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How Early Humans First Reached the Americas: 3 Theories

By: Dave Roos

Published: July 14, 2023

According to most archeologists and geneticists, the best theory for how the first humans migrated to the Americas is the same one that many likely learned in grade school: they crossed the Bering Strait from Asia via a now-extinct land bridge.

“One can only imagine what they thought when they got to North America south of the ice sheets and looked around and realized nobody else was home,” says David J. Meltzer, an archeologist and professor of prehistory at Southern Methodist University. “‘Wow, we’ve got an entire land to ourselves.”

Thanks to advances in genome sequencing and data analysis, we know that some of the first humans to set foot in North America (known as Paleo-Americans) were direct descendants of ancient people in Siberia, which is solid evidence for the land bridge hypothesis.

But not everyone is convinced that all Paleo-Americans walked to the Americas from Asia. There are outlier archeological sites in both North and South America that date to times before a land route was accessible. Could some of the first Americans have crossed oceans to get here? And do those theories hold up to scientific scrutiny?

Here is the evidence for three theories explaining how the first humans arrived in America: the land bridge theory, the trans-Pacific migration theory and the controversial Solutrean hypothesis.

The Land Bridge Theory: Crossing Beringia

The theory with near-unanimous support from both archeologists and geneticists is that the first humans to populate the Americas arrived on foot via a temporary land bridge—across a region known as Beringia—that connected Eastern Siberia to Alaska for a span of roughly 5,000 years.

Why did they cross that forbidding, near-lifeless landscape into an unknown world? And once they arrived, why and how did they push southward so quickly? The classic explanation—that they were following animal herds—is far too simplistic, says Meltzer, author of First Peoples in a New World: Populating Ice Age America . “It’s not as though animals were headed down to Miami.”

Archeologists and anthropologists are still searching for the “why” of “how” of the first human migration to the Americas, but they’re zeroing in on the “when.” Thanks to a handful of well-preserved Ice Age archeological sites, and a precious few fully-sequenced genomes from Paleolithic human remains, a rough timeline has emerged.

The ancient ancestors of the first Americans left Siberia between 24,000 and 21,000 years ago. That’s been confirmed by comparing the DNA of Paleo-Americans with the DNA of Paleo-Siberians to pinpoint the moment when those two human populations diverged.

“We’re analyzing a mind-bogglingly huge scale of data to detect these patterns,” says Jennifer Raff , a geneticist and anthropologist at the University of Kansas. “These are really subtle differences that you wouldn’t pick up on if you were not sequencing every single base pair of these ancient genomes.”

According to paleoclimatologists, thick ice sheets covered much of the northern latitudes from 23,000 to 19,000 years ago, a period known as the Last Glacial Maximum. With all of that sea water trapped in ice, sea levels dropped, exposing a stretch of dry land between Asia and North America.

When Did They Cross the Land Bridge?

If a land route to the Americas was open at least 20,000 years ago (if not earlier), when exactly did the first Americans cross it? That’s one of the liveliest debates among archeologists.

For decades, says Meltzer, the consensus was that the first Americans arrived around 13,000 years ago. That date corresponds with thousands of finds across North America pointing to a shared archeological culture known as Clovis (named after a specific type of fluted spear point first found in Clovis, New Mexico in 1933). Clovis points were everywhere by 12,000 years ago, so the archeological evidence overwhelmingly backed an initial arrival 13,000 years ago. 

But then came Monte Verde in Chile. At this remarkable site, thousands of miles south of the Bering Land Bridge crossing, archeologists unearthed solid evidence of a human settlement dating to 14,800 years ago, well before Clovis. After Monte Verde broke the 13,000 barrier, even more pre-Clovis sites emerged: Paisley Caves in Oregon (14,400 years ago), the Debra L. Friedkin Site in Texas (15,500 years ago) and Cooper’s Ferry in Idaho (16,000 years ago).

By Land or By Sea?

Those early, pre-Clovis dates were exciting, but they posed a new challenge for archeologists. According to geological evidence, thick glaciers blocked the land route from the Bering Land Bridge into North America until the glaciers started retreating around 15,000 to 14,000 years ago. So how were humans already in Idaho and Texas before the land route opened up? Or as far south as Southern Chile by 14,800 years ago?

“This is a point of great controversy among archeologists,” says Raff. “You’ll find plenty of archeologists who say [the first Americans] came through an ice-free corridor [over land], which didn’t open up until 14,000 years ago. But we have pre-Clovis sites that are early enough in the Americas that can’t be explained by the ice-free corridor.”

For Raff and others, a more likely scenario is that the pre-Clovis humans reached America in boats. The western coastline of North America was ice-free thousands of years earlier than the interior. The pre-Clovis humans could have crossed the Bering Land Bridge on foot, then used simple boats to skirt around the glaciers and make their way down the West Coast of North and South America.

Genomic evidence also supports the coastal boat theory.

“All of the ancient genomes that have been sequenced carry the signature of rapid movement—the rapid divergence of different lineages in the Americas—suggesting that people were moving very quickly,” says Raff. “It’s harder to move that quickly on foot than by boat.”

It could be, says Meltzer, that there were many “pulses” of migrations into the Americas via the land bridge over several millennia, but that the pre-Clovis arrivals were highly mobile and relatively few in number.

“We know that people can be present long before they pop up on archeological radar,” says Meltzer. “It may be that what Clovis represented [13,000 years ago] was the population in the Americas finally getting to the point where there were enough of them out there producing enough stuff that they became archeologically visible—really visible.”

The Trans-Pacific Migration Theory: Sailing the Open Seas

In 2015, a geneticist named Pontus Skogland published some intriguing results from sequencing the genomes of modern-day indigenous people living in the Amazon region of South America. While the vast majority of their genome was shared with indigenous people in other parts of the Americas—and clearly descended from Eastern Siberia—there was a mysterious “signal” in the data.

According to that signal, the indigenous Amazon villagers appeared to share an ancient common ancestor—named “Population Y”—with indigenous people from “Australasia,” a region that includes indigenous Australians, New Guineans, Papuans and more.

For some, this was evidence that ancient inhabitants of Australia or its nearby islands may have used Polynesian-style wayfinding to sail thousands of miles across the open Pacific Ocean to arrive on the coast of South America.

While a trans-Pacific migration to the Americas sounds plausible, there are problems with the theory.

“We don’t have any evidence, archaeologically or genetically, of a trans-Pacific migration,” says Raff. “We do have evidence of a faint signal of shared ancestry between some South Americans, both ancient and modern, and individuals in Australasia, but it doesn’t match what you would expect from a trans-Pacific migration. The signal would be a lot stronger in individuals on the West Coast, and less as you move farther East, but it doesn’t fit with that model. It’s scattershot throughout the population.”

Because of the nature of the signal, Raff and other geneticists believe that Population Y is very, very old , and originated in Asia (the same genetic signal was present in a 40,000-year-old man found in a Chinese cave). Tens of thousands of years ago, some descendants of Population Y went north and others went south. Some of those northern descendants ultimately crossed the land bridge and made it to South America, while some of the southern descendants populated Australasia.

The Solutrean Hypothesis: Across the Atlantic Ice

There are no archeological sites in the Americas that pre-date 16,000 years ago, according to Meltzer. “There are claims to sites that are 20,000, 25,000 or even 130,000 years old,” says Meltzer, “but at the moment those claims are highly questionable at best.”

Not everyone agrees. Bruce Bradley , an emeritus archeology professor at the University of Exeter, thinks that there’s compelling evidence that humans were occupying sites along the East Coast of North America as far back as 20,000 years ago. And he has a controversial theory for how they got there so early: they came from Europe.

Bradley’s theory—which he detailed in a 2013 book, Across the Atlantic Ice: The Origin of America’s Clovis Culture (co-authored with the late Dennis Stanford)—centers on something called the Solutrean archeological culture. Roughly 23,000 to 18,000 years ago, ancient humans living in modern-day France and Spain produced a distinctive and elaborate toolkit of stone blades, spear throwers and harpoons that archeologists call Solutrean.

“Everybody agrees, Solutrean-age humans were incredibly innovative,” says Bradley. “They lived in a relatively harsh environment [during the Last Glacial Maximum], but also started looking toward the ocean. We’re starting to see the beginnings in Western Europe of maritime adaptations—looking at the ocean and other aquatic resources.”

Bradley thinks that Solutrean hunters and fishermen may have fashioned simple “skin boats” (similar to the Inuit umiak ) to expand their hunting territories along the ice-clogged North Atlantic. Eventually, those travels took them further and further across the ice until they arrived on the eastern shores of North America.

“We’re not talking about Solutreans getting in boats and sailing across the ocean,” says Bradley. “It wasn’t a migration, but an expansion of hunting territory.”

For Bradley, the evidence that Solutreans landed in America is found in sites like Parsons Island, Maryland, where stone blades and other tools ( tentatively dated to more than 20,000 years ago) bear a striking resemblance to Solutrean technology.

“If you put this group of artifacts and technologies at a site in France, you wouldn't even question it,” says Bradley. “It’s Solutrean, period.”

Bradley hypothesizes that these ancient Solutreans were some of the earliest (if not the first) humans to arrive in the Americas and that their technology was what became Clovis, the archeological culture that spread across North America by 13,000 years ago.

The Solutrean hypothesis has many critics, Meltzer and Raff among them. Meltzer wonders how an ancient people with no archeological evidence of boat-making could have navigated an ocean. “Look, the Titanic didn't make it,” he says. “How are a bunch of Solutreans in a boat going to cross the Ice Age North Atlantic?”

For Raff, the proof (or lack of it) is in the genetic record. In 2014, scientists sequenced the genome of the Anzick child , the remains of a Clovis-era boy in Montana who lived 12,700 years ago, making him the oldest burial in the Americas.

“The Anzick genome showed absolutely no genetic evidence of European ancestry, nor do any genomes of pre-contact Native Americans,” says Raff. “Anzick very roundly refuted the Solutrean hypothesis.”

For his part, Bradley isn’t conceding. He says that the Solutrean hypothesis was never meant to “replace” the Bering Land Bridge theory.

“People definitely came out of Siberia; there’s no question about that,” says Bradley. “We’re not saying that everybody came from what’s now southwestern Europe. The Solutreans were just one of probably multiple groups that came to the New World at various times and from various places.”

HISTORY Vault: America Unearthed

In America Unearthed, forensic geologist Scott Wolter, a real-life Indiana Jones, will reveal that the history we all learned in school may not always be the whole story.

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When, How Did the First Americans Arrive? It’s Complicated.

The first Americans weren't one group of people; they arrived at different times, and likely by different methods.

How did human beings first come to North America? Across the Bering Strait, on foot? Down the “kelp highway” by boat? Across the Atlantic via the polar ice cap? And when did they reach here? 10,000 years ago? 40,000? Or were they always here, as the Navajo and other Native American tribes believe? In his new book, Atlas Of A Lost World , author Craig Childs sets off to test these different theories on the ground, traveling from Alaska to Chile, Canada to Florida. What he finds, despite the best efforts of archaeologists and the latest technology , still remains in many ways a mystery.

Speaking from his home in Colorado, he explains why many Native Americans reject the idea that their ancestors migrated from somewhere else; how an archaeologist nicknamed Dr. Poop believes he has identified the first human excrement in America ; and why diversity seems to have been built into America’s DNA.

Let’s cut straight to the chase: when did humans first arrive in North America?

The first arrivals keep getting older and older because we’re finding more evidence as time goes on. Right now we can solidly say that people were across the Americas by 15,000 years ago. But that means people were probably already well in place by then; and there’s enough evidence to suggest humans were widespread 20,000 years ago. There’s some evidence of people as far back as 30,000 to 40,000 years ago, but the evidence gets thinner and thinner the further back you go . It appears there’s not a single arrival date. No doubt there was a first person walking in, but when that happened is well before 20,000 years ago.

The solid dates of 15,000 are based on sites where you can find fire pits , burned bones and work stones that have been turned into scrapers and hammers and spear points. When you go back further, you’re finding mammoths that have been shattered open in a way that’s characteristic of humans. Then you start getting into these questions of what really counts as a sign of human presence, and what is just a trampled mammoth bone that happens to look like it was struck by a human with a rock.

Equally thorny is the question of how humans got here. Give us a quick 101.

[Laughs] The easiest way to get here is by foot. The Bering Land Bridge has been the longstanding theory because that’s the clearest connection between Asia and North America, up in the Arctic, and it only appears when ice is locked up on land and sea levels drop. It’s the only place where you could walk from one side to the other.

I spent some time up on an island that is a remnant of the land bridge between the coast of Siberia and Alaska. There, you can see walking across. But when you got to the other side, you’d be facing 5 million square miles of ice; and that’s when you start looking at coastal migrations. People in the Ice Age were already moving up and down the coast of Japan, Kamchatka, and Korea, using boats, and the evidence is clear that they were getting out to places you can only reach with boats.

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It makes sense that you would keep following the coast around. The land bridge has a coast, which would bring you down Alaska and British Colombia, to Washington and Oregon. This is the more viable way into North America, because there’s what is called the kelp highway , a biotically rich region that follows the entire coast. During the Ice Age this coast was continuous from Sumatra to the tip of South America. But that coast is now under water, so any evidence of boats and people moving along it is much thinner than people being on the land mass.

The idea of an Atlantic crossing has also gained some traction. Tell us about the Clovis people , and why their stone tools may suggest a European origin.

