1 00:00:05,400 --> 00:00:08,920 Speaker 1: There were so many questions about the site that were unanswered. 2 00:00:09,280 --> 00:00:12,959 Speaker 1: That's why I went back seventy years later. On this 3 00:00:13,039 --> 00:00:16,520 Speaker 1: episode of the Bargaris podcast, we're going to the site 4 00:00:16,600 --> 00:00:20,479 Speaker 1: of an ancient bison kill, the one found by George 5 00:00:20,520 --> 00:00:24,560 Speaker 1: mcjuncan on Part one of the series. After George's death, 6 00:00:24,680 --> 00:00:27,880 Speaker 1: it would become known as the Fulsome Site. It was 7 00:00:27,960 --> 00:00:31,639 Speaker 1: here that stone tools made by humans were found with 8 00:00:31,720 --> 00:00:36,000 Speaker 1: a relic form of Pleistocene bison and forever planted an 9 00:00:36,080 --> 00:00:40,920 Speaker 1: indisputable data point into the debate of human antiquity in 10 00:00:41,000 --> 00:00:44,440 Speaker 1: North America. We're gonna talk with Old Steve ronnella of 11 00:00:44,560 --> 00:00:49,479 Speaker 1: Meat Eater and the nation's leading expert on the Fulsome site, 12 00:00:49,760 --> 00:00:53,519 Speaker 1: Dr David Meltzer. He literally wrote the book on Fulsome 13 00:00:53,840 --> 00:00:57,959 Speaker 1: after he went back there seventy years after its initial 14 00:00:58,040 --> 00:01:02,400 Speaker 1: excavation and excavator in it again to find more answers. 15 00:01:02,760 --> 00:01:07,480 Speaker 1: So on this podcast, we're going back to Fulsome. I 16 00:01:07,680 --> 00:01:11,400 Speaker 1: really doubt you're gonna want to miss this one. But first, 17 00:01:11,840 --> 00:01:15,840 Speaker 1: I have an overarching question I'd like to present to you, 18 00:01:15,920 --> 00:01:19,920 Speaker 1: and it's this, What is the relevance of this knowledge 19 00:01:20,000 --> 00:01:24,000 Speaker 1: about these ancient people in their lives? Why do we care? 20 00:01:24,400 --> 00:01:28,320 Speaker 1: Is it merely entertainment to try to understand them or 21 00:01:28,400 --> 00:01:32,280 Speaker 1: is there more? I'm in search of the answer. These 22 00:01:32,319 --> 00:01:36,280 Speaker 1: things were herded, driven into a box canyon and then 23 00:01:36,360 --> 00:01:39,040 Speaker 1: just raindown spears. I don't even kill them. You can't 24 00:01:39,160 --> 00:01:42,320 Speaker 1: make them go anywhere they don't want to go. We 25 00:01:42,319 --> 00:01:44,520 Speaker 1: don't have to drive them in there. Oh we gotta 26 00:01:44,560 --> 00:01:46,520 Speaker 1: do is wait until they go up in their own 27 00:01:46,600 --> 00:01:57,680 Speaker 1: their own So I think it was an accident. My 28 00:01:57,800 --> 00:02:01,360 Speaker 1: name is Clay Nukelem, and this is the Air Grease podcast, 29 00:02:01,600 --> 00:02:05,920 Speaker 1: where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search for insight 30 00:02:06,080 --> 00:02:09,720 Speaker 1: and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the story of 31 00:02:09,760 --> 00:02:14,440 Speaker 1: Americans who lived their lives close to the land. Presented 32 00:02:14,560 --> 00:02:19,520 Speaker 1: by f HF gear, American made purpose built hunting and 33 00:02:19,560 --> 00:02:23,040 Speaker 1: fishing gear as designed to be as rugged as the 34 00:02:23,040 --> 00:02:34,360 Speaker 1: places we explore. Yeah, that's see, that's the only way 35 00:02:34,400 --> 00:02:37,800 Speaker 1: that I need to get in here. I'm walking through 36 00:02:37,840 --> 00:02:42,079 Speaker 1: a grassy meadow headed towards a small drainage. The clicking 37 00:02:42,200 --> 00:02:47,560 Speaker 1: you're hearing is Kyle Bell's Spurs the wild Worth Royo. 38 00:02:48,240 --> 00:02:56,000 Speaker 1: That's it. We're eleven miles west of Folsom, New Mexico, 39 00:02:56,200 --> 00:02:59,480 Speaker 1: on the Crowfoot Ranch. The place we're headed to is 40 00:02:59,480 --> 00:03:03,680 Speaker 1: where a Pleistocene hunters killed a cow calf herd of 41 00:03:03,800 --> 00:03:08,440 Speaker 1: thirty two bison some ten thousand, three hundred years ago. 42 00:03:09,280 --> 00:03:13,440 Speaker 1: Here they found the bison bone piles buried beneath ten 43 00:03:13,600 --> 00:03:18,240 Speaker 1: feet of earth and astonishingly roughly twenty stone points of 44 00:03:18,280 --> 00:03:22,080 Speaker 1: a design that had never been documented before. They called 45 00:03:22,120 --> 00:03:26,200 Speaker 1: this place the fulsome sight. You'd walk right past it 46 00:03:26,280 --> 00:03:28,520 Speaker 1: if you didn't know what you were looking for. It 47 00:03:28,560 --> 00:03:32,480 Speaker 1: looks like every other place on this ranch, but something 48 00:03:32,639 --> 00:03:36,560 Speaker 1: special happened here. This is the voice of the current 49 00:03:36,720 --> 00:03:42,760 Speaker 1: manager of the Crowfoot Ranch, Seth. They had all those 50 00:03:42,840 --> 00:03:45,920 Speaker 1: archaeologists come out, you know, from this different schools, and 51 00:03:46,320 --> 00:03:49,640 Speaker 1: they did a dig twenty years ago, twenty plus, so 52 00:03:49,680 --> 00:03:52,120 Speaker 1: all this disturbed dirt they they dug right in here. 53 00:03:52,280 --> 00:03:54,280 Speaker 1: What I thought was ironic that they found was they 54 00:03:54,280 --> 00:03:56,640 Speaker 1: said that they were being selective of meat. Have you 55 00:03:56,680 --> 00:03:58,200 Speaker 1: heard that? Because they didn't have any of their lower 56 00:03:58,280 --> 00:04:00,400 Speaker 1: jaw bones to them, so they thought they were eating 57 00:04:00,400 --> 00:04:02,760 Speaker 1: the tongues out of him. Yeah, really, and they were. 58 00:04:02,800 --> 00:04:05,600 Speaker 1: They thought that was a delicacy. Here you're at the site. 59 00:04:06,000 --> 00:04:08,760 Speaker 1: So when George found it, would it have been like 60 00:04:08,800 --> 00:04:11,680 Speaker 1: it had been like a fresh cut bank after a 61 00:04:11,720 --> 00:04:14,120 Speaker 1: big floor. Yeah, I mean you look, you can come 62 00:04:14,200 --> 00:04:17,159 Speaker 1: up here and look at the erosion from it. Uh. 63 00:04:17,240 --> 00:04:20,520 Speaker 1: And I assumed that this this has probably eroded more since. 64 00:04:20,600 --> 00:04:24,560 Speaker 1: But you see how steep it was in in that flood. 65 00:04:24,920 --> 00:04:26,960 Speaker 1: You know, it probably took another two or three foot 66 00:04:27,040 --> 00:04:31,640 Speaker 1: off the sides. And that's when he set found the bone. 67 00:04:33,200 --> 00:04:35,520 Speaker 1: In part one of this series, we learned that the 68 00:04:35,640 --> 00:04:38,680 Speaker 1: site was discovered a nineteen o eight by freed slave 69 00:04:38,760 --> 00:04:42,839 Speaker 1: named George mcjunkin. He was a self educated, self made 70 00:04:42,880 --> 00:04:45,960 Speaker 1: man who became a renowned cowboy and the manager of 71 00:04:46,000 --> 00:04:50,960 Speaker 1: the Crowfoot Ranch. The site wasn't excavated by professional archaeologists 72 00:04:51,040 --> 00:04:54,880 Speaker 1: until after George's death, so he never knew the significance 73 00:04:54,920 --> 00:04:58,680 Speaker 1: of his discovery. In this podcast series, we're en route 74 00:04:58,720 --> 00:05:01,760 Speaker 1: to get a layman's pa h D on the fulsome site. 75 00:05:02,240 --> 00:05:05,800 Speaker 1: You've heard Steve Ronella on Fair Greece before. He's a 76 00:05:05,839 --> 00:05:10,000 Speaker 1: George Junkin junkie and has been forever fascinated by ice 77 00:05:10,120 --> 00:05:13,440 Speaker 1: age hunters. In fact, he loved the bison hunters of 78 00:05:13,480 --> 00:05:15,919 Speaker 1: the American planes so much he wrote a book called 79 00:05:15,960 --> 00:05:21,080 Speaker 1: American Buffalo and he's been to the Fulsome site. Here's 80 00:05:21,120 --> 00:05:28,320 Speaker 1: Steve of all the different really cool archaeological sites in America. 