Archaeologists have long debated how and when people entered the Americas. Throughout the 20th century, the mainstream hypothesis was that the Clovis people were the first to pass into Alaska about 13,000 years ago. Stemming from his excavations between 1977 and 1987 at the Bluefish Caves in northwestern Yukon, Jacques Cinq-Mars, a Canadian archaeologist, unearthed evidence that hunters were using the site some 24,000 years ago.
Lauriane Bourgeon, a French archaeologist, has spent much of her career re-examining and dating the Bluefish Caves collection to clarify the history of the contentious site. Her research has shown that at least 15 bones from the Bluefish Caves were cut-marked by people as early as 23,500 years ago.