Borax Lake Site

Borax Lake Site, also known as Borax Lake—Hodges Archaeological Site, is an archaeological site near Clearlake, California. A portion of the site is owned and preserved by the Archaeological Conservancy.

In 2006, a National Park Service statement about it read:

The Borax Lake Site is considered of national significance as the type site for a major prehistoric period in the far western United States, the Paleo-Indian (Clovis), referred to in archeological literature of the Western Great Basin and California as the Post Pattern. The occurrence of Clovis-like projectile points from Borax Lake in the Coast Range of northern California dramatically extended the geographic scope of Paleo-Indian occupation into the far western United States. Archeological investigations at the Borax Lake Site demonstrated that Paleo-Indian occupation of the Far West (Western Great Basin and California) represents a specialized lake shore dwelling adaptation”by this group, which was significant because it represented a unique response to an environment that had been unfamiliar to Paleo-Indians. This adaptation is referred to as the Western Pluvial Lakes Tradition and differs from the large mammal hunting traditions of the southwestern United States and Great Plains.

It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 2006.