: Quaternary fluvial terraces near confluence locations.

     In addition to the more well-documented sites discussed above, there have been isolated Clovis projectile point finds documented on the coast, as well (see Figure 3 for site locations). A Clovis point base was found on the surface near Siltcoos Lake (Aikens 1993), but additional documentation regarding this find is unavailable. On the Winchuck River in southern Oregon, a single point base identified as Clovis was discovered during test investigations (Hemphill 1990; Fagan 1990). No additional artifacts typical of Clovis technology were found at the site during testing or during the subsequent data recovery project conducted in 1991. Although it is possible that occupation at the Winchuck site (35CU176) dates as far back as Clovis times (~11,500 yr BP in central, southern, and southwestern United States), some investigators have suggested otherwise. They argue that the point base was perhaps brought to the site later, as a type of heirloom, or that the artifact has been misidentified due to its fragmentary nature, implying that the site is not as old as the point base would initially indicate (Flenniken et al. 1992:81).

References cited above:

Aikens, C.M. 1993 Archaeology of Oregon. U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office, Portland.

Barner, D.C. 1982 Shell and Archaeology: An Analysis of Shellfish Procurement and Utilization on the Central Oregon Coast. Unpublished Master’s Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis.

Erlandson, J.M. and M.L. Moss 1996 The Pleistocene-Holocene Transition along the California Coast. In Humans at the End of the Ice Age: The Archaeology of the Pleistocene-Holocene Transition, edited by L.G. Straus, B.V. Eriksen, J.M. Erlandson, and D.R. Yesner, pp. 277-301. Plenum Press, New York.

Fagen, J.L. 1990 Preliminary Lithic Analysis of the Winchuck Site, 35CU176. Archaeological Investigations Northwest. Submitted to Siskiyou National Forest, Grants Pass, Oregon.

Flenniken, J.J., T.L. Ozbun, and J.A. Markos 1992 Chetco Archaeological Data Recovery Project: The Winchuck Site, 35CU176. Lithic Analysts Research Report No. 30. Pullman.

Hemphill, C.B. 1990 Test Excavations at the Winchuck Site (35CU176) 1989. Ms. on file, Siskiy ou National Forest, Grants Pass, Oregon.

Lyman, R. L. 1997 Assessing a Reassessment of Early “Pre-Littoral” Radiocarbon Dates from the Oregon Coast. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 19(2):260-269.

Lyman, R. L. and R. E. Ross 1988 Oregon Coast Prehistory: A Critical History and a Model. Northwest Anthropological Research Notes 22:67-119.

McDowell, P.F. 1986 Reconstructing the Setting of the Tahkenitch Landing Site. In The Archaeology of the Tahkenitch Landing Site: Early Prehistoric Occupation on the Oregon Coast, by R. Minor and K. A. Toepel, pp.91-103. Heritage Research Associates Report 46, Eugene.

Minor, R. 1986 An Evaluation of Archaeological Sites on State Park Lands Along the Oregon Coast. Heritage Research Associates Report No.44, Eugene.
1993 National Register of Historic Places Registration Form, Blacklock Point Lithic Site. Manuscript on file, Oregon State Historic Preservation Office, Salem.
1995 A Reassessment of Early “Pre-Littoral” Radiocarbon Dates from the Southern Northwest Coast. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 17(2):267-273.

Minor, R. and K.A. Toepel, eds. 1986 The Archaeology of the Tahkenitch Landing Site: Early Prehistoric Occupation on the Oregon Coast. Heritage Research Associates Report 46, Eugene.

Moss, M. L. and J.M. Erlandson 1995 Reflections on the Prehistory of the Pacific Coast of North America. Journal of World Prehistory 9(1):1-45.
1998 Early Holocene Adaptations on the Southern Northwest Coast. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 20(1):13-25.
1999 Radiocarbon Dates from Native American Archaeological Sites on the Oregon Coast. CAHO 24(3):20-24.

Pullen, R.J. 1982 The Identification of Early Prehistoric Settlement Patterns Along the Coast of Southwest Oregon: A Survey Based Upon Amateur Artifact Collections. Unpublished Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis.

Ross, R.E. 1984 Terrestrial Oriented Sites in a Marine Environment Along the Southern Oregon Coast. Northwest Anthropological Research Notes 18:241-255.

Schreindorfer 1987 Archaeological Investigations at the Marial Site (35CU84), Curry County, Oregon. Unpublished Masters Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis.

Zontek, T. 1983 Aboriginal Fishing at Seal Rock (35LNC14) and Neptune (35LA3): Late Prehistoric Archaeological Sites on the Central Oregon Cost. Unpublished Master’s Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis.