Were Native Americans in Wisconson the worlds first coppersmiths?

​Were Native Americans in Wisconson the worlds first coppersmiths? 

In a 2021 study published in Radiocarbon, archaeologists believe that "the Old Copper Culture emerged at least 9500 years ago and peaked between 7000 and 5000 years ago."  This suggests that the copper artifacts of Indigenous peoples of the Lake Superior Basin are at least as old, perhaps older than cultures in the Middle East.  (Pompeani and Steinman and Abbott 2021)

The Lake Superior Basin is an area rich with native copper deposits. Nearly pure and sometimes found in nugget form on the ground, it was an easy pathway into metal smithing because the nuggets would not require the added material preparation of extracting the metal from a host ore or quartz. If one found an appropriately sized nugget, it could be cold hammered into the desired shape. More on cold hammering later! 
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Pompeani, David P. and Byron A Steinman and Mark B Abbott. 2021. "On the Timing of the Old Copper Complex in North America: A Comparison of Radiocarbon Dates From Different Archaeological Contexts." Radiocarbon. 63(2). Cambridge University Press: 513–531 LINK

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https://www.science.org/content/article/ancient-native-americans-were-among-world-s-first-coppersmiths#:~:text=Ancient%20Native%20Americans%20were%20among%20the%20world's%20first%20coppersmiths%20%7C%20Science%20%7C%20AAAS

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