Indian Country BY C. GREGORY C R A M P T O N GUEST
EDITOR
9 T H I S I S S U E of the t/ta/z Historical Quarterly is devoted to the history of the aboriginal peoples who once ranged over the wide sweep of rough country from Great Salt Lake to Colorado's Western Slope and from the Uinta Mountains to the Grand Canyon. H e who would write of the first men who lived in this land of deserts, high mountains, deep canyons, and sharp-edged mesas, must begin his story with an account of the Desert Culture which dates back some nine or ten thousand years. Archeologists say that over this long period of time the climate of the arid West has remained about the same as it is today. In a harsh and vigorous environment the desert people, who roamed over an area much wider than we have described here, in time worked out a stable pattern of living nicely and efficiently adjusted to the limited resources available to them. I n small bands the desert dwellers in search of food moved about with the seasons hunting and gathering but they sought out the protection of caves and overhanging cliffs for temporary residence. By 6000 B.C., they had developed a specialized material culture resting in part on the use of basketry and netting, fur cloth and sandals, nredrills and milling stones, digging and throwing sticks, wooden clubs, and stone projective points. With the passage of time the southern segments of the Desert Cultures were changed dramatically, though not suddenly, by the infusion of new ideas from Mexico. Of these, agriculture based mainly on that great triad of prehistoric plants — corn, beans, and squash — was the most important. A reliable food supply made sedentary living possible and with some leisure time on their hands the aboriginal peoples of Dr. Crampton, professor of history and director of the Duke Indian Oral History Project at the University of Utah, has been a frequent contributor to the Quarterly. T h e editors of the Quarterly are grateful to Dr. Crampton for his help in arranging for this special issue.
