What path had the gentlest grade and might have been the route the first Paleo-Indians took entering Pennsylvania from the west?
The Iroquoian-speaking Susquehannocks were the earliest recorded inhabitants of the West Branch Susquehanna River basin, which includes Quehanna Wild Area. They were a matriarchal society that lived in stockaded villages of large long houses. The Susquehannocks' numbers were greatly reduced by disease and warfare with the Five Nations of the Iroquois, and by 1675 they had died out, moved away, or been assimilated into other tribes. After this, the Iroquois exercised nominal control of the lands of the West Branch Susquehanna River valley. They also lived in long houses, primarily in what is now New York, and had a strong confederacy which gave them power beyond their numbers. To fill the void left by the demise of the Susquehannocks, the Iroquois encouraged such displaced eastern tribes as the Shawnee and Lenape (or Delaware) to settle in the West Branch watershed.The Seneca tribe of the Iroquois hunted in much of Pennsylvania and the Quehanna area. The Iroquois and other tribes used the Great Shamokin Path, the major native east–west path connecting the Susquehanna and Allegheny River basins, which passed south of what is now the wild area. The native village of Chinklacamoose (or Chingleclamouche) was on this path at the West Branch Susquehanna River, at what is now Clearfield to the southwest of Quehanna. The Sinnemahoning Path along Sinnemahoning Creek ran north of Quehanna; as the path with the gentlest grade, it may have been the route the first Paleo-Indians took entering this part of Pennsylvania from the west.The French and Indian War (1754–1763) and the subsequent colonial expansion encouraged the migration of many Native Americans westward to the Ohio River basin. In October 1784, the United States acquired a large tract of land, including what is now Quehanna Wild Area, from the Iroquois in the Second Treaty of Fort Stanwix; this acquisition is known as the Last Purchase, as it completed the series of purchases from the resident Native American tribes of lands within the boundaries of Pennsylvania, initiated by William Penn and continued by his heirs.Although most of the Native Americans left this area of Pennsylvania, the state's Native American heritage can be found in many of its place names. The Susquehannocks were also known as the Susquehanna, from which the Susquehanna River and its West Branch obtained their names. In the 1950s the Curtiss-Wright Corporation coined the name "Quehanna" for its nuclear reservation, which it derived from the last three syllables of "Susquehanna", "in honor of the river that drained the entire region". Part of Quehanna Wild Area lies in the Moshannon State Forest, named for Moshannon Creek, which means "moose stream" or "elk stream" in the Lenape language. Sinnemahoning Creek's name means "stony salt lick" in Lenape.
Sinnemahoning Path