This has been a big debate for some time, that people some 13,500 years ago were making distinct tools that you can find all over the Americas, so-called Clovis Weapons. This is a new style of weaponry: finely crafted, relatively flat spear points no thicker than an envelope, which required unique skills, and therefore stand out in the record.

Something happened, a cultural change or an arrival. For a long time they were seen as the first people. Now, we’re seeing it more as the middle-age arrival in the Ice Age. Where these weapons came from has also been a huge question for archaeologists. Many have been trying to trace them back to the Bering Land Bridge, but the evidence just doesn’t stack up. Others have tried to trace them to an Atlantic arrival by Palaeolithic Europeans around 20,000 years ago.

The weapons being found along the Eastern Seaboard are in some ways also identical to ones made in Palaeolithic Spain and Southern France during the Solutrean industry . So, it looks like people were crossing the Atlantic, hunting along the ice packs—following ice flows—with skin boats, and arriving in Maryland and Virginia.

I was fascinated to discover that many Native American tribes flatly reject the idea that their ancestors migrated from somewhere else. Tell us about the Navajo theory of the first people.

The first people there came out of the ground. These are stories related to origin and creation stories all over the Americas. Native tribes have clear stories about how they got here, coming out of caves or up through springs and underground sources.

The idea of coming from somewhere else might threaten the notion that they have primacy on the lands. But, they obviously do because they are coming from these much older stories than anybody else. I look at these stories of arrival and think, “Yeah, they come out of the ground because that is how deep their history goes.” It’s a non-scientific view of the world, but it gives us a window into what it means to be in a place for that long.

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Of course, the world looked very different 15,000 years ago. summon up a picture for us from the mists of time, and explain the importance of the woolly mammoth..

The landscape people walked into was substantially different. The animals were much larger. You have mammoths, dire wolves , and sabre tooth cats.

Everything is very big and very woolly, and in some places armoured. There were 300-pound armadillos living in Florida and Louisiana, so you’re talking about a very different landscape and way of living. But there were many places that looked the same. Other parts, including most of Canada, were completely covered with ice.

There are a number of sites in Alaska, like Swan Point , where you can see signs of mammoth hunting. But mammoths probably weren’t their mainstay. Early people were eating salmon, seaweed, deer, and rabbit. The mammoth hunts were probably culturally important, much like the northern whale hunts. At Swan Point multiple mammoths were killed at once, which you can imagine was a dramatic scene of people and dogs gathering together and going after this animal that’s 13 feet tall and extremely dangerous. Hunting whales in the north out of skin boats is also a dangerous endeavour, and people have often been killed. I imagine the same thing happened while hunting mammoths. You would have these stories of epic mammoth hunts, who died and who lived, and these stories would have been passed down for thousands of years.

You actually recreated part of the journey across the land bridge on Alaska’s Harding Icefield . Take us inside that adventure and what it told you about the first arrivals. Did you get dressed up in furs and carry a spear?

No, I decided that if I dressed up in furs and carried a spear, I would have probably died. [laughs] I took modern gear—sleds, skis, and backpacks— and made about a 4,000-foot ascent through fresh snow, trying to hit the ice field at the right time of year, just as winter was letting off. Once we got up there, we clicked in the skis, put our gear on a sled, and headed across the ice.

I wanted to get a sense of what it’s like to travel as a group into a desolate ice landscape, climb up on the peaks that stand out on the ice field and get a sense of navigation in this landscape, which is a remnant of what was there during the Pleistocene. In one sense, it told me that this is the worst way to do it. [laughs] That crossing a giant ice field is a ridiculous notion. That’s not to say it didn’t happen. Humans have often done ridiculous things! Being out there on the ice I thought this is maybe where the crazy people went, the ones who were looking to fall off the edge of the Earth. At the same time, as we climbed the mountain ranges sticking up through the ice, I could see how you could have hopped your way from one summit to the next down the entire length of the ice sheet to arrive in the rest of North America.

But it also made me turn to the coastal migration theory, and say, “That makes sense !” There, you would be moving through a water landscape of islands and coasts rich with kelp and fish, as opposed to eating lichens and trying to catch birds on a 2,000-mile journey across an ice sheet. [laughs]

One of the experts you consult has the wonderful nickname, Doctor Poop. Tell us about him and his work on what you call “the earliest identified human craps in America.”

This is Paisley Caves , in the desert of southern Oregon. There, Dr. Dennis Jenkins , aka Doctor Poop, found the oldest human coprolites , which I believe are 14,300 years old. He explained to me that, in the caves, he has also found the scat of American lions and other predators. My question to him was, “How do you know that these were pieces of human faeces and not humans that were eaten by American lions and then shat out in the caves?” His response was that either way, you’d know that humans were here . This is such a basic function: a human goes into a cave, craps, and leaves it there. This is a story of people arriving and leaving their sign behind.

Bring it home for us, Craig, by telling us what you believe is ultimately the real story of the populating of North America, and what surprised you most during your travels?

What I took away was that people came from everywhere. We think of the arrival of the first people as one group braving their way across a land bridge, when in fact it was many groups, many different languages, and technologies arriving at different times from different directions. This makes sense because that’s how we do things as humans. It’s not just one group . It is this complex story of many people, with many different stories.

For me, it was an opportunity to explore landscapes I wouldn’t normally go to, like an island off the coast of Siberia or crossing an ice field in Alaska. The most fascinating place I saw was a back woods river south of Tallahassee, Florida, where human evidence from 14,500 years ago was found. Just being in these swamps with a boat, surrounded by alligators and poison snakes, gave me a sense of coming into a landscape I didn’t know and encountering animals I wasn’t familiar with. There were many moments like this, where I felt this must have been something like how it was to be first in a place; to have to figure out which direction is which, what animals you have to avoid, what plants you can eat or can’t touch. For me, this was a new beginning, a way of coming into my own continent.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

Simon Worrall curates Book Talk . Follow him on Twitter or at simonworrallauthor.com .

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The earliest Americans arrived in the New World 30,000 years ago

People travelled by boat to North America some 30,000 years ago, at a time when giant animals still roamed the continent and long before it was thought the earliest arrivals had made the crossing from Asia, archaeological research reveals today.

Researchers from the University of Oxford have published a study , showing important new insights into our understanding of these ‘First Americans’, who made the journey from eastern Eurasia before the last Ice Age. And it reveals that the arrival of humans in numbers coincided with the ‘catastrophic decline’ in now-extinct large animals, including camels, horses and mammoths.

The arrival of humans in numbers coincided with the ‘catastrophic decline’ in now-extinct large animals, including camels, horses and mammoths

Based on a powerful statistical approach, the international team, led by Oxford’s Professor Tom Higham , Director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit , School of Archaeology, was able to build a chronological framework for the arrival of humans into North America – and their dispersal across the continent.

This showed that people were present long before previous estimates - before, during and after the ‘Last Glacial Maximum’, the peak of the Ice Age, when temperatures fell to their lowest for tens of thousands of years.  But, the research, also shows that they must have come by sea, rather than across a land bridge.

According to Professor Higham, ‘A combination of new excavations and cutting-edge archaeological science is allowing us to uncover a new story of the colonisation of the Americas. The First Americans came from eastern Eurasia, and it looks as though there was a surprisingly-early movement of people into the continent.

‘The people that travelled into these new lands must have come by boat, because the northern parts of North America were impenetrable and sealed off from eastern Eurasia by a massive ice sheet until 13,000 years ago.

The discovery that people were here more than 30,000 years ago raises a range of key new questions about who these people were, how they lived, how widespread they were and, ultimately, what their fate was

‘The discovery that people were here more than 30,000 years ago raises a range of key new questions about who these people were, how they lived, how widespread they were and, ultimately, what their fate was.’

In addition, when the timeline for humans was compared with dates obtained for extinct animals, the analysis showed human expansion, during this warmer period, happened at broadly the same time as their disappearance.  The team suggests an increase in human population seems to be linked to a significant impact on the catastrophic decline of these large megafauna.

One of the team, Dr Lorena Becerra-Valdivia (now with the University of New South Wales), says, ‘The peopling of the Americas was a complex and dynamic process...What is clear is that humans were present in the continent well before previously accepted dates. But it was only around 14,700 years ago that those people became more highly visible in the archaeological record, likely due to an increase in population.’ 

It seems likely to us that the people...represent a ‘failed colonisation’, one which may well have left no genetically detectable heritage in today’s First Americans’ populations

Alongside this research, another team, led by Dr Ciprian Ardelean , from the University of Zacatecas, Mexico, and the University of Exeter, has disclosed the results of a decade of excavation of a high-altitude cave in Chiquihite, central Mexico. The cave has shown occupation earlier than anything previously known and, according to Dr Ardelean, ‘It seems likely to us that the people of Chiquihuite represent a ‘failed colonization’, one which may well have left no genetically detectable heritage in today’s First Americans’ populations.’

Dr Jean-Luc Schwenniger , who heads Oxford’s Luminescence Dating Laboratory at the School of Archaeology, notes, ‘Our involvement in the dating of this extraordinary site stretches back almost ten years and finally to see the results published is immensely satisfying...the publication of these new discoveries and findings, which rock and challenge long established views, required extra amounts of diligence, scrutiny, patience and perseverance.’

The Oxford results are based on hundreds of dates obtained from 42 archaeological sites in North America and Beringia (the ancient land bridge connecting the continent to Asia).  The team used a statistical approach known as Bayesian age modelling performed on software (OxCal) developed in Oxford by Professor Christopher Bronk Ramsey. The analysis estimates the start of human occupation at different sites, as well as the commencement of three distinct stone tool traditions in these regions. Dates were combined statistically along with stratigraphic information from the deposits to estimate the start and end of human occupation at each of the sites and then plotted spatially across the continent. The Oxford work was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC; grant NF/2017/1/2), Merton College, Santander, and the Clarendon Fund. The latter also provided the funding for the paper titled, “The timing and impact of the earliest human arrivals in North America”.

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Why Did Humans Migrate to the Americas?

The Americas were the last (well, second-to-last if you count Antarctica) continents to be inhabited by early humans. Archaeologists estimate that people entered North America by crossing over the Bering Strait, which back then was a wide swath of land, about 15,000 years ago.      In other words, people got here by walking a very long distance .      Our image of this major migration is fanciful. When I teach about the peopling of the Americas, I show a slide of people purposefully trekking in a straight line on a tundra from Siberia to Alaska , as if there was some destination on the other side and the only way to get there was to follow the leader, one behind the other.      But the truth is that human migration is much more complex, as suggested by genetic evidence presented recently by Ugo Perego and Alessandro Achilli of the Università di Pavia, Italy. Using mitochondrial DNA, they found two rare haplotypes (gene groupings) in modern Native Americans that point to two simultaneous ancestral migrations into this part of the world. One group took the fast track down the Pacific Coast to Tierra del Fuego (they may have used boats for part of the journey) and the other came across the Strait, maybe even with the coastal folks,  and then took a sharp left turn past the ice sheet and spread out over inland North America.      But what compels people to walk that fast and that far into the unknown?      The most obvious reason is that one has to pack up and go because things are not so good at home. Long ago, that probably meant that the climate had changed and made life impossible. It might have become too hot or too cold or too wet, which in turn would have affected not only quality of life but also make survival a shaky proposition. Drought, flood, and temperature changes could certainly push people to move on.      Climate change also affects the food supply, and anthropologists have assumed that people came to the Americas because they were following food on the hoof. Humans are famous for wiping out big game as they go, so these early travelers might have been walking behind herds and not realizing they were covering new ground as they ate their way into the New World.      People also migrate when they are being chased. Back then, there weren't enough people to cause civil unrest, tribal warfare, or religious persecution, but there could have been conflicts over land use or hunting rights.      Or maybe, they came because they could. Humans seem to have a universal penchant for moving around, and not always under duress. These days, people sometimes move to have a new life in a new land, or just for fun. Sometimes they want a new view, an adventure, or they want to reinvent themselves.      Maybe the two major groups of people coming to the New World were looking for a new life and they found it beaching it to Tierra del Fuego or chasing the herds across the plains of Canada.

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Meredith F. Small is an anthropologist at Cornell University. She is also the author of "Our Babies, Ourselves; How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent" ( link ) and "The Culture of Our Discontent; Beyond the Medical Model of Mental Illness" ( link ).

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Humans could have arrived in North America 10,000 years earlier, new research shows

Arctic people today travel along sea ice on dog sleds and snow mobiles, but did early americans also use the “sea ice highway” recent discoveries fuel one of the hottest debates in archeology..

A growing number of archaeological and genetic finds are fueling debates on when humans first arrived in North America.

New research presented Dec. 15 at the American Geophysical Union Annual Meeting (AGU23) in San Francisco highlighted “one of the hottest debates in archaeology,” an article by Liza Lester of American Geophysical Union said. 

According to Lester, archaeologists have traditionally argued that people migrated by walking through an ice-free corridor that briefly opened between ice sheets an estimated 13,000 years ago.

But some of the recent finds suggest that people made their way onto the continent much earlier. The discovery of human footprints in New Mexico, which were dated to around 23,000- years-old, is just one example, and Archaeologists have found evidence of coastal settlements in western Canada dating from as early as 14,000-years-ago. 

'Incredible': Oldest known human footprints in North America discovered at national park

The 'kelp highway' theory

The research presented at the AGU23 meeting provides another clue on the origins of North American human migration. 

