Humanity was harnessing fire for technology over seventy thousand years ago - leading to us winning the evolutionary game so hard we ended up researching it instead of playing.
This past summer a global team of researchers found evidence of rock tool use among early South African tribes, but couldn't find any of the actual rocks. Since seventy thousand years is barely a blink by geological standards this was something of a problem, until they found some rocks buried in a fire-pit and realised: they were right about the rocks in the area being wrong. And early man had been making his own.
By firing native silcrete rocks the very first technologists on record created something better than anything that existed before. Fired silcrete was far easier to shape into tools, and by tools we mean "sharp things for making meat hold still before you eat it." More importantly the prevalence of fired silcrete tools means this wasn't a lucky accident (at least, not after the first time.) The tribes must have been able to pass on the process, refining it as they went and becoming the very first - and thus most important - designers. And we can all agree that "make food us live!" is a better mission statement than most of the crap we have today.
It's an incredible insight into early evolution, and just how humanity became so awesomely dominant we can waste resources on crap like Pokemon while every other species struggles to stay alive. It meant communication, co-operation, teamwork and - since hunters would have to feed the fire-users - the ability to put the good of the group ahead of your own short term gains. A trick which those who follow politics might say we're losing.
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