For thousands of years before the white man, the Algonquin and Iroquois Indians inhabited the land now known as the City of Oneonta.
Evidence still remains of their long occupation.
Many village, camp and trail sites have been discovered. Traces have been found of Folsom man, the earliest Indian to inhabit North America. Indian cultures have been identified from artifacts found in the area and there are many evidences of later Iroquois occupation. The Indians of the Six Nations who made the valley their home were mainly Mohawks, Oneidas, with a few Senecas and Tuscaroras. Indian archeology is greatly indebted to Willard E. Yager, a native Oneontan, who spent most of his life and a great deal of money studying the Indians and writing about them.