Earliest history found in artifacts

Spear points reveal clues about residents of prehistoric New Mexico

By Miguel Encinias
For the Journal
What we know about the prehistoric, or Paleo, Indians has been brought to light by archaeological discoveries fixed in time through radiocarbon dating. While very useful, disagreement sometimes arises as to precise dates.
The first arrivals in the Southwest for whom there is consentient evidence were the big-game hunters who arrived prior to the drying of the Great Plains and the desert West about 10,000 years ago.
The earliest of these, dating back about 12,000 years, were those associated with Sandia Man, a controversial figure. The spear points found in Sandia Cave near Placitas tell a very interesting tale when taken in the context of other, more sophisticated points found elsewhere.
There is a great deal of doubt about the authenticity of this site, but it is whether the points in question were found there, and not necessarily about the points themselves.
In any case, two unquestioned archaeological finds complete the story of New Mexico paleological men.
Clovis Man goes back to around 11,000 B.C. By then, the point had evolved from a leaf-shaped one to a finer point with concave faces or flutes. He was followed by Folsom Man a century later who shaped a point with smaller concave fluting resulting in thinner edges approaching the sharpness of the steel blade.
What happened to the Paleo Indians we can only conjecture. They could have moved on to the south or perished. The Indians who did keep on going south very early started to develop agriculture, which marked the beginning of advanced civilizations, such as the pre-Aztec in the area of Teotihuacan near present-day Mexico City.
As early as 3000 B.C., traits of such civilization began to appear in our Southwest, as evidenced by the discovery of pod corn or maize in Bat Cave here in New Mexico.
Soon, a semiagricultural society started to emerge in the Mogollon area, stretching from central Arizona to southern New Mexico. Another emerged west of the Mogollon in the southern Arizona desert.
These people became specialists in irrigation, constructing canals up to 25 kilometers in length which made the desert bloom.