Jimmy Allen or Frederick Point? Too Close for Comfort

 

Jimmy Allen or Frederick? Too Close for Comfort

by John Bradford Branney

Figure 1 -  High Plains Jimmy Allen and/or Frederick projectile points. Which is which?

The longest point is 3.25 inches long. John Bradford Branney Collection.   

After the projectile points of the Cody Complex came and went in the archaeological record, an abrupt change took place in projectile point technology on the High Plains. The stemmed projectile points with transverse pressure flaking of the Cody Complex disappeared from the archaeological record and a series of lanceolate-shaped projectile points with parallel-oblique flaking appeared. Instead of stemmed Alberta, Scottsbluff, and Eden points from the Cody Complex, the new projectile point style was indented with concave bases and parallel oblique flaking on many. Why the change from stems to indented bases? It might have been that indented bases worked better with the hafting method at the time, or it might be as simple as human preferences shifted. The indented base probably fit as "snug as a bug in a rug" in the hafting elements of the spear or dart weaponry. Paleoindians used what worked. After all, this was not the first time that indented base technology showed up in archaeological records with Clovis, Goshen, Folsom, and Midland as examples. 

Within this Late Paleoindian timeframe, archaeologists have identified and named a plethora of different indented base projectile point types on the High Plains such as Jimmy Allen, Frederick, Andersen, Angostura, Lusk, and others. 

Figure 4 - 1.7 inch long surface found Jimmy Allen point from eastern Colorado. I already hear some of you screaming 

Dalton! Dalton! Dalton! 

John Bradford Branney Collection. 

The variations in Late Paleoindian indented projectile point types added even more confusion to projectile point typology. If anyone tries to convince you that they have Late Paleoindian projectile point typology down pat, they are either a point-type genius (which is a blessed few) or they are pulling your leg. We find similarities in the different projectile point types such as Jimmy Allen, Frederick, Andersen, Angostura, and Lusk, and we find differences (some so subtle they hardly deserve mention). Were the differences seen by different points driven by other factors such as workmanship, quality, style, knapping skill, and/or raw material?    

Figure Four - A surface found knife form from Wyoming.
It is 2.6 inches long with indented base, polished lower
edges and base, and parallel oblique flaking.
Jeb Taylor identified this as a Frederick point.
John Bradford Branney Collection. 

Archaeologist and flintknapping expert Bruce Bradley (Larson et al 2009:271) explained Late Paleoindian projectile point typology this way; After the Cody Complex, there was a technological horizon on the High Plains incorporating the same basic flintknapping technology, but with slightly different styles of projectile points and knife forms. He included the following projectile point types in his analysis; Jimmy Allen, Frederick, Lusk, Brown's Valley, and Angostura. He noted that each type used the same flintknapping process from bifacial percussion reduction through pressure thinning through a final product of projectile points and knife forms. He also noted that oftentimes these different projectile point types exhibited similarity with their parallel oblique flaking.  

The two projectile points in figures three and four are both Late Paleoindian from the High Plains. Other collectors who have seen them have called them Jimmy Allen or Frederick, or even a mid-continent projectile point type called Dalton. What do I call them? Wait and see.         

Figure 5 - University of 
Wyoming anthropologist
William Mulloy. 

In the late 1940s, an adept amateur archaeologist by the name of Jimmy Allen discovered a Paleoindian bison kill site in the Laramie Basin of Wyoming. In 1959, University of Wyoming anthropologist William Mulloy (Figure 5) and associates excavated what he later named the James Allen site. Investigators recovered thirty fragmentary projectile points, all of which had similar characteristics. The projectile points were unnotched and lanceolate-shaped with indented (concave) bases and rounded corners. Dr. Mulloy named the new projectile point Jimmy Allen after the discoverer of the site.   

