The sudden unexplained disappearance of the Red Paint People is considered a mystery. It has been observed, however, that their stone tool technology apparently ended without influencing the Susquehanna culture that inhabited the same area years later. 

        One of the theories explaining their disappearance was based on evidence that coastal Maine was sliding under the ocean (Robinsion 1997). The geological evidence for this has been expanded to include the suggestion that coastal inhabitants may have:

 succumbed to tidal waves that resulted from violent earthquakes that may have caused the land to sink. While such catastrophes did not likely wipe the people out, the slow rise of the sea level [as depicted in the pictures below] is methodically destroying the coastal occupation sites, and thus our ability to learn about them. (Robinson 1997).

   The images below  show the changing sea levels.

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