81 00:05:28,600 --> 00:05:30,560 Speaker 1: I think one of the best things about the Fulsome 82 00:05:30,600 --> 00:05:34,000 Speaker 1: site is that the finding of it, like the circumstances 83 00:05:34,040 --> 00:05:37,719 Speaker 1: of who found it and how with the flash flood 84 00:05:37,760 --> 00:05:42,040 Speaker 1: and you know, everybody dying in this freed slave trying 85 00:05:42,080 --> 00:05:44,640 Speaker 1: to convince people to come. Look, right, the finding of 86 00:05:44,680 --> 00:05:47,400 Speaker 1: it's as cool as what happened. So it's like a 87 00:05:47,440 --> 00:05:50,800 Speaker 1: double whammy. Finding it is way cooler than just some 88 00:05:51,000 --> 00:05:53,760 Speaker 1: I mean no disrespect, but if some anthropologists had just 89 00:05:53,920 --> 00:05:57,560 Speaker 1: found it whatever doing aerial mapping right, it wouldn't be 90 00:05:57,560 --> 00:05:59,479 Speaker 1: half as cool as it is. The way that it 91 00:05:59,560 --> 00:06:01,960 Speaker 1: was the sky, yeah, and the fact you go down 92 00:06:02,000 --> 00:06:04,679 Speaker 1: there and the guy's buried not too far from the site, 93 00:06:04,839 --> 00:06:08,640 Speaker 1: like McJunkins, it just drips of history. You know. Mcjonkans 94 00:06:08,680 --> 00:06:10,359 Speaker 1: got a nice tombstone now, but he used to just 95 00:06:10,400 --> 00:06:12,600 Speaker 1: have this crudi old tombstones and people pitched together and 96 00:06:12,600 --> 00:06:14,839 Speaker 1: made him a nice tombstone. I was standing there in 97 00:06:14,880 --> 00:06:17,919 Speaker 1: the at Mcjonkins's grave with an archaeologist. Let's see these 98 00:06:17,960 --> 00:06:19,880 Speaker 1: little bones laying on the ground, said what are all 99 00:06:19,920 --> 00:06:21,520 Speaker 1: these bones. I picked one up. He said, that's a 100 00:06:21,600 --> 00:06:26,000 Speaker 1: human finger bone because it had been ground squirrels and 101 00:06:26,000 --> 00:06:31,200 Speaker 1: pray dogs whatever it Badgers over your cemetery, Yeah, every 102 00:06:31,480 --> 00:06:34,400 Speaker 1: every you know, presidents make monuments all the time. If 103 00:06:34,480 --> 00:06:36,880 Speaker 1: I was president, I would I would make it the 104 00:06:37,120 --> 00:06:42,039 Speaker 1: George mcjunkin, not the Foalsome, the George mcjunkin National Monument, 105 00:06:42,040 --> 00:06:45,640 Speaker 1: which would include the Falsome Site. Now, that would be 106 00:06:45,760 --> 00:06:50,640 Speaker 1: something if Steve Ronella was president. To understand the significance 107 00:06:50,680 --> 00:06:53,480 Speaker 1: of the Falsome Site. We've got to understand the quandary 108 00:06:53,680 --> 00:06:57,400 Speaker 1: about human antiquity in North America that had been brewing 109 00:06:57,480 --> 00:07:01,960 Speaker 1: for decades. Up to this point. Most people believe humans 110 00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:06,680 Speaker 1: have only been here for about three thousand years. I 111 00:07:06,720 --> 00:07:09,280 Speaker 1: had mentioned how the Folsome site is doubly cool. It's 112 00:07:09,320 --> 00:07:12,360 Speaker 1: cool because how was found and who founded the McJunkins story. 113 00:07:12,680 --> 00:07:15,200 Speaker 1: It was cool because of what happened there, meaning some 114 00:07:15,280 --> 00:07:17,760 Speaker 1: dudes during the Ice Age killed thirty some bison and 115 00:07:17,840 --> 00:07:22,400 Speaker 1: a big pile with stone tools and hand thrown weaponry. 