This activity provides a visual representation of how long people have lived in the area we call “Michigan.” Archaeology shows that the first people, called Paleo Indians, arrived here about 10,000 B.C. Unlike people of the Middle Ages, Biblical times or ancient Chinese dynasties, Michigan’s first people left artifacts (studied by archaeologists) and oral traditions (studied by anthropologists), but no written records. Missionaries and other Europeans who arrived in the Great Lakes area around 1620 began its written history.
