It has been seen that in southern Illinois the Archaic way of life may
have persisted until 2100 B.C. or perhaps even later. Across the state
on the Ohio River a Woodland people succeeded the earlier Archaic
residents. Their culture is known as Baumer and their nearest cultural
relatives lived south of the Ohio in Kentucky (Round Grave or Upper
Valley People). The Baumer artifacts do not resemble those of the
Archaic period very closely, giving one the impression that the Baumer
people developed their way of life elsewhere and moved into Illinois,
possibly while Archaic groups were still in the region.
The Baumer culture differs in several ways from the northern Initial
Woodland; actually it appears to be more advanced although it has been
termed early Woodland by some archaeologists. In the first place, the
area of settlement was more extensive which seems to indicate a larger
population than do early northern Woodland campsites. Their artifacts
are numerous and varied, suggesting they were well adapted to their
surroundings. Flat forms of polished stone (resembling in outline
certain Archaic bannerstones from which they may have derived) served
presumably as breast ornaments or gorgets (as similar pieces did in the
Hopewellian period). Tear-shaped stone objects (plummets) were made as
they had been in Medial and Terminal Archaic. House structures were
semi-permanent, large, square, made of poles or logs set in holes in the
ground. Huts with circular floors seem to have been in use also. Most
important of the cultural habits noted were numerous pits apparently for
the storage of food. In these the remains of acorns and hickory nuts
were found. These people, like the acorn gatherers of California and the
Eskimo, knew how to preserve food over long periods. Acorns were
probably abundant enough for a Baumer family to lay up several months’
supply in a short time. This permitted them to live in larger
settlements and gave them sufficient leisure to build rather substantial
houses and shape symmetrical ornaments from stone. These facts seem to
substantiate the hypothesis that they were a sedentary people by virtue
of their knowledge of how to store food.
[Illustration: Fig. 14. Housewife storing roasted acorns in a pit
near door of her square log cabin dwelling. Characteristic clay
vessel (“flower-pot” type) with “mat-impressed exterior.” Baumer
period. (J.C.)]
[Illustration: Fig. 15. A, stone pestle; B, reel-shaped stone
gorget; C, “spud-shaped” stone gorget or pendant; D, grooved
plummet. From the Baumer subculture and site.]
[Illustration: Fig. 16. Pots from the Crab Orchard period of Baumer
subculture recovered from the Sugar Camp Hill Site by Moreau Maxwell
for Southern Illinois University. Vessel in center is roughly 16″
tall. (Photographs furnished through courtesy of Dr. James B.
Griffin, Univ. of Michigan.)]
The size of the Baumer settlement, the semi-permanent houses, the
presence of chipped spades, stone pestles and pottery might lead one to
think that these people were plant-growers rather than simple food
storers. Comparing them with the acorn-gathering tribes of California,
who were storers and not food growers, it is seen that these, too, had
permanent settlements with well over one hundred inhabitants, rather
substantial houses, stone pestles, and some tribes, at least, had
pottery vessels. The Californians doubtless had digging tools since the
rooms of some houses were dug four feet down into the soil.
Traces of Hopewellian influence, possibly indicating inter-marriage with
Hopewellians, have been noted at the Sugar Camp Hill site (date
undetermined) in Jackson County, which is presumably later than Baumer.
However, the Baumerians like the native Californians were conservative,
for four centuries intervened between the oldest Hopewellian village in
the north and the earliest known station of that culture in southern
Illinois.[11]