Dr. Sissel Schroeder, Professor of Anthropology, UW-Madison
From UW Showcase Lecture March 2014
The study of the peopling of the Americas near the end of the last major stage of Pleistocene glaciation (c. 78,000-11,550 B.P.) has captured the interest of scholars since the nineteenth century and been a subject of speculation since Europeans first reached the America. Based on the geographic distribution of distinctive Paleoindian stone tools called Clovis and Folsom, initial human exploration of Wisconsin appears to have occurred relatively rapidly following the last glacial retreat. These data help to establish a regional settlement context for the Skare site, situated along the Yahara River just south of Madison, which is one of the earliest places in Wisconsin occupied on a recurrent basis by people at the end of the Pleistocene.
