JOHNSON CITY (March 5, 2014) – Dr. Jay Franklin, an archaeologist and associate professor of anthropology at East Tennessee State University, has received a grant from the National Geographic/Waitt Grant Program entitled “Paleoindian Pioneers of the Upper Cumberland Plateau of Tennessee.” He will study an ancient rock shelter site located in the upper regions of the Cumberland Plateau.
“The shelter is located at one of the highest elevation sites in Southern Appalachia,” Franklin said. “The information we have suggests that early Native Americans settled in lower areas near major streams or rivers. But that is not the case with the site we are exploring.”
Franklin added that this newly discovered area did contain high-quality flint but not in large nodules typically sought by the earliest North Americans. And, he said, the climate there was likely very harsh.
“All of these factors make you wonder what it was about this upland rock shelter that drew early settlers there,” he said.
Funds from the grant will be used to support mapping, travel and geographic information system (GIS) work, as well as radiocarbon testing to determine the age of some of the artifacts that have been found.
Franklin has spent the past 18 years exploring rock shelter and cave sites across the Cumberland Plateau and has focused the majority of his time researching those shelters in the upper regions of the plateau approximately 1,000 feet higher than the river valleys.