This is a story about a specific branch of an ancient family — not about the very beginning of the family, but about a branch that preserved the deepest-sitting genetic characteristics of the founding lineage that we have been able to directly observe.

The Archaeology Beyond The DNA

The genome of USR1 was the most globally significant finding from Upward Sun River, but the archaeology of the site — independent of the genetic analysis — has contributed substantially to the understanding of how people lived in interior Alaska during the late Pleistocene and early Holocene.

The dietary evidence from the site is particularly informative.

The combination of salmon bones, small mammal bones, and bird remains in the occupation horizons documents a subsistence strategy that combined fishing with hunting and gathering — a pattern that is recognizable in the historical and contemporary practices of Athabascan communities in the region and that reflects the specific productivity of subarctic river systems.

The salmon run that provides the modern Tanana Valley with its most productive seasonal food resource was apparently already being exploited by people 11,500 years ago.