In Jeb Taylor's Projectile Points of the High Plains (2006), the author described Jimmy Allen points as lanceolate-shaped with carefully executed diagonal flaking and a pronounced basal concavity. In Greg Perino's Selected Preforms, Points, and Knives of the North American Indians (1985), he described Jimmy Allen points by their side and basal edge grinding, diagonal flaking, basal thinning, and rounded basal corners. Both authors appear to be singing from the same sheet of music when it comes to the description of Jimmy Allen points.    

One important point that I want to make before proceeding is that NOT all Jimmy Allen points have diagonal or parallel oblique flaking and NOT all diagonal or parallel oblique flaked projectile points are Jimmy Allen points! 

Figure 6 - Cynthia Irwin-
Williams. 

Cynthia Irwin–Williams (Figure 6) and her brother Henry Irwin discovered what they thought was a new projectile point type at the Harvard University excavations of the Hell Gap site in east-central Wyoming in the 1960s. They named the new point type, Frederick, after the site's landowner. Investigators unearthed twenty-four examples of the so-called Frederick points. Both Cynthia Irwin-Williams (1973) and Henry Irwin recognized the similarities between their newly named Frederick points and Mulloy's Jimmy Allen points. According to Henry Irwin, he believed that Frederick points had a greater degree of basal concavity and a different width to length ratio than Jimmy Allen points (Byrnes 2009:218). Therefore, the label Frederick stuck for the points found at the Hell Gap site.      

In his book, Jeb Taylor described Frederick points with the same diagonal flaking as Jimmy Allen points but stated that Frederick points were thicker with straighter bases. Taylor's 'straighter base' comment appears to contradict Henry Irwin's comment in the previous paragraph. Irwin stated that Frederick points had a greater degree of basal concavity while Taylor wrote Frederick points had straighter bases than Jimmy Allen points. It cannot be both ways. 

Based on Jeb Taylor's study of the original projectile points from both the James Allen and Hell Gap sites, he believed that there were enough differences between Jimmy Allen and Frederick to warrant two separate projectile point types. Taylor also mentioned in his book that he had a personal conversation with George Frison who told him that before Cynthia Irwin-Williams died, she admitted to Frison that Frederick was most likely the same point type as Jimmy Allen. 

I have not studied 'in hand' the original points from the James Allen and Hell Gap sites, but I have handled enough parallel oblique flaked, indented base Late Paleoindian points to believe that Jimmy Allen and Frederick points are the same point type.  

It appears that Jimmy Allen at the James Allen site and Frederick at Hell Gap overlapped in time, providing a little more evidence for their possible relationship. Irwin-Williams et al (1973) determined that the duration of Frederick at Hell Gap lasted from approximately 8,400 to 8,000 years BP while recent dating techniques at the James Allen bison kill site placed the event sometime around 8,405 years BP (Knudson and Kornfeld 2007).  

To summarize, it is my opinion that Jimmy Allen and Frederick points are the same point type, and as my father used to put it, "That's close enough for government work!"  

REFERENCES CITED  

Byrnes, Allison

2009    Frederick Component at Locality I in  Hell Gap: A Stratified Paleoindian Campsite at the Edge of the Rockies by Mary Lou Larson, Marcel Kornfeld, and George C. Frison.  University of Utah. 

Irwin-Williams, Cynthia, Henry T. Irwin, George Agogino, and C Vance Haynes
1973    Hell Gap: Paleo-Indian occupation on the High Plains. Plains Anthropologist  18(59):40-53.     

Knudson, Ruth Ann, and Marcel Kornfeld  
2007    A New Date for the James Allen Site, Laramie Basin, Wyoming. Current Research in the Pleistocene 24:112-114.  

Larson, Mary Lou, Marcel Kornfeld, and George C. Frison

2009    Hell Gap: A Stratified Paleoindian Campsite at the Edge of the Rockies. University of Utah.        

Perino, Gregory
1985    Selected Preforms, Points, and Knives of the North American Indians, Volume I.  Points and Barbs Press, Idabel, Okla.  

Taylor, Jeb
2006   Projectile points of the High Plains. Sheridan Books, Chelsea, MI.     

