Arlington Springs Man was an ancient Paleoindian, most likely a man, whose remains were found in 1959 on Santa Rosa Island, one of the

Channel Islands The Channel Islands are an archipelago in the English Channel, off the French coast of Normandy. They are divided into two Crown Dependencies: the Jersey, Bailiwick of Jersey, which is the largest of the islands; and the Bailiwick of Guernsey, ...

located off the coast of

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural List of regions of California, region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Its densely populated coastal reg ...

. He lived about 13,000 years

Before Present Before Present (BP) or "years before present (YBP)" is a time scale used mainly in archaeology, geology, and other scientific disciplines to specify when events occurred relative to the origin of practical radiocarbon dating in the 1950s. Because ...

, making him the earliest dated adult in North America. It was an important scientific discovery because his presence on the island at this early date supports the coastal migration theory for the

peopling of the Americas It is believed that the peopling of the Americas began when Paleolithic hunter-gatherers (Paleo-Indians) entered North America from the North Asian Mammoth steppe via the Beringia land bridge, which had formed between northeastern Siberia and we ...

. In 2022, after a NAGPRA request, Arlington Springs Man was repatriated to the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Mission Indians for reburial according to their native customs.

History

In 1959, the socialite and philanthropist Kitty Harvey, granddaughter of Fred Harvey and heir of the

Fred Harvey Company The Fred Harvey Company was the owner of the Harvey House chain of restaurants, hotels and other hospitality industry businesses alongside railroads in the Western United States. It was founded in 1876 by Fred Harvey (entrepreneur), Fred Harve ...

, funded an archaeology expedition to the Channel Islands. It was under the leadership of Phil C. Orr, curator of anthropology and paleontology at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, who had been prospecting the steep bluffs of Arlington Canyon annually since 1946. Orr and his associates were in the canyon at a location called Arlington Springs, where according to his memoir he was "working" - scientists who knew Orr reported his jeep had become stuck and they were actually working to extract it. At this point, Orr looked up the canyon wall and noticed what he thought was a femur bone eroding from a cut bank, later determined to be about 37 feet deep from the surface. Orr understood that at this depth it was probably a very old bone. He pointed it out to his associates who didn't think it was important and kept working, but according to Orr, without his insistence to investigate further, they probably would have passed it by. In this way the discovery was notable, according to Orr, for being so improbable. Two femur and other unidentified bone fragments bones were found. The bones were radiocarbon dated to 10,000 years Before Present, using the relatively primitive dating technology available at the time. The area was once marshy and the man had died on the edge of a ciénega, a type of marsh common in the region. According to Orr's original paper the man may have died accidentally. Orr named him Arlington Springs Man, wrapped the bones in plaster, and stored them at the museum where they sat undisturbed and largely overlooked for the next 30 years. Arlington Springs Man was later re-examined in 1989 by Orr's successors at the museum, John R. Johnson and Don Morris. Newer radiocarbon dating technology determined the remains were actually as old as 13,000 years Before Present, making him the earliest dated (adult) individual in North America. It was also determined the bones were from a female. The moniker was changed to Arlington Springs ''Woman'', but after more time and study, in 2006 Johnson reversed his assessment, concluding that the remains were more likely those of a man. Author Stephen Fried noted that Kitty Harvey probably would have been delighted by the gender controversy because she was herself openly gay.

Habitat

Arlington Springs Man lived on

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

epoch In chronology and periodization, an epoch or reference epoch is an instant in time chosen as the origin of a particular calendar era. The "epoch" serves as a reference point from which time is measured. The moment of epoch is usually decided b ...

Santa Rosae island. The weather was much cooler and the sea level was lower than today. During the last ice age, the four northern Channel Islands were held together as the one mega-island of Santa Rosae. At the time the island was inhabited by Pygmy mammoths, which it is supposed the Arlington Man's people hunted, because at the same time full-sized Columbian mammoths were being hunted elsewhere in North America. The coastal regions of the island, which Paleo-Indians likely inhabited, has since been inundated by sea-level rise, meaning the location of Arlington Canyon was in the interior miles from the coast. His presence on an island at such an early date demonstrates that the earliest Paleoindians had watercraft capable of crossing the

Santa Barbara Channel The Santa Barbara Channel is a portion of the Southern California Bight and separates the mainland of California from the northern Channel Islands. It is generally south of the city of Santa Barbara, and west of the Oxnard Plain in Ventura Co ...

, and lends credence to a coastal migration theory for the

, using boats to travel south from Siberia and Alaska. Six more field seasons have taken place between 1994 and 2008. No new human bones have been found, but chert microflakes derived from sharpening stone tools were discovered in the same soil layer that contained Arlington Man's bones, along with discoveries about other flora and fauna.

Custody and reburial

Arlington Springs Man's remains were held by the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History from the time of discovery in 1959. In April 2022, under the federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), his remains were repatriated to the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Mission Indians. The claim was made by the tribe in October 2021, along with a request to return other Chumash items held by the museum. NAGPRA requires that Native American remains held in labs, museums, and private collections be repatriated to Native tribes if requested. According to the museum president, they were "honored to care for this important cultural heritage for many years and now find it deeply satisfying otransfer custody back to the Chumash community". Tribal Chair Kenneth Kahn stated that "These items have come home to our tribe, and it allows us to do the important work of repatriation and reburial."

References

External links

NPS.gov: Channel Islands National Park — Arlington Man

Journal from The Center for the Study of the First Americans: "The Mammoth Trumpet"
— ''Volume 21, Number 4 September 2006''. {{coord, 34.0061, N, 120.1771, W, region:US-CA_type:landmark, display=title 1959 archaeological discoveries 1959 in California Archaeological sites in California Channel Islands National Park History of Santa Barbara County, California Indigenous peoples of California Late Pleistocene Native American history of California Natural history of the Channel Islands of California Paleo-Indian people Repatriated human remains Pleistocene California Unsolved deaths in California Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Mission Indians

History

Habitat

Custody and reburial

See also

Notes

References

External links