116 00:07:22,440 --> 00:07:25,600 Speaker 1: That's cool. It's tripally cool because of what it did 117 00:07:25,640 --> 00:07:29,400 Speaker 1: to up end conventional thinking about what had gone on 118 00:07:29,440 --> 00:07:32,520 Speaker 1: in the Western hemisphere. There's been a handful of occasions 119 00:07:32,600 --> 00:07:38,960 Speaker 1: where human tools, like indisputably human creations in the form 120 00:07:39,040 --> 00:07:44,720 Speaker 1: of projectile points were found mixed up with near in 121 00:07:44,880 --> 00:07:48,680 Speaker 1: loose association with animals that we knew to be, like 122 00:07:48,760 --> 00:07:51,760 Speaker 1: extinct Ice age animals. But the Ice Age was a 123 00:07:51,800 --> 00:07:55,720 Speaker 1: long time ago. Here with the Folsome site, you got 124 00:07:55,880 --> 00:08:00,920 Speaker 1: it stuck together. You got a projectile point in the rib, 125 00:08:01,280 --> 00:08:04,000 Speaker 1: laying what they call in C. Two, laying in the 126 00:08:04,120 --> 00:08:08,640 Speaker 1: rib of the thing. No rational reasonable person could come 127 00:08:08,720 --> 00:08:12,000 Speaker 1: and make any argument that here's an Ice age relic, 128 00:08:12,280 --> 00:08:15,400 Speaker 1: an animal that's not here now, that was killed and 129 00:08:15,520 --> 00:08:19,560 Speaker 1: butchered by human beings, And that proved once and for 130 00:08:19,600 --> 00:08:23,520 Speaker 1: all that human antiquity in the New World went back 131 00:08:23,600 --> 00:08:29,760 Speaker 1: a long way. I want to clarify that by quote 132 00:08:29,800 --> 00:08:33,040 Speaker 1: in the rib, Steve means the point was laying in 133 00:08:33,160 --> 00:08:36,800 Speaker 1: between two ribs. It wasn't stuck in a rib, but 134 00:08:37,160 --> 00:08:42,120 Speaker 1: it was just as conclusive. We heard briefly from Dr 135 00:08:42,240 --> 00:08:46,240 Speaker 1: David Meltzer on Part one. He's the national authority on 136 00:08:46,280 --> 00:08:49,440 Speaker 1: the Falsome site. And how would one know that, Well, 137 00:08:49,880 --> 00:08:53,880 Speaker 1: he literally wrote a giant book called Falsome. It's basically 138 00:08:53,960 --> 00:08:58,000 Speaker 1: a textbook on everything known about the place. Dr Meltzer 139 00:08:58,120 --> 00:09:01,720 Speaker 1: isn't just a falsome expert, though. He's dedicated his academic 140 00:09:01,760 --> 00:09:05,360 Speaker 1: career to the people of the Pleistocene era, which is 141 00:09:05,400 --> 00:09:08,439 Speaker 1: a block of time that began a couple million years 142 00:09:08,520 --> 00:09:13,040 Speaker 1: ago and ended ten thousand years ago. The time period 143 00:09:13,160 --> 00:09:17,040 Speaker 1: from then until now it is called the Holocene. We 144 00:09:17,160 --> 00:09:20,440 Speaker 1: live in the Holocene. If you know these two words, 145 00:09:20,520 --> 00:09:24,000 Speaker 1: Pleistocene and Holocene, you'll pretty much be in the loop 146 00:09:24,120 --> 00:09:27,839 Speaker 1: for talking about the recent history of planet Earth. Dr 147 00:09:27,920 --> 00:09:31,479 Speaker 1: Meltzer is the author of multiple books on the Pleistocene, 148 00:09:31,840 --> 00:09:36,800 Speaker 1: including First People's in a New World, The Great Paleolithic War, 149 00:09:37,360 --> 00:09:41,800 Speaker 1: and Search for the First Americans. I went to the 150 00:09:41,880 --> 00:09:45,480 Speaker 1: campus of s m U in Dallas, Texas, where he works. 