“Given that the ice-free corridor wouldn't be open for thousands of years before these early arrivals, scientists instead proposed that people may have moved along a ‘kelp highway,’" Lester writes. “This theory holds that early Americans slowly traveled down into North America in boats, following the bountiful goods found in coastal waters.” 

According to Lester, climate reconstructions of the Pacific Northwest hint that sea ice may have been one way for people to move farther south along the Pacific coastline from Beringia, “the land bridge between Asia and North America that emerged during the last glacial maximum when ice sheets bound up large amounts of water causing sea levels to fall,”  Lester writes. 

What if they didn't use boats?

Additionally, researchers found that ocean currents were more than twice the strength they are today during the height of the last glacial maximum around 20,000 years ago due to glacial winds and lower sea levels, meaning it would be incredibly difficult to travel along the coast by boat in these conditions, said Summer Praetorius of the U.S. Geological Survey , who presented her team’s work at the summit.

But what if early migrants didn't use boats?

Praetorius' team is asking this very question because evidence shows that people were well adapted to cold environments. If they couldn't paddle against the current, "maybe they were using the sea ice as a platform," Praetorius said.

Praetorius and her colleagues used data that came from tiny, fossilized plankton to map out climate models and “get a fuller picture of ocean conditions during these crucial windows of human migration.”

The Vikings: A Memorable Visit to America

The Icelandic house of what is likely the first European-American baby has scholars rethinking the Norse sagas

Eugene Linden

Roughly 1,000 years ago, the story goes, a Viking trader and adventurer named Thorfinn Karlsefni set off from the west coast of Greenland with three ships and a band of Norse to explore a newly discovered land that promised fabulous riches. Following the route that had been pioneered some seven years before by Leif Eriksson, Thorfinn sailed up Greenland’s coast, traversed the Davis Strait and turned south past Baffin Island to Newfoundland—and perhaps beyond. Snorri, the son of Thorfinn and his wife, Gudrid, is thought to be the first European baby born in North America.

Thorfinn and his band found their promised riches—game, fish, timber and pasture—and also encountered Native Americans, whom they denigrated as skraelings , or “wretched people.” Little wonder, then, that relations with the Natives steadily deteriorated. About three years after starting out, Thorfinn—along with his family and surviving crew—abandoned the North American settlement, perhaps in a hail of arrows. (Archaeologists have found arrowheads with the remains of buried Norse explorers.) After sailing to Greenland and then Norway, Thorfinn and his family settled in Iceland, Thorfinn’s childhood home.

Just where the family ended up in Iceland has been a mystery that historians and archaeologists have long tried to clear up. In September 2002, archaeologist John Steinberg of the University of California at Los Angeles announced that he had uncovered the remains of a turf mansion in Iceland that he believes is the house where Thorfinn, Gudrid and Snorri lived out their days. Other scholars say his claim is plausible, although even Steinberg admits, “We’ll never know for sure unless someone finds a name on the door.”

The location of Thorfinn’s family estate in Iceland has surprisingly broad implications. For one thing, it could shed new light on the early Norse experience in North America, first substantiated by Helge Ingstad, an explorer, and his wife, Anne Stine Ingstad, an archaeologist. In 1960, they discovered the remains of a Viking encampment in Newfoundland dating to the year 1000. But the only accounts of how and why Vikings journeyed to the New World, not to mention what became of them, are in Icelandic sagas, centuries-old tales that have traditionally vexed scholars struggling to separate Viking fantasy from Viking fact. Steinberg’s find, if proved, would give credence to one saga over another.

By Steinberg’s admission, he found the imposing longhouse— on the grounds of one of northern Iceland’s most visited cultural sites, the GlaumbaerFolkMuseum—“by dumb luck.” For decades, visitors had gazed upon the field in front of the museum, unaware that evidence of one of the grandest longhouses of the Viking era lay just beneath the grass.

Steinberg did not start out trying to insert himself into a debate about Viking lore, but to survey settlement patterns during Viking times. With his colleague Doug Bolender of NorthwesternUniversity in Chicago, he had developed a method for using an electrical conductivity meter to detect buried artifacts. The tool—a cumbersome, 50-pound apparatus usually used to identify contaminated groundwater and locate pipes—sends alternating current into the ground. The current induces a magnetic field, and the tool then measures how the magnetic field varies according to the makeup of the soil and the objects buried in it. The two men fitted the electronic equipment into a 12-foot-long plastic tube and trekked around fields holding the apparatus by their sides, looking for all the world like slowmotion pole vaulters getting ready to vault.

The two first worked with Icelandic archaeologist Gud- mundur Olafsson, who was excavating the site of Erik the Red’s farmstead in western Iceland and had identified it as the place from which some of the explorers of the New World first set out. There, Steinberg and Bolender charted magnetic anomalies—possible signatures of buried walls and floors of turf houses. Then, Steinberg says, “Gudmundur would draw upon his knowledge of ancient Norse houses to imagine possible configurations underground so that we could refine the search.” By the end of 2000, Steinberg and Bolender could survey a field as quickly as they could walk.

An 18-person team they put together then settled on Skagafjord, on the north coast of Iceland, as the most promising place to conduct their studies. The area is dotted with rills, rivers and thousand-year-old fields green from the abundant rain and long, soft sunlight of summer days in the Far North. The territory was ideally suited to their technology, layered as it is with known volcanic deposits that coincide with important historical events, enabling the archaeologists to get a good fix on the ages of objects they found. “See, the soil reads like a book,” Steinberg says, standing in a trench on a farm near Glaumbaer that was the site of northern Iceland’s most powerful estate during Viking times. He points to a green layer that marks a volcanic eruption in 871, a blue layer from one in 1000 and a thick, yellow layer from yet another in 1104.

In the summer of 2001, Steinberg and his colleagues scanned the low fields in Glaumbaer. The work proceeded uneventfully until late August, when the team was about to pack up and leave. (“You always find the most important things in the last week of a field season,” says Steinberg.) When two undergraduates probing spots that showed low conductivity in earlier scans pulled up their first plug of earth, they looked in the hole and saw a layer of turf—consistent with a turf house—below a yellow layer that marked the eruption of MountHekla in 1104.

Excited, Steinberg returned in 2002 to dig a series of trenches. By the end of that season, the team had uncovered parts of what appeared to be an extensive longhouse, 100 feet by 25 1/2 feet. By the end of 2004, the team had plotted the direction and length of one of the walls. The house was so large that it evidently belonged to someone with wealth and power. But who?

All the detail about Norse trips to Vinland (as the Norse called North America) comes from two accounts: The Saga of Erik the Red and The Saga of the Greenlanders . These epic Viking tales were probably first written down around 1200 or 1300 by scribes who either recorded the oral stories of elders or worked from some now-lost written source, says Thor Hjaltalin, an Icelandic scholar who oversees archaeological activities in northwest Iceland. The two sagas give similar accounts of Thorfinn’s trip to the New World, but they differ on some significant details about his return to Iceland. In Erik the Red’s saga, Thorfinn moves back to his family estate in Reynisnes, while in the Greenlanders’ saga, Thor-finn settles down in Glaumbaer, after his mother proves less than welcoming to his wife. In a key passage from the Greenlanders’ saga, Thor-finn sells some of his Vinland spoils in Norway, then comes to “north Iceland, in Skagafjord, where he had his ship drawn ashore for the winter. In the spring he purchased the land at Glaumbaer and established his farm there.” It goes on: “He and his wife, Gudrid, had a great number of descendants, and a fine clan they were. . . . After [Thorfinn’s] death, Gudrid took over the running of the household, together with her son Snorri who had been born in Vinland.”

Apart from the grand scale of the longhouse, which ties it to someone of Thorfinn’s stature, other evidence links it to the North American expedition, Steinberg claims. Its straight-walled design differs from the bowed-wall construction typical of Icelandic longhouses of the era, and it bears a strong resemblance to structures that have been uncovered in L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland. And finally, Steinberg says, it’s unlikely that any other chief could build one of the grandest longhouses of the Viking era and not be mentioned either in the sagas or other sources.

Before Steinberg’s find, conventional wisdom held that Erik the Red’s version was more credible and that the reference to Glaumbaer in the Greenlanders’ saga was merely a flourish, added years after most of the saga was written, to improve Gudrid’s image and perhaps that of a Glaumbaer chief. There are still many points of dispute about which Norse did what and where in North America, but if Steinberg’s find is indeed Thorfinn’s house, the long-discounted Greenlanders’ saga, which names Thorfinn as a primary source, becomes the more accurate version—at least on the matter of where Thorfinn and company ended up. So after he found the longhouse, Steinberg called Olafsson—who had identified Erik the Red’s farmstead as a jumping-off place for the New World—and blurted, “I think I’ve found the other end of your story.”

Vikings spread out from Scandinavia and settled in Iceland, which Steinberg describes as “one of the world’s last large inhabitable islands to be inhabited,” in 874. They were led by local chiefs who did not like taking orders from, or paying taxes to, Harald Finehair, a Norse king then consolidating power in Norway. As the celebrated Norwegian anthropologist Vilhemmer Stefansson wrote in 1930, the Viking expansion was perhaps “the only large scale migration in history where the nobility moved out and the peasantry stayed home.”

At first, Iceland offered a paradise to these ruggedly independent Vikings. The lowlands had forests of birch and other trees that had never felt the ax. In just 60 years the population jumped from zero to 70,000. By 930, the Norse had established one of the world’s first parliaments, the Althing , where chiefs met to settle disputes.

There was just one sore point to this idyllic life. Settled and organized though they might have been, the Vikings were also some of the toughest warriors who ever lived. A slighted Norse was not the type to turn the other cheek. The resulting bloody duels reverberated far beyond Iceland. As Stefansson put it in 1930, writing during Prohibition, “The eventual discovery of North America hangs upon a fashionable practice of the day, that of man-killing, which, like cocktail shaking in the later America, was against the law but was indulged by the best people.” He was referring to a few unreconstructed manslayers like Erik the Red, who overtaxed even the Norse tolerance for conflict and was exiled more than once by his fellow chiefs. Erik was first forced to relocate to Iceland’s west coast and was then banished from the island altogether.

According to the sagas, Erik eventually set up a farmstead on the west coast of Greenland. The incongruous name for this barren, frigid island dominated by a vast ice cap comes from the outcast’s attempt to lure other settlers, demonstrating “a genius for advertising that made him prophetically American,” Stefansson wrote. Erik heard tales of strange lands to the west from a Norse sailor blown off course en route to Greenland, and it was his son Leif who led the first expedition to the New World. Another was led by Erik’s son Thorvald (who died in Vinland from an arrow wound). Thorfinn Karlsefni led a third.

Thorfinn’s assumed lineage is distinguished: one ancestor was Aud the Deepminded, a queen from the British Isles, and another was Ugarval, a king of Ireland. Thorfinn had grown up in Iceland on a farm not far from Glaumbaer. A wealthy merchant notorious for his cleverness, Thorfinn was also a good leader. On a trading voyage to Greenland, he met and married Gudrid Thorbjarnardottir, the beautiful and charismatic widow of Erik’s son Thorvald. (A history of Iceland written around 1120, as well as scattered church records, back up the genealogies and dates in the sagas.) During the winter of 1005 at Brattahlid, Erik’s manor in Greenland’s eastern colony, Thorfinn played board games and planned his trip to Vinland. Erik the Red’s saga makes the planning sound boisterous and somewhat haphazard, noting that various other Norse chiefs decided to join the expedition seemingly on the spur of the moment.

While Leif Eriksson is the Viking name most familiar to Americans, the sagas devote as much space to Thorfinn and his voyage. Steinberg’s discovery supports a long-held theory that Thorfinn was the principal teller of the sagas. (That would explain why he plays such a major role in them.) Steinberg notes that knowing the source of a text helps historians weigh the assertions.

Whoever their author was, the stories have challenged scholars to match the place names mentioned in them to real topography. For example, Thorfinn called two crucial places where he and his group camped in the New World Straumfjord (stream fiord) and Hop (lagoon) and described the first as having strong currents. Scholars have variously located Straumfjord, where Snorri was born, in Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts; Long Island Sound; the Bay of Fundy; and L’Anse auxMeadows (the Norse site discovered by Helge and Anne Ingstad on the northern tip of Newfoundland). Different advocates have placed Hop near New York City, Boston and points north.

If in fact Thorfinn and company traveled as far south as Gowanus Bay in New York Harbor, as asserted by the British scholar Geoffrey Gathorne-Hardy in 1921, they would have sailed past some of the greatest stands of primeval hardwoods on the planet, not to mention grapes—treasured by Norse chiefs who cemented their status with feasts accompanied by copious amounts of wine—and unlimited fish and game.

Why would the Norse have abandoned them or similar inducements farther north? Perhaps the Vikings’ Vinland was like Alexander the Great’s India: a land of fabulous wealth so far from home that it was beyond the limits of his ability to impose his will. Both Norse sagas have Thorfinn beating a retreat north after some humbling battles with Native warriors. (See “Why Didn’t They Stay?”)

Thorfinn never went back to Vinland, but other Norse subsequently did. Evidence continues to accumulate that Norse traded with both Inuit and more southern tribes for skins, and that they regularly brought back wood and other items from the New World. Over the years, various accounts have placed Norse colonies in Maine, Rhode Island and elsewhere on the AtlanticCoast, but the only unambiguous Norse settlement in North America remains L’Anse aux Meadows.

