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A number of Fremont villages have been excavated, including several from Dinosaur <br />National Monument and Browns Hole in Colorado. Carbon 14 dates range from AD 500 to <br />1100. Some polemic surrounds these dates: some archaeologists would restrict Uinta- <br />Fremont time spans to AD 1000 to 1200 (Ibid.). <br />Upper Republican <br />In eastern Colorado and the Central Plains, the Plains Woodland tradition was replaced <br />by the Upper Republican sometime after AD 1000. Whether or not this Upper Republican <br />tradition extended into the Colorado Piedmont has been in question (Nelson 1967), but <br />the Colorado Highway Department has just finished excavating a probable Upper Repub- <br />lican site near Parker, Colorado.4 In Kansas and Nebraska, the Upper Republican oc- <br />cupation consists of small hamlets supported by the cultivation of maize, beans, squash, <br />and sunflowers (Wedel 1961a). Pottery was more plentiful than in proceeding Woodland <br />times. The Upper Republican tradition disappeared around AD 1500, possibly due to the <br />onset of drought, or the influx of Apache groups (Ibid.). <br />• Historic Period <br />Three tribes of Indians occupied northwestern Colorado; the Ute, Arapaho, and Shoshoni, <br />though the Ute and Arapaho were frequently in conflict over Arapaho utilization of <br />traditionally Ute land (Athearn 1977). The Uinta Ute were the primary occupants of <br />northwest Colorado. Subsistence was based on a nomadic hunting and gathering <br />economy, summering in mountain parks and wintering in the Yampa or White River <br />valleys (Ibid.). A site of probable Ute affiliation was excavated by the Colorado Highway <br />Department just outside of Steamboat Springs. <br />The first known European entrance into northwestern Colorado was the Dominguez- <br />Escalante expedition in 1776. This expedition moved up the Douglas Creek drainage to <br />the White River Valley and west to Utah, never approaching the study area. <br />Little European presence was felt until after 1780, with the advent of fur trapping in <br />northwestern Coloaado. William Ashley organized a major expedition in 1822, and the fur <br />Trade boomed for 20 years. <br />Several explorers, including John Fremont and John Wesley Powell, passed through the <br />area just before and after the collapse of the fur trade in 1843. They had little good to <br />say about the worth of the area (Ibid.). <br />5-7 <br />