In the early 13th century, Athapaskan speakers from Canada entered the Great Basin and the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains creating opportunities for later ancestral Apache groups to move into the southern and central Great Plains. These groups were the ancestors of modern Plains and Lipan Apache people who figured so prominently in Great Plains ethnohistoric records in the 1500s to 1800s. In this talk Dr. Hill will summarize our current understanding of the archaeological record for precontact Apache groups on the Central Great Plains. He also will review regional differences in early Apache ways of life and subsistence practices and provide an overview of timing of first Apache settlement in the Western U.S. This talk emphasizes new technologies and customs that came from interactions with non-Apache peoples during their migration to the Great Plains that helped shape Apache life and identity.