Icelanders, for their part, need no persuading of the Viking’s preeminence among Europeans in the New World. Asked who discovered America, 8-year-old Kristin Bjarnadottir, a third grader in Holar, Iceland, answers with complete confidence: “Leifur,” naming the celebrated Viking explorer. She and other Icelandic kids often play a game called Great Adventurer, in which they take on the roles of the saga heroes. Steinberg’s ongoing investigation of the turf house in Glaumbaer and other structures could well give Kristin and her friends rich new exploits of their Viking ancestors to act out.

Freydis: Heroine or Murderer?

Viking scholars have long debated the veracity of the Icelandic sagas. Are they literature or history, or both? The two conflicting versions of Freydis Eriksdottir, who was Erik the Red's daughter and the half sister of Leif Eriksson and who traveled to North America 1,000 years ago, are a case in point.

In Erik the Red's saga, Freydis and her husband Thorvard accompany Thorfinn Karlsefni and Gudrid Thorbjarnardottir on their journey to the New World. When Natives attack their small colony, the Norse men run off. But a pregnant Freydis stands her ground, shouting: "Why do you flee from such pitiful wretches, brave men like you? . . . If I had weapons, I am sure I could fight better than any of you." She snatches up a sword from a fallen Norseman and exposes a breast (presumably to indicate that she's a woman), frightening off the attackers. When the danger had passed, Thorfinn came over to her and praised her courage.

But in the Greenlanders' saga, Freydis is a murderer. Freydis and her husband do not travel with Thorfinn and Gudrid, but instead undertake an expedition with two Icelanders, known as Finnbogi and Helgi. When they arrive in Straumfjord (thought by some scholars to be the site in Newfoundland known as L'Anse aux Meadows), they quarrel over who will live in the longhouses Leif Eriksson has left behind. Freydis wins, rousing the Icelanders' resentment. After a hard winter in which the two camps become more estranged, Freydis demands that the Icelanders hand over their larger ship for the journey home. She goads her husband and followers into murdering all the male Icelanders. When no one will kill the five women in the Icelanders' camp, she takes up an ax and dispatches them herself. Back in Greenland, word of the incident seeps out. "Afterwards no one thought anything but ill of her and her husband," concludes the story of Freydis' expedition.

Was Freydis a heroine? Or a homicidal maniac? Archaeologist Birgitta Linderoth Wallace, who directed much of the excavation of L'Anse aux Meadows, doesn't know for sure. "We try to sort out what's fact and fiction," she says. "We can't presume the saga writers knew the difference. What we do know is the writers were often anonymous.and male. They were Christian priests. Freydis was a pagan, while Gudrid was Christian. Gudrid's descendants were bishops and had an interest in making her appear as holy as possible and Freydis as bad as possible, for contrast." Wallace says the murder of the Icelanders is hard to believe. "Something bad happened," she says. "But can you imagine killing 35 Icelanders without all their relatives coming over to take revenge?"

Why Didn’t They Stay?

The Viking presence in North America had dwindled to nothing long before Columbus began island hopping in the Caribbean. Why did the Norse fail where other Europeans succeeded? After all, Vikings were consummate seamen and peerless raiders who populated marginally inhabitable Greenland and who would push their way into the British Isles and France. And with their iron weapons and tools, they had a technological edge over America's indigenous peoples.

Several explanations have been advanced for the Vikings' abandonment of North America. Perhaps there were too few of them to sustain a settlement. Or they may have been forced out by American Indians. While the European conquest was abetted by infectious diseases that spread from the invaders to the Natives, who succumbed in great numbers because they had no acquired immunity, early Icelanders may not have carried similar infections.

But more and more scholars focus on climate change as the reason the Vikings couldn.t make a go of it in the New World. The scholars suggest that the western Atlantic suddenly turned too cold even for Vikings. The great sailing trips of Leif and Thorfinn took place in the first half of the 11th century, during a climatic period in the North Atlantic called the Medieval Warming, a time of long, warm summers and scarce sea ice. Beginning in the 12th century, however, the weather started to deteriorate with the first  frissons  of what scholars call the Little Ice Age. Tom McGovern, an archaeologist at Hunter College in New York City, has spent more than 20 years reconstructing the demise of a Norse settlement on Greenland. In the middle of the 14th century, the colony suffered eight harsh winters in a row, culminating, in 1355, in what may have been the worst in a century. McGovern says the Norse ate their livestock and dogs before turning to whatever else they could find in their final winter there. The settlers might have survived if they had mimicked the Inuit, who hunted ringed seal in the winter and prospered during the Little Ice Age.

With sea ice making the routes from Iceland to Greenland and back impassable for Norse ships for much of the year, the Little Ice Age probably curtailed further Norse traffic to North America. Iceland also fared badly during this time. By 1703, weather-related food shortages and epidemics of plague and smallpox had reduced Iceland's population to 53,000, from more than 150,000 in 1250.

It’s worth pondering how the history of the West might have differed if the weather had remained balmy. Norse populations in Iceland and Greenland might have flourished, and the Vikings might have remained in North America. If the temperature had been a few degrees higher, some of North America might be speaking Norse today.

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John Cabot and the first English Expedition to America

Forget Christopher Columbus… this is the story of John Cabot, a Venetian captain who led the first ever European expedition…

Ben Johnson

Did you know that Christopher Columbus never discovered mainland America? In fact, during his first voyage in 1492 he only landed in the West Indies, Cuba and the Dominican Republic, leaving the vast continent of North America untouched since Leif Ericson and his Viking expedition some five centuries earlier.

It was, in fact, a ship commissioned by England’s very own King Henry VII which first reached the American mainland in 1497, albeit led by a Venetian captain called John Cabot. Dropping anchor at Cape Bonavista on Newfoundland on June 24th, Cabot and his English crew only remained on land long enough to fetch some fresh water and claim the land for the Crown. Although the crew did not meet any natives during their brief visit, they did apparently come across tools, nets and the remains of a fire.

For the following weeks Cabot continued to explore the coastline of Canada, making observations and charting the coastline for future expeditions.

Upon arriving back in England in early August, Cabot went straight to London to inform King Henry VII of his discoveries. For a short period of time Cabot was treated as a celebrity throughout the country, although surprisingly Henry only offered him £10 as a reward for his work!

Although Cabot’s expedition would have seen the first Englishmen walk upon the American mainland, it is important to remember that the Welsh were reputedly colonising Alabama as far back the 12th century! You can read the story of Prince Madog and his exploration of America here .

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Who Reached America First? Hint: NOT Columbus!

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Even today, many people still believe that Christopher Columbus was the person who “discovered” America when he landed there in 1492. That belief overlooks the fact that indigenous people had already been living there for at least 20,000 years and other non-indigenous people had already made expeditions to the Americas – some hundreds of years before Columbus – and some had even built settlements. Ancient Greek, Chinese, Viking, and Welsh explorers have all been proposed as forerunners to the famed voyage in 1492. So who really did get there before Columbus?

Which ancient explorers reached North America before Columbus? ( Public Domain )

The Chinese

One intriguing argument suggests that Chinese explorers reached the Americas about 70 years prior to Columbus’ famous voyage. This is based on a 1418 map charted by Admiral Zheng He which appears to show North American rivers and coasts and some of South America. Historians state the map was created during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

There are also older indications that ancient Chinese explorers may have reached the Americas. In one example, a lizardite Chinese votive sword was discovered in 2014 in an eroded bank of a small stream in Georgia. The many symbols on the sword and its shape suggest it comes from the Liangzhu culture (3400-2250 BC) or the Xia (2070-1600 BC), Shang (1600-1046 BC), or Zhou Dynasty (1046-256 BC). No one can say how the artifact ended up where it did.

A second indication of an earlier date for the Chinese arriving in America comes from petroglyphs in Albuquerque’s Petroglyph National Monument, as well as in Arizona, Utah, Nevada, California, Oklahoma, and Ontario, which for some scholars appear to be ancient Chinese scripts inscribed by a group of Chinese explorers thousands of years ago. The calligraphy and wording used suggest the characters would have probably been carved close to the end of the Shang Dynasty in 1046 BC.

Reproduction of a supposed Chinese map from 1418 showing some of the Americas. ( Public Domain )

Three elements that suggest the ancient Greeks may have made it to the Americas are: their famed navigational skills, an extensive knowledge of astronomy, and the fact that they were the only ancient civilization to understand that the Earth was round.

Some scholars say an advanced knowledge of astronomy may have helped the Greeks identify Atlantic currents that would propel them west. And several scholars have also pondered if Plutarch's work  De Facie describing a stranger recently returned from a 'great continent' refers to an explorer who had visited Newfoundland, Canada.

But the strongest evidence comes from the ancient Greek reference to the Fortunate Islands, which an Italian physicist and philologist says were the Antilles. Unfortunately, Ptolemy is said to have misidentified them as the Canary Islands off Africa’s West coast. It seems the mistake was made when Ptolemy moved the Canary Islands by 15 degrees latitude. But he was following a common belief at the time that people were incapable of navigating an ocean.

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Some scholars say an advanced knowledge of astronomy may have helped the Greeks identify Atlantic currents that would propel them west. ( Paul Moore /Adobe Stock)

The Vikings

It is well established that almost 500 years before Columbus set sail, a Viking named Leif (“the lucky”) Erikson visited, and temporarily colonized, a small village in Newfoundland , Canada. But the Norsemen may have been there even earlier. According to the Norse Graenlendinga Saga, Vikings first arrived in the New World in 986 AD when Bjarni came upon a beautiful wooded area. He returned home and his tale soon spread, inspiring Leif Erikson to try to retrace the explorer’s passage.

According to the Sagas of Icelanders, Leif got thrown off course by a violent storm and his first visions of Canada were not a pleasant forest but “flat and stony land,” perhaps modern-day Baffin Island. Leif and his crew continued their expedition and ended up in an area with many trees, wild grapes, and grains. They brought the grapes back home and called the land Vinland in honor of the fruit.

Today, the area Leif settled has been identified as L'Anse aux Meadow , on the northernmost tip of the island of Newfoundland. Archaeologists working there have unearthed eight houses as well as food and hunted animal remains. The Sagas clearly indicate Norsemen continued to explore the new land during the summer months for several years, making contact with indigenous tribes and trading and often fighting with them. Lacking resources and manpower to fend off the attacking locals, the Vinland settlement was abandoned in less than 10 years. But no one knows for sure how far south the Vikings made it into the Americas.

The Vikings were in North America before Columbus. ( diter /Adobe Stock)

Legends say the Welsh Prince Madoc (Madog) reached the New World with a fleet of ships between the years 1170 and 1171 AD. Specifically, Madoc and his brother Riryd are said to have landed in Mobile Bay, Alabama. When they returned to Wales in 1171 they recruited 100 men, women, and children to form a colony in the new land across the sea. They never returned.

But the story of Welsh inhabitants in the Americas doesn’t end there. It has also been suggested that several Native American tribes may be descended from the members of the prince’s expedition. The Mandan , a tribe that originally lived along the Missouri River, are most commonly connected to this story mainly because of their relatively light colored skin and their hair turning grey. Other European explorers also claimed that the Mandan language was similar to Welsh and the tribe had Welsh-inspired architecture, such as stone forts and permanent towns and villages with planned streets.

Mandan bull boats and lodges. ( Public Domain ) The Mandan people have been linked to the story of the Welsh arriving in America before Columbus.

We may never know who the first non-indigenous person was to reach North America. But one thing is for sure – it was not Christopher Columbus .

Top Image: Which explorers reached North America before Columbus? Source: Alexstar / Adobe Stock

By Alicia McDermott

Also, that there seems to be Malinese script petroglyphs in the Grand Canyon Valley?

I read a short article some time ago "Ancient Earthworks of North America suggest pre-Columbian European contact." https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-americas/ancient-earthwor...

This suggest Europeans came here about 3000 BC.well ducumented

The book, Across Atantic Ice, explores the evidence of Solutrean travelers coming from the Iberian peninsula to the East coast of the USA about 20,000 years ago, and as far south as Florida by following the edge of the ice sheet which extended much further south at that time. The manufacture of arrowheads and other stone artifacts, different from the stone tools found in the Western US suggests they are different people and a different culture, and arrived several thousand years before the people coming from the Northwest. Evidence is also found when fishing boats, dragging the ocean floor of the Continental Shelf, which used to be the coastline before the raising of ocean levels by several hundred feet, has yielded stone artifacts worked by humans, and similar to the technology of stone articles found in Spain and France. The natural tendency of people is to live near oceans, or other bodies of water if they live inland.

Copper mines in Michigan suggest someone was mining copper for bronze way back then.

You also have these cocaine mummies from ancient Egypt.

I think it looks like many people have come here off and on. They traded for a while but eventually the way was lost until it was rediscovered hundreds of years later.

Some people also appear to have made one way trips. Genetic studies are turning up all kinds of stuff. The Cherokees appear to have a middle eastern origin. I haven't even touched upon South America.

Columbus did lead the way for the first sustained settlement. He discovered it for us.

Do those Mandan boats look like coracles?