Check out my prehistoric book series the SHADOWS 

ON THE TRAIL Pentalogy at the 'link' below. 

CLICK for JOHN BRADFORD BRANNEY BOOKS

      

F is for Flattop Chalcedony; S is For Shadows on the Trail!

Figure One. 1.8-inch-long Midland dart point I found on September 2, 1997, near Flattop Butte 
on private land in Logan County, Colorado. It was made from a pale red
Flattop chalcedony. The age is around 12,000 years plus, give or take.
John Bradford Branney Collection.  

 

Welcome to my series of articles on High Plains raw materials. In this article, I explore the raw material called Flattop chalcedony, aka Flat Top Chalcedony, Flat Top Chert, Flattop Chert, or simply FTC. Flattop chalcedony is the most abundant prehistoric tool stone found by collectors in northeastern Colorado. Anyone who hunts artifacts in northeastern Colorado, the panhandle of Nebraska, or southeastern Wyoming finds artifacts and/or chipping debris made from Flattop chalcedony. It is nearly impossible to avoid the material when artifact hunting in those areas, especially in northeastern Colorado. What is Flattop chalcedony and where is its geological source? I will explore that and much more in my article, but first I want to take you on a little journey back in time around 12,600 years in what we now call northeastern Colorado.    

 

CLICK for WINDS OF EDEN

I took the passage in blue from my prehistoric adventure book titled WINDS of EDEN, the third book in my prehistoric saga called the SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy. This particular book passage illustrates a Paleoindian tradition called flintknapping or the making of projectile points and stone tools from specific types of rock. In that particular scene, an elderly grandfather is teaching his grandchildren how to make stone spear tips, in that case, they were making what we now call Folsom points. Since there is no archaeological evidence that North American Paleoindians used any kind of written language, we must assume that they passed along their traditions and practices from generation to generation through "word of mouth" and/or "an apprenticeship for children".  

The old man motioned for his two young grandchildren to sit down in front of him, close enough to see, but far enough away to avoid flying pieces of sharp rock. The old man readjusted the flat rock with the tip of the spear point. He then carefully positioned the groove in the antler punch with the tiny knob at the base of the spear point. When everything was to his liking, the old man picked up the heavy antler hammer and took a couple of practice swings in the air. The old man then held the antler hammer above the antler punch and swung down with enough force to transfer energy from the antler punch through the rock. The rock popped loudly and when the old man lifted up the spear point for the children to see, a flute or groove ran longitudinally up the entire length of the spear point. The children laughed as if they just witnessed great magic. Their eyes were as big as the moon as they looked around at each other. The old man gazed around at the children, smiling. The old man was proud of the flute in the spear point and relieved that he could still do it. However, what made him the happiest was passing down the fluting tradition to the next generation of the tribe.

WINDS of EDEN and the rest of my books in the SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy mix in evidence from high plains archaeology while chronicling the lives and challenges of my fictional protagonists, the Folsom People. In the books, my heroes and heroines journey across what we now call Texas, Colorado, and Wyoming and encounter many challenges that test both grit and survival. 

Figure Two - 1.36-inch long Folsom dart point made from a typical, semi-translucent Flattop chalcedony. I surface found this 12,600-year-old artifact on private land in Weld County,
Colorado on August 30, 2007. The source of the material at Flattop Butte is 
approximately twenty miles from where I found this Folsom point. 
John Bradford Branney Collection.  

The highest quality stone for making projectile points and stone tools comes from different forms of quartz. Quartz is composed of silica and oxygen, the two most common elements on the planet. Quartz has many flavors and crystal structures and can differ in color, texture, and minor chemical elements. In this article, I explore one variety of quartz favored by prehistoric people for thousands of years called Flattop chalcedony. Chalcedony is a general term describing a fine-grained or cryptocrystalline variety of quartz with a texture varying between waxy and grainy. Chalcedony ranges from nearly opaque to translucent and is found in a variety of colors including white, gray, blue, brown, red, and every shade in between. Some other rock types that fall under the chalcedony family include agate, moss agate, onyx, sardonyx, prase, and chrysoprase. 

