"Fourteen years of excavation yielded little else but flaked stone tools, debitage from their manufacture and maintenance, a lesser number of rough stone tools, stones showing abrasion resulting from use and a small volume of potshards of the post-Dalton era."---2002, Richard Michael Gramly, "Olive Branch: A Very Early Archaic Site On The Mississippi River," p. 115.
      "The group of analyzed specimens from Olive Branch includes the largest, systematically excavated Dalton tool assemblage from any open site."---2002, Richard Michael Gramly, "Olive Branch: A Very Early Archaic Site On The Mississippi River," p. 116.
     "----in short, the dating evidence for Dalton is mixed with some researchers preferring an "early chronology" of 10,000-10,500 years before present and other opting for a more recent age of 9,000-10,000 years. The sheer weight of the evidence favors placement within the tenth millennium before present" ---2002, Richard Michael Gramly, "Olive Branch: A Very Early Archaic Site On The Mississippi River," pp. 219-220.
 

 
DALTON TOOLS
OLIVE BRANCH SITE
ALEXANDER COUNTY, ILLINOIS
EARLY ARCHAIC PERIOD

   The stone tools that Dalton people were making 10,000 years ago were simple and primitive but they were effective. Their toolkit successfully produced the intended results that the user needed for piercing, drilling, scraping, breaking, smoothing and cutting processes. The fact that they were successful is also proven by many other cultures, around the world, who used similar tools for many thousands of years before and after the Dalton culture.
   The majority of all Dalton tools that have ever been recovered from Early Archaic sites are made of stone. But many more tools were made of organic materials that were not preserved. Dalton people made a variety or different kinds of tools from antler and bone such as awls, atlatl hooks, handles and needles. They have survived but in far lesser numbers than artifacts made of stone.

    Most Dalton tools were made from simple flakes. Utilized flakes represent the largest number. These were flakes that were not altered in any way except for obvious use wear along the edges from cutting. Other flakes were reshaped along the edges by pressure flaking to form the various types of end-scrapers, side-scrapers, gravers, denticulates and drills. More complicated bifacially flaked tools like projectile points and knives were made from thicker flakes.

    The basic technique for Dalton stone tool manufacturing is core and blade technology. This process produces simple flakes in large numbers in an efficient manner by preparing striking platforms on a core and striking off a flake. Core and blade technology was invented in Europe during the Aurignacian period approximately 34,000 years ago.
   One of the most common tools found on Dalton sites are end-scrapers. These tools are generally thick and heavy duty but some were made on thin flakes. Gramly writes, "Dalton end-scrapers tend to have rounded bits but become more angular when approaching exhaustion." These tools were probably hafted on the ends of a short handles. Hafted end-scrapers with handles have been observed on Eskimo and Mandan sites. End-scrapers are a popular tool form that has been found on prehistoric sites around the world. The earliest recognized culture in North America, the Clovis culture, also produced large numbers of end-scrapers.

   Another common tool form are side-scrapers. The Olive Branch site produced four different forms of side-scrapers. The most common form are side-scrapers with only one scraping edge. Another form has one scraping edge with only slight use wear on the opposite edge. A third form is represented by side-scrappers that have two working edges that converge to a point. The fourth type found on the Olive Branch site are side-scrapers that have two working edges that are parallel to each other.

    Another tool form that is commonly found on early sites around the world, are gravers. The Olive Branch site produced many "classic" examples. Gravers were made on simple flakes by pressure flaking two notches along an edge to isolate a small projecting point or spur. Some gravers have multiple points along the edge. These tools were probably used to cut or groove various types of organic materials such as antler, bone or wood.

"REFERENCES"

1983, Morse, Dan F. and Morse, Phyllis A., "Archaeology Of The Central Mississippi Valley," p. 73.
2002, Gramly, Richard Michael "Olive Branch: A Very Early Archaic Site On The Mississippi River," p. 116.

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