Alicia McDermott holds degrees in Anthropology, Psychology, and International Development Studies and has worked in various fields such as education, anthropology, and tourism. She is the Chief Editor of Ancient Origins Magazine. Traveling throughout Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, and Ecuador, Alicia... Read More

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Updated Date: April 21, 2022

Since January 22, 2022, DHS has required non-U.S. individuals seeking to enter the United States via land ports of entry and ferry terminals at the U.S.-Mexico and U.S.-Canada borders to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 and provide proof of vaccination upon request.  On April 21, 2022, DHS announced that it would extend these requirements. In determining whether and when to rescind this order, DHS anticipates that it will take account of whether the vaccination requirement for non-U.S. air travelers remains in place.

These requirements apply to non-U.S. individuals who are traveling for essential or non-essential reasons. They do not apply to U.S. citizens, Lawful Permanent Residents, or U.S. nationals.

Effective November 8, 2021, new air travel requirements applied to many noncitizens who are visiting the United States temporarily. These travelers are also required to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination. All air travelers, including U.S. persons, must test negative for COVID-19 prior to departure. Limited exceptions apply. See  CDC guidance  for more details regarding air travel requirements.

Below is more information about what to know before you go, and answers to Frequently Asked Questions about cross-border travel.

Entering the U.S. Through a Land Port of Entry or Ferry Terminal

Q. what are the requirements for travelers entering the united states through land poes.

A:  Before embarking on a trip to the United States, non-U.S. travelers should be prepared for the following:

• Possess proof of an approved COVID-19 vaccination as outlined on the  CDC  website.
• During border inspection, verbally attest to their COVID-19 vaccination status. 
• Bring a  Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative  compliant border crossing document, such as a valid passport (and visa if required), Trusted Traveler Program card, a Department of State-issued Border Crossing Card, Enhanced Driver’s License or Enhanced Tribal Card when entering the country. Travelers (including U.S. citizens) should be prepared to present the WHTI-compliant document and any other documents requested by the CBP officer.

 Q. What are the requirements to enter the United States for children under the age of 18 who can't be vaccinated?

A:  Children under 18 years of age are excepted from the vaccination requirement at land and ferry POEs.

Q: Which vaccines/combination of vaccines will be accepted?

A:  Per CDC guidelines, all Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved and authorized vaccines, as well as all vaccines that have an Emergency Use Listing (EUL) from the World Health Organization (WHO), will be accepted.

Accepted Vaccines:

• More details are available in CDC guidance  here .
• 2 weeks (14 days) after your dose of an accepted single-dose COVID-19 vaccine;
• 2 weeks (14 days) after your second dose of an accepted 2-dose series;
• 2 weeks (14 days) after you received the full series of an accepted COVID-19 vaccine (not placebo) in a clinical trial;
• 2 weeks (14 days) after you received 2 doses of any “mix-and-match” combination of accepted COVID-19 vaccines administered at least 17 days apart.

Q. Is the United States requiring travelers to have a booster dose to be considered fully vaccinated for border entry purposes?

A:  No. The CDC guidance for “full vaccination” can be found here.

Q: Do U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents need proof of vaccination to return to the United States via land POEs and ferry terminals?

A:  No. Vaccination requirements do not apply to U.S. citizens, U.S. nationals, or Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRs). Travelers that exhibit signs or symptoms of illness will be referred to CDC for additional medical evaluation.

Q: Is pre- or at-arrival COVID testing required to enter the United States via land POEs or ferry terminals?

A: No, there is no COVID testing requirement to enter the United States via land POE or ferry terminals. In this respect, the requirement for entering by a land POE or ferry terminal differs from arrival via air, where there is a requirement to have a negative test result before departure.

Processing Changes Announced on January 22, 2022 

Q: new changes were recently announced. what changed on january 22.

A:  Since January 22, 2022, non-citizens who are not U.S. nationals or Lawful Permanent Residents have been required to be vaccinated against COVID-19 to enter the United States at land ports of entry and ferry terminals, whether for essential or nonessential purposes. Previously, DHS required that non-U.S. persons be vaccinated against COVID-19 to enter the United States for nonessential purposes.  Effective January 22, all non-U.S. individuals, to include essential travelers, must be prepared to attest to vaccination status and present proof of vaccination to a CBP officer upon request. DHS announced an extension of this policy on April 21, 2022.

Q: Who is affected by the changes announced on January 22?

A: This requirement does not apply to U.S. citizens, U.S. nationals, or U.S. Lawful Permanent Residents. It applies to other noncitizens, such as a citizen of Mexico, Canada, or any other country seeking to enter the United States through a land port of entry or ferry terminal.

Q: Do U.S. citizens need proof of vaccination to return to the United States via land port of entry or ferry terminals?

A: Vaccination requirements do not apply to U.S. Citizens, U.S. nationals or U.S. Lawful Permanent Residents. Travelers that exhibit signs or symptoms of illness will be referred to CDC for additional medical evaluation. 

Q: What is essential travel?

A:  Under the prior policy, there was an exception from temporary travel restrictions for “essential travel.” Essential travel included travel to attend educational institutions, travel to work in the United States, travel for emergency response and public health purposes, and travel for lawful cross-border trade (e.g., commercial truckers). Under current policy, there is no exception for essential travel.

Q: Will there be any exemptions? 

A: While most non-U.S. individuals seeking to enter the United States will need to be vaccinated, there is a narrow list of exemptions consistent with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Order in the air travel context.

• Certain categories of individuals on diplomatic or official foreign government travel as specified in the CDC Order
• Children under 18 years of age;
• Certain participants in certain COVID-19 vaccine trials as specified in the CDC Order;   
• Individuals with medical contraindications to receiving a COVID-19 vaccine as specified in the CDC Order;
• Individuals issued a humanitarian or emergency exception by the Secretary of Homeland Security;
• Individuals with valid nonimmigrant visas (excluding B-1 [business] or B-2 [tourism] visas) who are citizens of a country with limited COVID-19 vaccine availability, as specified in the CDC Order
• Members of the U.S. Armed Forces or their spouses or children (under 18 years of age) as specified in the CDC Order; and
• Individuals whose entry would be in the U.S. national interest, as determined by the Secretary of Homeland Security.

Q: What documentation will be required to show vaccination status?

A:  Non-U.S. individuals are required to be prepared to attest to vaccination status and present proof of vaccination to a CBP officer upon request regardless of the purpose of travel.

The current documentation requirement remains the same and is available on the CDC website . Documentation requirements for entry at land ports of entry and ferry terminals mirror those for entry by air.

Q: What happens if someone doesn’t have proof of vaccine status?

A: If non-U.S. individuals cannot present proof of vaccination upon request, they will not be admitted into the United States and will either be subject to removal or be allowed to withdraw their application for entry.

Q: Will incoming travelers be required to present COVID-19 test results?

A: There is no COVID-19 testing requirement for travelers at land border ports of entry, including ferry terminals.

Q: What does this mean for those who can't be vaccinated, either due to age or other health considerations? 

A: See CDC guidance for additional information on this topic. Note that the vaccine requirement does not apply to children under 18 years of age.

Q: Does this requirement apply to amateur and professional athletes?

A: Yes, unless they qualify for one of the narrow CDC exemptions.

Q: Are commercial truckers required to be vaccinated?

A: Yes, unless they qualify for one of the narrow CDC exemptions. These requirements also apply to bus drivers as well as rail and ferry operators.

Q. Do you expect border wait times to increase?

A:  As travelers navigate these new travel requirements, wait times may increase. Travelers should account for the possibility of longer than normal wait times and lines at U.S. land border crossings when planning their trip and are kindly encouraged to exercise patience.

To help reduce wait times and long lines, travelers can take advantage of innovative technology, such as facial biometrics and the CBP OneTM mobile application, which serves as a single portal for individuals to access CBP mobile applications and services.

Q: How is Customs and Border Protection staffing the ports of entry? 

A: CBP’s current staffing levels at ports of entry throughout the United States are commensurate with pre-pandemic levels. CBP has continued to hire and train new employees throughout the pandemic. CBP expects some travelers to be non-compliant with the proof of vaccination requirements, which may at times lead to an increase in border wait times. Although trade and travel facilitation remain a priority, we cannot compromise national security, which is our primary mission. CBP Office of Field Operations will continue to dedicate its finite resources to the processing of arriving traffic with emphasis on trade facilitation to ensure economic recovery.

Q: What happens if a vaccinated individual is traveling with an unvaccinated individual?  

A:  The unvaccinated individual (if 18 or over) would not be eligible for admission.

Q: If I am traveling for an essential reason but am not vaccinated can I still enter?

A:  No, if you are a non-U.S. individual. The policy announced on January 22, 2022 applies to both essential and non-essential travel by non-U.S. individual travelers. Since January 22, DHS has required that all inbound non-U.S. individuals crossing U.S. land or ferry POEs – whether for essential or non-essential reasons – be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 and provide related proof of vaccination upon request.

Q: Are sea crew members on vessels required to have a COVID vaccine to disembark?

A:  Sea crew members traveling pursuant to a C-1 or D nonimmigrant visa are not excepted from COVID-19 vaccine requirements at the land border. This is a difference from the international air transportation context.

Entering the U.S. via Air Travel

Q: what are the covid vaccination requirements for air passengers to the united states  .

A:  According to CDC requirements [www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/travelers/noncitizens-US-air-travel.html | Link no longer valid], most noncitizens who are visiting the United States temporarily must be fully vaccinated prior to boarding a flight to the United States. These travelers are required to show proof of vaccination. A list of covered individuals is available on the CDC website.  

Q: What are the COVID testing requirements for air passengers to the United States?  

A:  Effective Sunday, June 12 at 12:01 a.m. ET, CDC will no longer require pre-departure COVID-19 testing for U.S.-bound air travelers.

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Visit the U.S. as a tourist

Learn about travel documents to enter the U.S., including visa waivers and non-immigrant visas.

Visa Waiver Program and ESTA application

The Visa Waiver Program allows citizens of participating countries to travel to the U.S. for tourism or business for up to 90 days without a visa.

How to apply for or renew a U.S. tourist visa

If you visit the U.S. for tourism or business, you may need a visitor visa, also known as a tourist visa. Learn how to get and renew this type of nonimmigrant visa.

How to check the status of your visa application

Find out how to check the status of your visa application online. And to avoid delays, learn how to update your address if you move while waiting for your visa to be approved.

What happens if your visa application is rejected

Find out what to do if your visa is denied, and learn if you are eligible for a waiver of grounds of inadmissibility.

COVID-19 international travel advisories

If you plan to visit the U.S., you do not need to be tested or vaccinated for COVID-19.

Entering the U.S. from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Bermuda

See what travel documents you need to enter the U.S. from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, or Bermuda.

Form I-94 arrival-departure record for U.S. visitors

Visa Waiver Program forms I-94 and I-94W record the arrival and departure dates of U.S. visitors.

How to extend your stay in the U.S.

You may be able to extend your stay in the U.S. Learn if you qualify and how to file for an extension.

Foreign visitors: what to do if your visa or passport is lost or stolen

If you are in the U.S. and your visa or passport was lost or stolen, learn how to report it and apply for a new one.

Visiting America for the first time – 27 valuable things to know

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For anyone visiting America for the first time, these travel tips & valuable things to know will help you plan a better trip.

Whether hitting those bucket list locations such as New York City , or taking on the great outdoors on an epic USA road trip, it’s well worth being prepared with some handy knowledge.

Visiting America for the first time

1. Don’t try to see all of it in one trip

The USA is a mighty big place so it’s impossible to see it all in one trip. I’ve been 15 times and still haven’t begun to scratch the surface.

For this reason. when planning a overseas trip , choosing just a few of your bucket list places is a much better idea. Also be sure to consider the distances and whether you would be better to fly or drive to each.

2. You’ll need an ESTA or visa to enter

Most nationals will only need an ESTA (Electronic System for Travel Authorization) to enter the USA.

• ESTA processing fee $14
• Nationals who DO NOT require a visa must apply for the ESTA (excludes Canada and some other countries)
• ESTA is valid for 2 years and covers multiple trips into the United States (unless your passport expires)
• single entries are valid for 90 days maximum
• Applications are typically processed within 24 hours
• to see your entry requirements got to esta.cbp.dhs.gov

3. Try not to get sick during your travels

The health care system in the United States is pretty dismal so getting sick is something I always try to avoid.

When visiting the USA for the first time my travel companion got sick and needed some heavy duty pain medication. Before we could even see the doctor they wanted us to fork out nearly $200, plus even more for the consultation. It would end us costing us around $500.

It’s a hard pill to swallow (no pun intended) when where we live it would only cost around $30. So stock up on your vitamins and try not to get sick.

4. Get travel insurance

So the good part of our doctors visit story is that we were able to claim most of the medical expenses back due to having travel insurance.

It may be a cost you hate to pay but the expenses you might incur are a much bigger headache. So one of the most important things to do before travelling to the USA is to get travel insurance.

5. Most domestic airlines will charge baggage fees

For those planning on traveling across country, baggage fees can certainly add up.

The big airline carriers in America include American Airlines, United, Delta and South West Airlines. There are also many smaller commercial airlines operating throughout the country. Many will charge baggage fees for domestic travel.

General luggage allowance is 50 pounds / 23 kg.

• American Airlines $30
• United Airlines $35
• South West – first 2 checked bags FREE

6. Tipping is inevitable

If tipping is not a requirement or customary in your place of residence then getting your head around tipping is not easy. But in the USA it is part of life and tipping is politely expected for most services. Think restaurants, taxi fares, tour guides, hotels and bars.

