But in the Northwest-Plateau area, it constitutes well over 50 percent of the evidence. Access to human history should not be restricted by the government, nor should it be controlled by small groups of people. My interest is in the patterns of skeletal variation temporally and geographically in prehistoric North America. Kennewick Man represents a time period from which there are few skeletons, so patterns are difficult to ascertain. Geographic variation among early populations.
Limited evidence suggests the existence of regional groups.
For example, the Minnesota specimens, Browns Valley and Pelican Rapids, are markedly different from Great Basin groups represented by Spirit Cave and Wizards Beach. The western skeletons seem to exhibit greater similarities to Pacific populations, suggesting coastal migration routes rather than the more commonly postulated Bering Land Bridge route. Preliminary evidence indicates Kennewick Man is differentiated from other ancient skeletons, suggesting another population. Relationships between early populations and recent Native Americans. Current evidence demonstrates that early populations differ markedly from recent ones.