Archaeologic evidence now suggest that more than 10,000 years ago, like their cultural kin -the Mogollon and the Hohokam – in the deserts to the south, the earliest
“Anasazi Peoples” felt the currents of revolutionary change during the first half of the first millennium. They began to turn away from the nomadism of the ancient hunting and gathering life, the seasonal rounds calibrated to the movement of game and the ripening of wild plants, the material impoverishment imposed by the limitations of the burdens they could carry on their backs.
They began living in small hamlets. They broke the land and took up agriculture. Over time, they acquired more possessions, stored food (graineries), made pottery , adopted the bow and arrow, domesticated dogs and the
turkey. The
turkey
had a number of uses. The manure was used as fertilizer for their seasonal crops. The early Basket-makers clothed themselves in fur-or
turkey-feather robes, string aprons, loincloths and round-toed, plant-fiber sandals. Of course, every turkey eventually ended up on the dinner table and “turkey was put on menu
”! Little did they know at that time, they had created the first “Grand Canyon Thanksgiving”…….only 10,000 years ago, do the Pilgrims know that?