With the minimum wage being so low, tipping your waiter is a gesture of good service. As a rough guide aim to tip 15 to 20%.

To give you an idea of how much you might spend on tips, during my first trip to the USA I spent nearly $400 in tips over a 1 month period.

Related article: A cheats guide to saving money while traveling.

7. The USA is king of food chains

It’s no surprise that the United States comes in first as having the most food chain restaurants in the world. And while you might think this all means lots of fast food, there are actually some really great chain restaurants that are perfect for travellers.

Chain restaurants usually means cheaper food expenses so if you are travelling the USA on a budget, they may just be your best friend. Some of these include P.F Changs, Red Lobster, Outback Steakhouse, Texas Roadhouse, The Cheesecake Factory and Olive Garden.

8. Food portions are huge

While we’re still on the subject of food, you certainly won’t go hungry during your stay. The food portions are absolutely huge so don’t be shy to ask for the rest to go.

9. Don’t forget your power converter

Power plugs are sockets for the USA are type A and B. Standard voltage is 120 V.

I recommend an international power adapter so you can use it for all your future travels. This handy converter with 4 USB ports is all about traveling lightly.

10. There are 9 climate zones in the USA

Weather in the United States can change dramatically from one state to the next. When visiting America for the first time it’s a good idea to brush up on where you are going in regards to expected weather and temperatures.

While regions such as Florida can be hot and humid all year round, head further north and you could be dodging a snow storm during the winter months.

Places such as Utah are also known to be extremely hot during the summer months yet still see snow and extreme cold during winter time.

11. Be aware of extreme weather events

Hurricanes, tornadoes, polar blizzards and firestorms can occur in America without warning. These kind of weather events are prone to certain areas and can sure ruin your vacation in an instant.

Hurricane /Cyclone Season – June 1st to November 30th, peaking between August to October. Florida, Texas, North & South Carolina and Louisiana are the highest hit states.

Tornadoes – these damaging funnels or air are generally formed when cold dry air meets moist warm air. Tornada Alley sees the highest occurrence in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.

Polar blizzards – these freezing snow storms can happen in many states throughout the USA but are more prone to the Northern and Eastern sides. Even southern states such as Texas and California have seen snow storms where altitude are higher.

Firestorms – these ravaging and life threatening fires occur mostly in the state of California during times of high heat, thunderstorms and prevailing winds. Texas and Colorado also have seen their fair share of firestorms.

12. You have to be 21 to drink alcohol

You might be disappointed to know that the drinking age in the USA is 21. So if you are planning on celebrating your birthday in America, best you be over this age.

13. Keep your passport with you at all times

If you look up to 30 years of age in the USA, you will most likely need to show some form of identification if purchasing alcohol. While a driver licence is usually enough, some establishments may ask to see your passport as proof of age.

There are also other times when your passport might just save your arse. This occurred to me while in San Diego when I was pulled over by police for walking in a unbeknownst dodgy part of town. After much questioning and a flash of my passport I was eventually let off, a little shaken by the experience.

14. The USA is the place to take a road trip

Road tripping is one the best experiences when visiting America for the first time.

Head out on the wide open roads in search of adventure and jaw dropping scenery. From the popular coastal route along California’s Pacific Coast Highway to Route 66 which crosses 8 states, taking a road trip is one of the best vacation ideas for your trip.

Rentalcars.com covers all the main car rental companies in order for you to find the best deal.

15. You may want to visit one of the 423 National Parks

The USA has some of the world’s most incredible and diverse National Parks in the world.

The Grand Canyon is by far the most popular for tourists and can be accessed via a range of tours. Personally, I have seen it via a road trip and also on a scenic flight.

Another super popular National Park is Yellowstone with it’s thermal and volcanic activity. It truly has to be seen to be believed. Head further south and you can do the join the Grand Circle Loop, taking in parks such as Zion, Arches, Bryce and Canyonlands.

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is situated on the eastern side of USA and borders North Carolina and Tennessee.

The top 5 visited USA National Parks by international tourists are:

• Grand Canyon NP
• Yosemite NP
• Yellowstone NP
• Bryce Canyon NP

16. A National Parks Pass can save you money

America the Beautiful Annual Parks Pass – costs $80 per vehicle.

While there is no shorter term for visitors to the USA, it still works out to be a cheap option visiting several parks.

For single entry you will pay up to $35 (eg. Yellowstone & Yosimte NP) so it makes sense to purchase one. You can either go online to purchase or grab it as you enter your first park. I recommend the latter as the park may be unattended when you arrive.

17. There’s some seriously incredible and dangerous wild life

The wildlife in the USA is a big reason many tourists are visiting USA for the first time.

Seeing a Bear, Moose or American Bison are incredible moments and worthy of multiple picture taking. But you must also remember that they are wild and a safe distance must be kept at all times. Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons are known for having the best wildlife sightings in the country.

Other wildlife to be weary of include the elusive Mountain Lion which is also known as a cougar. These creatures inhabit many states including California, Montana, Arizona and Florida to name a few.

With 30 species of venomous snakes throughout the country, it’s worth watching where you set foot when out and about in the great outdoors. With the rattle snake being king of dangerous snakes, Arizona tops the state with the most deadliest snakes.

18. Los Angeles is a traffic nightmare

One place to ditch the car is most definitely Los Angles.

Known as having the worst traffic congestion than any other city in the United States, Los Angeles is best avoided on road simply for your insanity.

As a visitor to the great city, I would opt for public transport and covering as much as possible on foot. Alternately a Hop on Hop off bus tour would be a better option than a rental car.

19. America is an incredible melting pot of cultures and ethnicities

Home to over 45 million immigrants, the USA sure is a diverse and cultural place to visit.

Mexico makes up a large portion of this number so knowing a little Spanish goes a long way, particularly in the southern states.

20. You have to try the local cuisine in each region

Back to food. It appears everywhere you go you’ll be met with local delicacies you absolutely must try.

Food trucks and street carts in particular are a cheap way to eat, and this is where you will find some amazing things to try.

Each state appears to have a local cuisine they are best known for so be sure to give them a try.

Here are a few to remember.

New York – best for street carts – includes Pizza, hot dogs and breakfast bagels

New Orleans – Cajun and creole cooking – jambalaya, gumbo and red beans and Rice. Also try the famous Po-Boy and Cafe Du Monde French Beignets.

New England – for the best Clam Chowder

San Diego – for Mexican food. Shrimp tacos are the best and can be found in many restaurants and food trucks.

Texas – juicy and delicious BBQ cook ups as well as pecan pie.

Southern States – fried green tomatoes, southern style chicken, shrimp and grits, biscuits & gravy.

21. Public transport is not so popular with tourists

Public transport in the United States is not particularly loved by many locals let alone tourists visiting. This makes it really hard to traverse the USA on a budget.

While you can certainly get away with using buses and trains, it’s not exactly up to date with the modern world, hense needing a serious upgrade.

Trains and buses can also be an intimidating prospect during night time, though many would have no issue using this means of transport.

Most tourists choose to either fly or rent a car for long distances rather than take a train or bus. For short distances and city commutes during the day you should have no issue on public transport, and I regularly used the New York subway when in town during the day and early evenings.

22. Ride Share options in the USA

Uber and Lyft are the country’s 2 largest ride share companies.

Uber: there are approximately 1 million drivers in the USA. It is available in all 50 states.

Lyft: there are approximately 700,000 + drivers in the USA. It is available in 40 states currently.

23. America is generally safe but…

Every country has crime so I’m certainly not picking on this one. In fact, of my 15 trips to the USA I never had an issue.

But is is worth noting if this is your first time in USA, crime happens and you should be aware of it. Violence and burglary is not uncommon as well as muggings. So be sure to keep your things close by and never assume every stranger means well. This would be the same advice for any country.

I like to carry a money belt to keep my passport and credit cards safe when travelling. You can also store your mobile phone and keys too. The RFID blocking component helps protect your credit cards chips being read.

You can purchase a RFID money belt via Amazon here.

24. Outlet shopping is worth saving for

Though not an avid shopper, the USA is my one exception. And for this reason heading to the many outlet shopping centers is a great place to find super bargains in all departments.

In particular, big brands such as Calvin Klein, Michael Kors, Coach and Kate Spade are high on my radar. Other great brands include Nike, Polo Ralph Lauren, Levi and Tommy Hilfiger.

So if you are also concerned about how much restraint you might or might not have, I suggest when saving for your overseas trip , you save a little more for some incredible bargains.

The top outlets in the country include:

Woodbury Common Premium Outlet – New York

Citadel Outlets – Los Angeles

North Premium Outlets – Las Vegas

Premium Outlets – Seattle

Waikeke Premium Outlets – Hawaii (Ohau)

25. States with no sales tax

Along with tipping, paying sales tax in addition to the advertised price is sometimes confusing.

Just think, you’ve come across something pretty awesome that takes your eye and the price is even sweeter. Then you get to the cashier and the price instantly goes up. That’s because sales tax is added to the price you see out on the shop floor.

Though the average tax is 2% to 7% with California having one of the highest in the country at 7.25%.

There are 5 states with NO sales tax – Alaska, Montana, Delaware, new Hampshire and Oregon. That means what you see is what you pay.

26. Try not to talk politics

Never have I seen a country so torn by the word ‘politics”.

When you hear of families been torn apart by opposite political views, you know it’s serious. So when I was in the USA during Trumps reign I made a note not to bring up the subject in fear of hearing more than I needed to.

27. Pack light for several reasons

Lugging your luggage around is no fun when moving from location to location.

After so many trips to the USA I made it a note to keep it light as possible. Of course I still take checked luggage but try to keep it under 15 kg. Using public transport and staying in cheaper hotels that have no elevator don’t make the situation any easier. Trust me, you’ll thank yourself for it.

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A cheats guide to saving money while traveling.

Know Before You Go: Travelling to America for the First Time

So you’re thinking of travelling to America for the first time? Great news! 

From applying for your ESTA and figuring out state laws to understanding money and American etiquette, this list of thirty things to know before going to America is a must read!

Know Before You Go: Planning Your Trip To America

1. check when hurricane season and tornado season are before booking your trip.

Destinations on the south east coast such as Florida are at risk of hurricanes at certain times of the year. This is known as the Atlantic hurricane season , which runs from June through November.

Likewise, April through June is a peak time for tornadoes to strike places like Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and South Dakota.

So keep both of these freak weather seasons in mind when planning your own USA trip.

2. Check the ‘six month club’ passport validity rules

Travellers from some countries are required to have a passport that is valid for six months beyond their intended stay in the US.

You can check whether this applies to you here [last updated in 2017] .

3. You’ll need to apply for an ESTA before travelling to the USA

ESTA stands for ‘Electronic System for Travel Authorisation’ and is a Visa Waiver Program. 

This enables travellers from certain countries to travel freely throughout the US (up to 90 consecutive days per trip) without having to apply for a traditional visa. For instance, if you’re travelling to the USA from the UK, then an ESTA is for you.

Although authorisation is usually granted within a few hours, it’s recommended to apply for a US ESTA well before your trip in case of any delays. This is the most important thing to do before travelling to the USA!

4. Know the rules about connecting flights

If you’re catching an international flight that has a US connection, which is most common with trips to Canada or South America, then you’ll still need to clear US customs and immigration just as you would if you were staying in America.

This means fulfilling the visa or ESTA visa requirements, even if you’re only staying in an American airport for a couple of hours between connecting flights, so make sure you allow for a 2-3 hour layover (as a minimum).

Know Before You Go: Packing & Border Control

5. you’ll need to pack a type a adapter.

American plug sockets are Type A and Type B (with the latter also fitting Type A sockets). 

We always prefer packing a universal adapter like this one so that we know it’ll work wherever we end up going.

6. Use a TSA-approved lock

Did you know that TSA agents in America are permitted to break locks on your luggage if they suspect something is amiss? A note will be placed inside your bag to tell you if this has happened to you.

To avoid having to replace your lock, you can use TSA-approved locks , which can be opened by any TSA agent with a master key.

7. Always check in online beforehand if you can

Okay so this isn’t a tip specifically for the US but it’s useful to know if you’re new to travelling by air. 

Airlines across the world frequently overbook flights, so that if a passenger doesn’t show up or cancels at the last minute, then the plane will always fly full.

If you’ve checked in online in advance then you won’t be bumped from the flight unless the airline calls for volunteers (and you put your hand up).

There’s a useful TripAdvisor post that goes into this in more detail here .

8. Customs and border control are taken very seriously

Particularly since 9/11, the US takes customs and border control very seriously.

Never try to be smart with border control in your answers to their questions or joke with the TSA agents (unless they’ve already cracked a joke with you first, which is rare).

You’ll be asked all sorts of questions like how long you’re staying for, where you’re staying, is your trip for business or leisure, what work are you doing if it is a business trip and possibly more.

Just answer them honestly and succinctly and you should be stamped through without a problem – providing you’ve sorted your ESTA or visa of course!

Know Before You Go: USA Laws

9. state laws differ across the fifty states.

Something you’ll notice a lot when reading the rest of these top things to know before travelling to America for the first time is that each state operates differently – just like individual countries do!

Each US state is a sovereign entity in its own right, so are granted the power to create state laws and regulate them according to their own needs, to be used alongside federal laws.

Examples of when state laws differ are in the cases of gun control, same-sex marriage and abortion.

10. The legal drinking age is 21

You can vote, smoke and enlist in the military at the age of 18 but you have to be over 21 in order to drink. 

