Steward’s framework, which emphasized the relationship between environment, technology, and social organization, became one of the most influential theoretical orientations in American anthropology.

The Great Basin also provided some of the most important early evidence about the deep history of the Americas.

Danger Cave in Utah, excavated in the 1940s and 1950s, demonstrated human occupation extending back approximately 11,000 years — challenging the Clovis-first hypothesis at a time when that hypothesis still commanded broad scientific consensus.

The caves and rock shelters of the Great Basin produced preserved organic materials — textiles, cordage, baskets, wooden tools, moccasins and sandals — that gave archaeologists a window into ancient technology that the stone tool assemblages of open sites could not provide.

Spirit Cave fits into this tradition of Great Basin cave sites as providers of exceptional preservation and important information about the early inhabitants of the region.