Figure Three - Prehistoric rock quarry at Flattop Butte in northern Colorado. The butte lies on
private land and is now closed to visitors. The new owners prosecute trespassers.
Photographed by the author in August 2001 when the land was still accessible.

For thousands and thousands of years, Paleoindians and later prehistoric people visited what we now call Flattop Butte in Logan County, Colorado (figure three). There, those prehistoric people mined chalcedony from veins within the butte. Flattop Butte is composed of tuffaceous siltstone, sandstone, and thin limestone stringers in what is called the White River Group of geological formations. The rocks that comprise Flattop Butte were originally deposited as sediments sometime between thirty-four and twenty-three million years ago in the Oligocene Epoch.    

So, what were the high plains of northeastern Colorado like during the Oligocene Epoch? The landscape was a whole lot different than it looks today (figure four)! For one thing, the climate was a whole lot hotter, and prior to the Oligocene Epoch in the Paleocene and Eocene Epochs, the landscape went through a long period of exposure and erosion. Then, at the beginning of the Oligocene, volcanic activity in the Absaroka-Yellowstone area spewed vast amounts of silica-rich volcanic ash into the air. Massive amounts of sedimentation filled in the previous highs and lows of the earlier topography and created a terrain of very low relief with meandering streams and wide floodplains. Geological evidence indicates that during the Oligocene there was massive flooding which laid down thick layers of mud and sand and volcanic ash which later consolidated into tuffaceous sandstones, siltstones, shales, and limestones.

Figure Four  - Mural of the Early Oligocene on the high plains 
by Jay Matternes for National Geographic Magazine.
Note the volcanic activity in the background.   

The high plains and mountains went through a long period of aggradation over several million years where sediments spilled out of the mountains onto the plains. Aggradation occurs when the supply of sediment is greater than the amount of material that the depositional system is capable of transporting. Large amounts of sediment clogged the river systems and increased the elevation of the high plains during the Oligocene. Even today, some mountains in Wyoming and Colorado have a partial blanket of Oligocene sediments. 

The depiction of life and landscape in figure four shows that strange and extinct animals were abundant during the Oligocene Epoch and bits and pieces of fossilized bone are commonly found in eroded geological formations. Many of the fossilized bones are separated from the original skeletons and show evidence of rodent gnawing, providing further evidence of a terrestrial depositional environment. 

   

Figure Five - 1.6-inch-long James Allen dart point surface found on private land near 

Flattop Butte in northeastern Colorado. The material is a semi-translucent, pale red

Flattop chalcedony. The age of the artifact is north of 9000 years.  

John Bradford Branney Collection.   

How did the chalcedony form at Flattop Butte? Sand, silt, volcanic ash, and limestone were deposited and consolidated into bedrock at the site. Saturated with silica, groundwater seeped into the fractures and voids within the geological formation. Where did that silica come from? Most likely from the volcanic ash that spewed from volcanoes to the northwest and covered the countryside for hundreds of miles with thick blankets of ash. Then, when the groundwater in the nooks and crannies of the bedrock evaporated, it left behind a silica precipitate. Over thousands or millions of years, silicate minerals filled the voids within the bedrock, leaving veins of chalcedony.  

Around thirteen or fourteen or maybe fifteen thousand years ago, humans showed up at Flattop Butte. How they discovered the tool stone at the summit is anyone's guess. Perhaps, those First Americans noticed chalcedony on the surface of the ground and when they needed more, they mined the top of the butte creating pits everywhere. Greiser (1983) documented over two hundred mine pits on top of Flattop Butte where it appears prehistoric people dug through the caprock in pursuit of the treasured tool stone. 

Figure Six- Piles of Flattop chalcedony chipping debris at a prehistoric campsite 

on private land in the vicinity of Flattop Butte. The author took this 

photograph on April 2, 2014. 