As strange as it sounds, this is a universal law across all US states – and they’re very strict about it, so take your ID everywhere you go!

11. The legal gambling age is sometimes 18 and sometimes 21… and sometimes another number entirely

To gamble in Las Vegas, you have to be 21. Head to Idaho or Rhode Island and you can go to a casino at the age of 18. And then there’s Alabama who calls for you to be 19 before you can legally gamble. Confused yet? Us too.

12. Take note of smoking bans and where they’re in effect

Smoking bans are in effect across a number of US states but – as usual – laws differ from state to state. 

Some states don’t regulate smoking at all, others have banned smoking in certain areas and not others, while other states have banned smoking from nearly everywhere (even in outdoor areas).

Check out this guide to find out where you can – and can’t – light up.

Know Before You Go: Money & Shopping

13. tipping is expected… for almost everything.

Hailing a taxi or Uber? You should tip. Grabbing a coffee to go from a cafe? You should probably tip. Ordering food in a restaurant? You should definitely tip.

In the UK, we’re accustomed to only tipping when we’ve had particularly great service. But in the US, they’re accustomed to tipping. Fullstop.

I remember during my first trip to America that I was surprised there was a tip jar in the takeout section of The Cheesecake Factory. All my server was doing was taking a slice of cake from the display and boxing it up for me, but my American friends were aghast and embarrassed when I “forgot” to add to the tip jar. Since then, I now tip for most things when visiting the US.

14. Always be prepared to pay more than you think

Prices shown in shops and restaurants are excluding tax so you should always expect to pay more than you initially think.

US sales tax is a BEAST to get your head around too as each state has its own individual sales tax rate – and some states like Oregon don’t have a state tax at all!

As a general rule of thumb, you should expect to pay at least 10% more at the till.

15. Credit cards are king pretty much everywhere

America is big on using credit cards pretty much everywhere; there are even some places that flat out refuse to take cash!

So make like Trump and get the flashiest travel credit card you can find!

16. ATMs usually charge for cash withdrawals

Another reason why credit cards are king in America is because most ATMs – even ones at banks – charge you to take money out. 

We found the average price to be about $3 per withdrawal, which is just crazy!

If needed, some gas stations have ATMs inside that don’t charge – look for ‘No Fee ATM’ signs in a cashier window.

17. America doesn’t have chip and PIN everywhere yet either

While the US has recently started to roll out a chip and PIN system across the country, it’s not yet used or accepted by all stores. And don’t even think about trying to use your contactless credit card!

Instead, the chip and sign or swipe and sign methods are used. And sometimes, especially since the announcement in April 2018 from a number of big-name credit card companies, you won’t be asked to sign at all – just insert or swipe and go.

18. Walmart, Target and CVS Pharmacy sell everything you need

Although America is BIG on shopping, if you’re struggling to find something then the chances are high that a Walmart, Target or CVS Pharmacy will have it. So head to one of these stores first and hope for the best!

19. Food portions are HUGE so you’ll probably want to share

Unless you’re used to large portions, you’ll feel your eyes pop out of your head when receiving food from restaurants or takeaways in America.

Scott and I almost always share now wherever we go within the US as we know we won’t finish our meals and don’t want to add to the food wastage issue over there. Plus it’s cheaper as one $15 or $20 plate of food is more than enough for us both!

20. Healthcare and hospital visits aren’t free… nope, not even for tourists!

Americans have to pay for their own healthcare and hospital visits, either with insurance or cash – and this is no different for tourists.

And it doesn’t come cheap either!

A single trip to the emergency room for a few stitches and some antibiotics can cost hundreds of dollars.

So – whatever you do – make sure you buy travel insurance before you book your trip, so that you’re covered for every eventuality, whether flights are cancelled or delayed , your baggage is lost, or worse, you need to see a doctor during your trip.

Know Before You Go: Culture & Etiquette

21. avoid talking about politics during your visit.

Just like Brexit is a touchy subject within the UK at the moment (and for the foreseeable future), politics is very much the same within America.

Despite Trump winning against Hilary Clinton in 2016, ‘swing states’ like Florida, Michigan and Pennsylvania essentially decided the vote – but it was still close-run!

We’d stay clear of discussing politics during your visit as you will find it hard to work out who is a Trump supporter, who isn’t and who has changed their minds since he came into power.

22. Watch out for tourist scams in large cities

From having your photo taken with superheroes to unofficial taxis and “free” gifts, there are various tourist scams to watch out for (particularly in large cities).

Just do a quick search online before your trip for “CITY + SCAMS” (e.g. New York Scams ) so that you’re prepared for what you might see during your trip.

23. Expect to see a lot of poverty and homeless people

While hoards of homeless people frequent large cities, you should expect to also see a big difference in poverty levels between big cities on the coasts and small non-coastal towns (for example).

If you’re not used to seeing homeless people or rundown houses, then it may be a bit of a culture shock for you. So just be prepared for that!

24. Americans measure things differently

Did you know that a section of the United States Constitution states that Congress shall have the power to “fix the standard of weights and measures”? 

This was the start of Americans not using the metric system that was adopted by Britain at the time.

Instead, Americans use US customary units , which means distances are measured in inches, feet, yards and miles; weights and cooking ingredients are measured in pounds, fluid ounces, quarts, cups and gallons; and temperatures are measured in degrees Fahrenheit, not Celsius.

25. Americans also expect you to BE ON TIME!

Americans are big fans of things happening on time, so if you’ve agreed to meet someone at 2pm, that doesn’t mean 2.05 or 2.10pm unless you’ve called ahead first to apologise for being late.

Know Before You Go: Top USA Destinations

26. america spans six different time zones from east to west.

At 3.8 million square miles in size and with a population of over 327 million people, the USA is one of the world’s largest countries.

It’s impossible to see all the top sights on one trip unless you’re travelling full-time or on a gap year – or several gap years!

There are also six different time zones in effect from east to west, which include:

• Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time (HST) 
• Alaska Standard Time (AKST)
• Pacific Standard Time (PST)
• Mountain Standard Time (MST)
• Central Standard Time (CST)
• Eastern Standard Time (EST)

27. Hawaii and Alaska are US states… despite being far away 

Over 500 miles of Canadian soil separates Alaska from Washington. While Hawaii is over 2,400 miles away from its closest state, California. 

BUT! Both destinations are still US states in their own right, so are subject to ESTA visa requirements and state laws just like any other state.

28. There’s more to the US than LA, New York and San Francisco

When travelling to America for the first time, you shouldn’t feel like you’ve “seen” America until you’ve travelled through small and medium-sized towns as well. 

Top places outside of the well-known city hubs include Nashville, Tennessee, Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania. This is where you’ll find true American hometowns and a more local feel.

29. Escape the city and #getoutside

America is a large country and full of incredible outdoor spaces and stunning National Parks. In fact, there are 58 of them in total!

Some of the most well known parks include Yellowstone, Grand Canyon and Yosemite, while lesser known ones that are just as beautiful include Great Basin in Nevada and the Volcano National Park in Hawaii .

Wherever you decide to go to escape the city, you’re sure to discover a world of incredible natural beauty throughout America!

30. Road trips are a popular pastime

Despite America’s size, a popular pastime for locals and tourists alike are road trips .

Perhaps one of the most popular USA road trips is the Pacific Coast Highway in California, which covers some 590 miles and links the popular cities of San Diego, Los Angeles , San Jose and San Francisco . If you love beaches, surfing and Mexican food, then this road trip will be perfect for you!

Another popular road trip in America is Utah’s All-American Road along Scenic Byway 12, which will find you passing desert-like landscapes, mountains, canyons, red rock towers, pine forests, numerous state parks and breathtaking vistas throughout the 119 miles.

Just remember that an American road trip like one of these demands quite a lot of your time and energy, so don’t rush it!

Did you find this list of things to know before going to America useful? Is there anything else you want to know about ESTAs, etiquette, eateries, etc? Just let us know in the comments below…

Pin ‘30 Things to Know Before Travelling to America for the First Time’ now, read it again later!

Justine Jenkins

Justine is one half of the married couple behind the Wanderers of the World travel blog. She lives in Bristol, UK and has travelled extensively within Europe and beyond since 2013. After her trips, she shares detailed travel itineraries, helpful travel guides and inspiring blog posts about the places she's been to. When she's not travelling overseas, you'll find her joining her husband, Scott on various day trips, weekend getaways and walks within the UK, which she also writes about on Wanderers of the World. Aside from travelling and writing, she also loves reading, crafting and learning about nature.

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Dos And Don’ts When Visiting The U.S. For The First Time

Visiting the U.S. is an exciting and often life-changing experience for those who have never been, so here are some helpful dos and don'ts.

The United States attracts visitors worldwide to witness its bucket list destinations, the most spectacular scenery in the world, and the most recognizable icons on the planet. Incredible sights are sprinkled around the country, and people with unlimited time and resources will enjoy the most of their trip to the greatest country in the world. Visitors to the US will want to hit the iconic Grand Canyon , marvelous Niagara Falls, historic Statue of Liberty, the White House, Walt Disney World Resort, the magnificent island of Waikiki, the fantastic Las Vegas Strip, Yosemite National Park, Golden Gate Bridge, Times Square, and the list goes on.

However, despite the US being the country of freedom, there are many things to avoid when spending a vacation there. Here's a guide to the do's and dont's when visiting the US.

Related:  The Cheapest Cities To Visit In The United States (& What You Can Do In Them)

Here Are The Things To Do When Visiting The US For The First Time

When eating out at a restaurant in the United States, people must leave tips since service workers rely on them, and tips make up a large percentage of their salaries. One is recommended to leave a tip anywhere between 10% and 20%. Some restaurants in the US will automatically include a tipping fee of around 18% in the bill once they know the client is coming from another country. In other places, the customer can put as many tips as they want. However, it isn't polite to walk out of a restaurant without putting tips at all.

• Recommended: People are advised to read their restaurant bill in detail and refer to the management if they find suspicious tip charges inside.

Americans are very time-sensitive, and they take punctuality very seriously. Thus, a meeting at 7:00 pm means 7:00 pm sharp. Moreover, it is better to reach the place a couple of minutes ahead of the meeting. According to Americans, being late is rude. People who don't know the area where they're heading must give themselves more time than they think they need to go somewhere. This is to avoid heavy traffic and other unexpected delays that might occur.

In many parts of the world, people think that No Parking signs and stop lights are just suggestions for drivers. However, this case does not apply to the US. In most jurisdictions inside the country, parking and traffic laws are seriously enforced. This is why people visiting the United States must respect traffic laws and abide by the regulations. Moreover, it is worthy to note that Americans drive on the right-hand side of the road, opposite Australia, the UK, and other countries.

When visiting the United States, it is a must to see the fantastic national parks in the country, and not only hit fan-favorite places, such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York City, and Washington DC. At the unique national parks of the US , people will have the chance to witness mammals only found in North America, such as grizzly bears.

Kindness Is Key

In the United States, it is essential to be kind to people. When asking questions, one is expected to say "please" and "thank you." Moreover, people visiting the US must be patient. Locals will reward kind people, and they will be guided to the best in their cities and towns.

Related:  Las Vegas Boasts The Largest Ferris Wheel In The United States

Here's What Not To Do When Visiting The United States For The First Time

The United States is larger than Europe. This is why people must not expect to see and do too much during their first short trip to the country. Many travelers to the states think they can see Miami, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington DC in a single trip. However, such a tour will leave one extremely tired and exhausted. A better way to experience America is to focus on one region and travel deeper. So, they must either focus on East Coast or West Coast destinations during a single trip. Areas of the East Coast include Washington DC and New York City, while West Coast destinations include San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles. Some people like to visit other areas, such as the Northwest, Midwest, and Southwest.

Some smokers may not like the situation in some states in America because they have implemented some of the harshest anti-smoking policies in the world. For instance, Chicago, San Francisco, New York City, Seattle, Washington DC, and others ban smoking in clubs, restaurants, bars, malls, and other places. Furthermore, California has expanded its smoking ban to private residences, healthcare facilities, beaches, and parks. Thus, when visiting the US for the first time, people must not assume that they can smoke anywhere they want.

American slang must be avoided at all costs. This is because American people will feel offended and take very seriously any demeaning or degrading comments associated with specific ethnic groups or races. It would also be better to adopt daily-life vocabulary, such as "How are you doing" instead of "How are you."

Next:  These Are The Foods That The United States Is Most Known For

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U.S. issues travel warning for Israel with Iran attack believed to be imminent and fear Gaza war could spread

By Debora Patta , Tucker Reals

Updated on: April 13, 2024 / 5:25 PM EDT / CBS News

Update: Iran launched drone attacks against Israel on Saturday. Read CBS News'  latest coverage here .

Tel Aviv  — Israel is bracing for a worst-case scenario that U.S. officials believe could materialize within just hours — the possibility of a direct attack on Israeli soil by Iran in retaliation for a strike almost two weeks ago that killed seven Iranian military officers. Iran has vowed to take revenge for Israel killing its commanders, who were hit by an April 1 strike on the Iranian embassy in Syria's capital.

Two U.S. officials told CBS News that a major Iranian attack against Israel was expected as soon as Friday, possibly to include more than 100 drones and dozens of missiles aimed at military targets inside the country. Sources have told CBS News the retaliation could include attacks carried out both by Iranian forces, and proxy groups around the region that it has been funneling additional arms to for weeks.  

