For decades, the history of Utah’s indigenous people has remained a mystery, often misunderstood or oversimplified in school textbooks. But thanks to archaeologists like Professor Joel Janetski, the picture of Utah’s earliest inhabitants is becoming clearer. On one of the episodes of the Utah Stories Show, we had the privilege of discussing these fascinating discoveries with Janetski, a retired professor from Brigham Young University and one of the foremost experts on the Fremont Indians—an enigmatic group that thrived in Utah long before the Ute people.
A Changing Understanding of Utah’s Indigenous Peoples
Many of us grew up with an incomplete understanding of the history of Native American tribes in Utah. The story often starts with the Ute and Shoshone people, but before their arrival, the Fremont culture thrived. The Fremont Indians occupied Utah and surrounding regions from around 200 AD to 1300 AD, leaving behind petroglyphs, pottery, and other archaeological clues that tell the story of a semi-sedentary, agrarian society.
Janetski’s research, along with the work of other archaeologists, has helped reshape our understanding of the Fremont. Their culture was distinct from that of the Ute, whose ancestors arrived later and lived a more nomadic, warrior-like existence. But what exactly happened to the Fremont people? Where did they go? And why did their culture disappear?
Digging into the Past: Recent Archaeological Finds
One of the most significant discoveries shedding light on the Fremont is the presence of imported moccasins—distinct from those made by the Fremont—found in caves along Utah’s Promontory Peninsula. These moccasins, which resemble those worn by indigenous groups in northern Canada, suggest a large-scale migration or cultural exchange.
Janetski explains that early archaeologist Julian Steward first hypothesized in the 1930s that the people who wore these moccasins were not Fremont at all, but rather northern migrants moving into the region. This evidence, along with changes in pottery and settlement patterns, points to a gradual replacement of the Fremont culture by Numic-speaking peoples—the ancestors of the Ute and Shoshone—who moved in from the west.
“As the farmers began to feel those pressures, both climatic and perhaps demographic, they shifted southward. And we believe that the Fremont are the ancestors of some of the modern Puebloan peoples of the American Southwest,” Janetski explains.
When Did People First Inhabit North America?
One of the long-standing debates in archaeology revolves around when the first people arrived in North America. The Clovis First theory once held that humans only arrived after the Ice Age ended, around 11,000 years ago. But more recent evidence has challenged this timeline, with some sites in North and South America dating back as far as 14,000 years. Caves in Oregon, for example, have yielded preserved artifacts that predate Clovis culture, suggesting that indigenous people were present earlier than previously believed.
These early inhabitants were hunter-gatherers, living off the land by hunting megafauna like mastodons and woolly mammoths, as well as gathering plants. Excavations in Utah have even revealed that some of these early people harvested wild potatoes as far back as 10,000 years ago.
The Arrival of Agriculture and the Rise of the Fremont
Farming arrived relatively late in Utah, with evidence suggesting that corn cultivation began around the time of Christ, roughly 2,000 years ago. Sites like Cowboy Cave and the Elsinore Burial have yielded corn remains dating to just after this period. However, it wasn’t until around 400 AD that farming societies truly took root in Utah. By then, the Fremont had established settlements complete with pithouses, storage facilities, and pottery production.
“In Utah, in the eastern Great Basin, you see corn arriving at about the time of Christ, shortly thereafter,” Janetski notes. “But we don’t really see what we call farming societies with all the accoutrements of farming societies for a couple of centuries after that.”
Unlike later Puebloan societies in the Southwest, which built massive irrigation systems and complex city-states, the Fremont lived in smaller, more scattered communities. They supplemented their diet with hunting and gathering but increasingly relied on corn as a staple crop. Evidence of trade also emerges during this period, as materials such as turquoise and marine shells from the Pacific coast appear in Fremont sites.
The Disappearance of the Fremont
By the 1300s, the Fremont culture began to decline. Archaeologists suggest multiple factors contributed to this collapse, including climate change and migration pressures. The region experienced prolonged droughts and a reduction in summer monsoons, making farming increasingly difficult. At the same time, new groups—most likely Numic-speaking ancestors of the Ute and Shoshone—began migrating into the region.
“We do think that a kind of double whammy occurred at about 1300 AD or so,” Janetski says. “Actually, maybe a bit earlier in the Great Salt Lake Valley, between 1150 and about 1200, there’s a shift in summer moisture. And we don’t have the summer monsoons that used to occur in that area after about 1150. And so farming wasn’t as viable.”
The Ute and the Changing Landscape of the Great Basin
The arrival of the Ute people in Utah marks another dramatic shift in the region’s history. Unlike the Fremont, the Ute were skilled warriors and horsemen, adopting a nomadic lifestyle that allowed them to travel great distances. Historical accounts suggest that before Spanish contact, the Ute were relatively peaceful, living in small bands and relying on fishing, hunting, and gathering.
“The Ute, for example, in Utah Valley, we know when the Spanish came through here in 1776, they were not warlike. They were not riding horses. They were living in wickiups, et cetera, around the edges of the lake. And they were fishermen,” Janetski explains.
The Importance of Protecting Utah’s Archaeological Heritage
One of the most significant changes in archaeology over the past century has been the introduction of laws protecting cultural sites. Before the 1960s, it was common for individuals to collect artifacts or even loot archaeological sites without consequence. Early recreational maps produced by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) even encouraged arrowhead hunting.
However, laws like the National Historic Preservation Act (1966) and the Archaeological Resource Protection Act (1979) changed everything. These laws required federal agencies to protect cultural resources and made looting a criminal offense. More recently, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) has ensured that indigenous remains and sacred objects are returned to their rightful communities.
“Because of those laws, the opportunities for archaeologists to make a living and have a job in archaeology, those opportunities exploded, because now all federal agencies that manage lands had to have an archaeologist on staff to do this evaluation of the cultural resources on their property,” Janetski explains.
Learning from the Past
Utah’s indigenous history is far richer and more complex than most people realize. Thanks to archaeologists like Joel Janetski, we now have a deeper understanding of the Fremont people and their role in shaping the region’s past. Their art, pottery, and architecture offer valuable insights into a way of life that persisted for over a thousand years before ultimately giving way to new cultures and traditions.