Hoard et al (1993) described a typical piece of Flattop chalcedony as lavender gray with a dull luster and small white inclusions. Lavender and gray are the two most prominent colors and can range from opaque to semi-translucent with the semi-translucent pieces having the smoothest texture. Flattop chalcedony colors range from white, gray, brown, lavender, pink (what I call pale red), and reddish purple. Figure six is a photograph I took at a prehistoric campsite near Flattop Butte. The photograph exhibits the wide range of colors and textures found in Flattop chalcedony chipping debris.  

The Paleoindians in my book series were nomadic hunters and gatherers. Archaeological evidence points out that Paleoindians led simple but dangerous lifestyles. The Paleoindian characters in my books were always on the move chasing the biggest meal ticket around, roaming bison herds. Since Paleoindians were traveling about and exploring new territories, they did not know what to expect so they carried some of their favorite raw materials with them. If a need for a new projectile point or tool popped up, they would have enough material from their last stop to meet an emergency. And even if they did not use the raw material themselves, they could trade it along the trail to other humans for something of equal value. 

As a lifelong artifact hunter, it is not uncommon for me to find stone tools or projectile points, or chipping debris originating at rock quarries from other geographical locations. There are tons of archaeological evidence that indicates that Paleoindians and even later prehistoric cultures utilized hoarding and a "have material, will travel" strategy. 

Figure Six - Clovis spear/knife form surface found on private land in Keith County, Nebraska 

by Kevin Hammond. Was the material sourced from Flattop Butte or another 

White River chalcedony source in Nebraska or South Dakota? Chemical 

analysis of the material could determine that.    

John Bradford Branney Collection.  

As an example of that strategy, Hoard et al (1993) determined through chemical analysis that several artifacts from the Eckles Clovis site in north central Kansas were chalcedony sourced from Flattop Butte in Logan County, Colorado, some two hundred eighty miles to the northwest. In my lifelong pursuit of artifacts, I have found artifacts and chipping debris made of Flattop chalcedony in Wyoming, at least two hundred miles away from the source at Flattop Butte. However, as Hoard cautions, the White River Group of geological formations produced similar-looking chalcedonies in southeastern Wyoming, western Nebraska, and southwestern South Dakota (see figure six).    

By the end of the SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy,  my main characters arrived at a campsite near the rock quarry at Flattop Butte, and today I am still finding artifacts that they made from Flattop chalcedony.   

Figure Seven - 2.3 inch long, Pelican Lake knife form made from what I 
call a very pale orange, semi-translucent Flattop chalcedony. I surface 
found this artifact on 9/27/1986 in Weld County, Colorado.
The age is Late Archaic at around 2000 and 3000 years old.
John Bradford Branney Collection.  

Greiser, S. 

1983    A Preliminary Statement About Quarrying at Flattop Mesa. Southwestern Lore 49-(4): 6-14.  

Hoard, Robert J., John R. Bozell, Steven R. Holen, Michael D. Glascock, Hector Neff, and J. Michael Elam

1993    Source Determination of White River Group Silicates from Two Archaeological Sites in the Great Plains. American Antiquity. Vol. 58, No. 4 (Oct. 1993), pp. 698-710 (13 pages). Cambridge University Press. 

Recollections...

In my early years of high school, I began contemplating what I would do for the rest of my life. Since rock star was out because I did not even play a musical instrument, I looked at other options. My parents and I conversed on this subject several times. I mentioned to them that I really wanted to be an archaeologist. After all, my passion for hunting arrowheads started about the same time I learned to walk. A family friend in Casper, Wyoming was a consulting geologist in the oil and gas industry. My parents knew that their geologist friend did pretty well for himself and his family, so they suggested to me that while I might find a bit of fame digging up bison bones as an archaeologist, I would never find fortune doing that. My parents convinced me that people would always need oil and gas and coal, and with the money I made in those industries, I could retire early and hunt for prehistoric artifacts to my heart's content. I took their advice and they were right. 

My prehistoric adventures from the SHADOWS on the TRAIL PENTALOGY are available at John Bradford Branney Books.