The officials said it would be challenging for the Israelis to defend against an attack of that magnitude, and while they held out the possibility that the Iranians could opt for a smaller-scale attack to avoid a dramatic escalation, their retaliation was believed to be imminent. 

Asked Friday how imminent he believes an attack is, President Biden responded, "I don't want to get into secure information, but my expectation is sooner than later." The president urged Iran not to move forward, saying his message to Tehran was: "Don't."

Tehran has not indicated publicly how or when it will return fire, so it's unclear how far Iran's leaders will go. If they decide to carry out a direct attack on Israel, there's fear it could blow Israel's ongoing war against Iranian ally Hamas up into a much wider regional conflict.

With the Iranian retaliation expected at any time, the U.S. State Department on Thursday warned Americans in Israel not to travel outside major cities, which are better protected from incoming rocket fire by the country's Iron Dome missile defense system. The latest guidance noted that travel by U.S. government employees in Israel could be further restricted with little notice as things develop in the tinderbox region.

"Whoever harms us, we will harm them," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed Thursday as he visited troops at an Israel Defense Forces airbase. "We are prepared … both defensively and offensively."

On Saturday, all U.S. embassies in the Middle East were put on high alert and required to hold emergency action committee meetings. Diplomats in Lebanon and Israel were specifically told not to travel to certain areas within those countries.

Sima Shine, a security expert and former official with Israel's national intelligence agency Mossad, told CBS News it was a dangerous moment for the region, and the "most worried" she has been. She said anxiety over an all-out war was likely just as high "on both sides, in Israel and in Iran."

If Iran does choose to strike Israel directly, it could involve a complex missile and drone attack similar to the one Iranian forces launched against a Saudi oil facility in 2019 .

"They will try to do it on the military or some military asset," Shine predicted. "But the question will be the damage. If there would be many injured people, killed or injured … I think it has the potential for a huge escalation."

Shine stressed, however, that she still believes neither side actually wants a regional conflict.

U.S. "really trying to avoid war"

The U.S. sent a senior general to Israel this week to coordinate with the close American ally on any response it might make to an Iranian attack. Speaking Friday on "CBS Mornings," America's top military officer said, "we're really trying to avoid war."

"This is part of the dialogue that I have with my counterparts within the region, to include the Israeli chief of defense, who I talked to yesterday," said Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr., adding that the U.S. military was "doing things not only to prevent a war, but at the same time, one of my primary things is to make sure all the forces in the region are protected."

"My role, as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, is to plan and prepare," Brown said. "That's one thing we do very well."

Brown's Israeli counterpart, Chief of the General Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, "completed a comprehensive situational assessment on the readiness of the IDF for all scenarios," Israel's military said Friday. 

"The IDF is very strongly prepared, both offensively and defensively, against any threat," Halevi was quoted as saying in the statement. "The IDF continues to monitor closely what is happening in Iran and different arenas, constantly preparing to deal with existing and potential threats in coordination with the United States Armed Forces." 

The IDF said the visiting U.S. general, Central Command chief Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla, was taking part in the IDF's situational assessment.

The dilemma for Iran, said Israeli expert Shine, is to figure out how to deliver its promised response to Israel's attack in Syria, but in a way that does not lead to further escalation. Likewise, Shine said Israel could choose to show restraint when it responds to whatever Iran eventually does.

If either side gets the balance wrong, the consequences for the region, and even the world, could be dire.

Weijia Jiang, David Martin, Margaret Brennan and Olivia Gazis contributed reporting.

• Middle East
• Benjamin Neta​nyahu

Debora Patta is a CBS News foreign correspondent based in Johannesburg. Since joining CBS News in 2013, she has reported on major stories across Africa, the Middle East and Europe. Edward R. Murrow and Scripps Howard awards are among the many accolades Patta has received for her work.

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Bank of America to Report First-Quarter 2024 Financial Results on April 16

April 9, 2024 at 9:00 AM Eastern

CHARLOTTE, NC – As previously announced, Bank of America will report its first-quarter 2024 financial results on Tuesday, April 16.  The results will be released at approximately 6:45 a.m. ET, followed by an investor presentation at 8:30 a.m. ET.

The news release, supplemental filing and investor presentation can be accessed at Bank of America’s Investor Relations website at https://investor.bankofamerica.com/quarterly-earnings .

Investor Conference Call Information

For a listen-only connection to the investor presentation, dial 1.877.200.4456 (U.S.) or 1.785.424.1732 (international). The conference ID is 79795. Please dial in 10 minutes prior to the start of the call. Investors can also listen to live audio of the conference call and view the presentation slides by visiting the “Events & Presentations” section of the company’s Investor Relations website.

Replay information for Investor Conference Call

Investors can access replays of the conference call by visiting the Investor Relations website or by calling 1.800.934.4850 (U.S.) or 1.402.220.1178 (international) from noon on April 16 through 11:59 p.m. ET on April 26.

Bank of America

Bank of America is one of the world’s leading financial institutions, serving individual consumers, small and middle-market businesses and large corporations with a full range of banking, investing, asset management and other financial and risk management products and services. The company provides unmatched convenience in the United States, serving approximately 69 million consumer and small business clients with approximately 3,800 retail financial centers, approximately 15,000 ATMs (automated teller machines) and award-winning digital banking with approximately 57 million verified digital users. Bank of America is a global leader in wealth management, corporate and investment banking and trading across a broad range of asset classes, serving corporations, governments, institutions and individuals around the world. Bank of America offers industry-leading support to approximately 4 million small business households through a suite of innovative, easy-to-use online products and services. The company serves clients through operations across the United States, its territories and more than 35 countries. Bank of America Corporation stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: BAC).

Investors May Contact:

Lee McEntire, Bank of America Phone:  1.980.388.6780 [email protected]

Jonathan G. Blum, Bank of America (Fixed Income) Phone: 1.212.449.3112 [email protected]

Reporters May Contact:

Bill Halldin, Bank of America Phone: 1.916.724.0093 [email protected]

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This material does not take into account your particular investment objectives, financial situations or needs and is not intended as a recommendation, offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any security, financial instrument, or strategy. Before acting on any information in this material, you should consider whether it is suitable for your particular circumstances and, if necessary, seek professional advice. Any opinions expressed herein are given in good faith, are subject to change without notice, and are only correct as of the stated date of their issue.

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"Bank of America" is the marketing name for the global banking and global markets business of Bank of America Corporation. Lending, derivatives, and other commercial banking activities are performed globally by banking affiliates of Bank of America Corporation, including Bank of America, N.A., Member FDIC. Securities, strategic advisory, and other investment banking activities are performed globally by investment banking affiliates of Bank of America Corporation ("Investment Banking Affiliates"), including, in the United States, BofA Securities, Inc. and Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated, both of which are registered broker-dealers and Members of  SIPC , and, in other jurisdictions, by locally registered entities. BofA Securities, Inc. is registered as a futures commission merchant with the CFTC and is a member of the NFA.

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La presentación del X-59 de la NASA personifica la tradición aeronáutica

65 years ago: nasa selects america’s first astronauts, johnson space center.

On Nov. 5, 1958, NASA, newly established to lead America’s civilian space program, formally established the Space Task Group (STG) at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, to implement one of the nation’s top priorities – to develop a spacecraft capable of sending humans into space and returning them safely to Earth. In January 1959, the STG selected a contractor to build the spacecraft for Project Mercury and began the process of choosing who would fly the spacecraft. President Dwight D. Eisenhower directed NASA to choose its first astronauts from among the ranks of military pilots. The three-month rigorous process led to the selection on April 2, 1959, of seven men from among America’s military branches. The agency presented them to the world on April 9 as America’s Mercury 7 astronauts.

President Eisenhower decided that military test pilots would make the most suitable astronauts. Choosing from among armed forces personnel would expedite the selection process since the government had access to their records and all had received prior security clearances and medical screening. On Jan. 5, 1959, NASA established the qualifications for the astronauts: less than 40 years of age; less than 5 feet 11 inches tall; excellent physical condition; bachelor’s degree or equivalent; graduate of test pilot school; and 1,500 hours of jet flight time. A screening in late January of the files of 508 graduates of the Navy and Air Force test pilot schools who met the basic age and flying requirements resulted in 110 qualified candidates. The selection committee ranked these candidates and divided them into three groups of about 35 each. The first two groups, comprising 69 candidates, received classified briefings at the Pentagon about the Mercury spacecraft and their potential participation. From this group, 53 volunteered for further evaluation and NASA decided not to call in the third group of candidates. Following an initial medical screening, 32 from this group advanced to undergo thorough medical evaluations at the Lovelace Foundation for Medical Education and Research, commonly known as the Lovelace Clinic, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Beginning on Feb. 7, the candidates in six groups of five or six spent one week at Lovelace undergoing comprehensive medical examinations. From there, 31 of the 32 (one candidate failed a blood test at Lovelace) advanced to the Aero Medical Laboratory (AML) at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, where weeklong testing of the six groups took place between Feb. 15 and March 28. Rather than simply examining them physically, testing at AML consisted of stressing the candidates in centrifuges, altitude chambers, and other devices to evaluate their reactions. The selection committee met at Langley in late March and based on all the available data selected seven candidates for Project Mercury. The 24 unsuccessful candidates received notification by telephone on April 1 with a follow up letter from Assistant STG Manager Charles J. Donlan on April 3, also advising them to apply for any possible future astronaut selections. Four of them did apply to the second selection in 1962, and NASA selected two of them. The seven chosen as Mercury astronauts received telephone calls from Donlan on April 2.

On April 9, 1959, NASA formally introduced the men to the nation and the world. The event took place in the ballroom of the Dolley Madison House on Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C., the new space agency’s first headquarters. The astronauts took their seats at a long table on a makeshift stage, and NASA Administrator T. Keith Glennan introduced them in alphabetical order: “ Malcolm S. Carpenter , Leroy G. Cooper , John H. Glenn , Virgil I. Grissom , Walter M. Schirra , Alan B. Shepard , and Donald K. Slayton … the nation’s Mercury astronauts!” After a brief photo session, for the next 90 minutes the new astronauts responded to numerous questions from the reporters gathered in the ballroom. For most of the men, meeting the press represented a new experience as they had little prior exposure to the media in their previous jobs as test pilots. By the time the event concluded, they clearly sensed that their lives had changed forever, with public attention as much a part of their jobs as training for and flying in space. They reported for work at Langley on April 27.

Carpenter flew America’s second orbital flight, Mercury 7, in May 1962, after serving as backup to Glenn for his historic first orbital flight. He named his capsule Aurora 7 . Due to late firing of his retrorockets for the deorbit burn, Carpenter landed 250 miles from the target, and he waited hours for rescue forces to recover him. Cooper served as Schirra’s backup before getting his flight assignment on Mercury 9. He spent 34 hours aboard his Faith 7 capsule, at the time the longest American spaceflight. He served as command pilot of the eight-day Gemini V mission in August 1965, setting another American record. As his last assignment, he served as backup commander for Apollo 10 in 1969. Glenn made history in February 1962 as the first American to orbit the Earth aboard Friendship 7 . Although he retired from NASA in 1964 to pursue a career in politics, he flew again as a U.S. Senator in 1998 aboard STS-95 at age 77, still the record as the oldest person to orbit the Earth. Grissom flew the second suborbital mission, Mercury 4, aboard his Liberty Bell 7 capsule, in August 1961. Following splashdown, his spacecraft’s hatch accidentally blew off and seawater rapidly filled it, a recovery helicopter pulling him to safety at the last moment. As the first American to travel to space a second time, he commanded the first two-man spacecraft, Gemini 3, in March 1965. He received a third spaceflight assignment as the commander of Apollo 1 , the first flight of the three-person spacecraft. He died tragically during a ground test fire of the spacecraft on Jan. 27, 1967.

Schirra served as Carpenter’s backup before flying six orbits aboard his Sigma 7 spacecraft during the Mercury 8 mission in October 1962. He served as Grissom’s backup for Gemini 3 and flew as the command pilot for Gemini VI in December 1965, the first space rendezvous mission. Two months earlier, he showed his cool when on the first attempt to launch Gemini VI, the rocket’s engines shutdown just before liftoff. Before the Apollo 1 fire, he served as the commander of the Apollo 2 mission, then once again as Grissom’s backup for Apollo 1. After the fire, he flew as the commander of Apollo 7 , the first crewed test of Command and Service Module in October 1968, the only astronaut to fly aboard all three of America’s first spacecraft. Shepard holds the honor as the first American in space for his suborbital flight aboard Freedom 7 during the Mercury 4 mission in May 1961. Grounded by an inner ear malady, Shepard went on to lead the astronauts as their chief until reinstated to flight duty in May 1969. He served as the commander of Apollo 14 in January-February 1971, the only Mercury 7 astronaut to walk on the Moon. Originally assigned to fly the Mercury 7 mission, in March 1962, flight surgeons grounded Slayton due to a heart irregularity just two months before his scheduled mission aboard Delta 7. While grounded, he served as chief of flight crew operations. Flight surgeons reinstated him to flying status in March 1972, and soon after NASA assigned him as the docking module pilot for the July 1975 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project joint mission with the Soviet Union.

Astronaut biographies can be found at https://www.nasa.gov/astronauts

Read the JSC History Office oral histories with Carpenter , Cooper , Glenn , Schirra , and Shepard .

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