Coming to our census.

• Author: Clinton, Kate
• Position: Unplugged

Scientists and archeologists recently reported exciting new findings on ancient human migration streams in the journal Science. Think of it as Census 13,500 B.C., with crosshatched, not byte-sized, data tagged in #2 charcoal on cave walls next to the horse picture.

Archeologists digging in the Buttermilk Creek excavation site forty miles northwest of Austin, Texas, found carved tools of an older design than those discovered in 1929 at a site in Clovis, New Mexico. The fluted and notched spear points of the Clovis people were estimated to be from 13,000 years ago. Archeologists estimate the recently uncovered smaller, fluteless arrowheads predate the Clovian find by 2,500 years.

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Of course, there is some vicious archeo-bickering and snark--"The Clovians are so last millennium."

Nonetheless, the Buttermilk Creek discovery has led to an exciting rethinking of how the first humans actually got here. For years, scientists had thought that the first people came to the Americas from northeast Asia, when lowered sea levels exposed the Bering Land Bridge. But scientists were always mystified that the Clovis artifacts had no connection to Asian artifacts. With the new discovery in Texas, scientists think that the technology was invented here.

The discovery also suggests that because extensive glaciers could have closed off interior travel corridors, an earlier migration might have meant that humans traveled along shorelines or used small boats. Since people settled as hunter-gatherers sooner than first thought, they could have invented new tools. This also explains the relatively rapid movement of people as far south as Peru and Chile.

Ironically, the same week the pre-Clovian discoveries were revealed, the Census Bureau released the 2010 national headcount done by thousands of census-takers (who also improved employment figures for a few months). The information is a...