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• the other Scottsbluff point precludes any possibility of making any <br />definitive statements. One might conclude, therefore, that cne or <br />both of these early points originated in a locale of the appropriate <br />antiquity (viz. 9000 B.P.), was collected by another, irore iecent <br />(viz. 6000 B.P.) group of peoples who adapted this item to their own <br />needs, only to later discard it (possibly into a campfire) at their <br />own camp. Although not oonfinnatory, this scenario is logically <br />consistent with the facts. <br />The occupation of SKC139 appears to be chronologically intermediary <br />or transitional between the Paleo-Indian and Middle Archaic time periods <br />but evinces greater functional and temporal affinities with the latter. <br />This transitional period is variously referred to as the Early Plains <br />Archaic or Altithennal Period, a time of supposedly severe climatic <br />conditions which was thought to represent a cultural hiatw^ in lower <br />elevations since evidence of occupation is scanty. There is, however, <br />• substantial evidence of Early Plains Archaic groups in foothill-imuntain <br />areas (Prison, 1978, p. 41), but sites of this period are located in <br />northern Wyoming at some distance from SFLC139. The results of investi- <br />gations in areas that geographically and enviroiarentally coincide with <br />5RP139 may have greater relevancy for this discussion. <br />The investigations of Benedict and Olson (1973) at the Fourth of July <br />valley site (SBL120) in the Colorado Front Range seem to support an <br />earlier hypothesis by Husted (1966) that the McKean Conplex originated <br />in the Central and Northern Rocky Mountains and ewlved fran Paleo-Indian <br />hunting cultures forced from the Plains by arid conditions of the Alti- <br />thermal. They base their conclusions on two salient characteristics of <br />the Fourth of July site: recovered projectile points are typologically <br />intern~iate between the Paleo-Indian James Allen and Pryor Steln~d <br />points and McKean lanceolate and Duncan points, and the radiocarbon date <br />of 6000 B.P. is consistent with this observation (Benedict and Olson, <br />1973, pp. 325-326). They further suggest that <br />• <br />55 <br />