151 00:09:45,960 --> 00:09:48,880 Speaker 1: We'd hardly greeted each other when he asked me to 152 00:09:49,040 --> 00:09:52,480 Speaker 1: follow him into his lab. It was full of bones 153 00:09:52,800 --> 00:10:00,920 Speaker 1: and stone tools, ancient stuff. Skull that's been turned upside 154 00:10:00,920 --> 00:10:04,079 Speaker 1: down because when we got it in the ground, it 155 00:10:04,200 --> 00:10:07,040 Speaker 1: was top of the head facing up right. So we 156 00:10:07,160 --> 00:10:10,320 Speaker 1: plastered it and then we cut underneath it, lifted it out, 157 00:10:10,800 --> 00:10:12,719 Speaker 1: and so now what you see is the plaster. It's 158 00:10:12,760 --> 00:10:15,160 Speaker 1: resting on its plaster cast and you can see the 159 00:10:15,200 --> 00:10:17,760 Speaker 1: teeth in here. Wow. Right, And there's the back of 160 00:10:17,800 --> 00:10:21,360 Speaker 1: the skull. So that is a bison antiquist skull from 161 00:10:21,400 --> 00:10:25,880 Speaker 1: the full side, Yes, and it's a big It's pretty 162 00:10:25,880 --> 00:10:28,200 Speaker 1: wild being in the same room with the skull of 163 00:10:28,200 --> 00:10:30,760 Speaker 1: a bison antiquous. If you want to see a cell 164 00:10:30,800 --> 00:10:33,200 Speaker 1: phone video the skull, you can check out my instagram 165 00:10:33,280 --> 00:10:38,000 Speaker 1: at clay Underscore Newcomb. Dr Meltzer is a unique guy 166 00:10:38,120 --> 00:10:42,040 Speaker 1: when it comes to fulsome The site was originally excavated 167 00:10:42,040 --> 00:10:47,000 Speaker 1: between nineteen and nineteen, but seventy years later there were 168 00:10:47,080 --> 00:10:51,199 Speaker 1: unanswered questions that he knew our modern techniques and technology 169 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:55,120 Speaker 1: could now answer, primarily carbon dating, which we'll talk about 170 00:10:55,120 --> 00:10:58,520 Speaker 1: more in Part three of this series. Like a dramatic 171 00:10:58,600 --> 00:11:02,600 Speaker 1: movie sequel and night Team, Dr Meltzer and his team 172 00:11:02,600 --> 00:11:05,960 Speaker 1: went back to Falsome. They dug up the place again 173 00:11:06,160 --> 00:11:11,240 Speaker 1: with new questions about the site's geology, it's antiquity which 174 00:11:11,280 --> 00:11:15,000 Speaker 1: is the site's age, the paleo topography which is its 175 00:11:15,040 --> 00:11:20,080 Speaker 1: former geography, and its depositional history, which basically means the 176 00:11:20,160 --> 00:11:25,360 Speaker 1: layers that covered the site. Here's Dr Meltzer talking about 177 00:11:25,440 --> 00:11:30,160 Speaker 1: the uniqueness of the Falsome site for fifty years there 178 00:11:30,160 --> 00:11:34,200 Speaker 1: had been this very heated debate over how long people 179 00:11:34,240 --> 00:11:38,120 Speaker 1: had been in the Americas, and all manner of contenders 180 00:11:38,120 --> 00:11:41,000 Speaker 1: were put forward. This is evidence that people have been 181 00:11:41,040 --> 00:11:43,160 Speaker 1: here since the place to see. This is evidence that 182 00:11:43,160 --> 00:11:45,600 Speaker 1: people have been here for three hundred thousand years. Here's 183 00:11:45,600 --> 00:11:47,640 Speaker 1: evidence that people have been here for three d fifty 184 00:11:47,640 --> 00:11:51,319 Speaker 1: thousand years. But in each and every instance, those sites 185 00:11:51,679 --> 00:11:55,400 Speaker 1: failed to prove what they were claimed to prove, and 186 00:11:55,480 --> 00:11:59,440 Speaker 1: they failed because of various reasons. Uh, the artifacts weren't 187 00:11:59,440 --> 00:12:03,199 Speaker 1: actually artif tacks, the artifacts were not in the geological 188 00:12:03,240 --> 00:12:06,640 Speaker 1: deposits that were said to be that old. Uh, the 189 00:12:06,760 --> 00:12:10,760 Speaker 1: artifacts had rolled downhill and ended up next to ancient 190 00:12:10,920 --> 00:12:13,800 Speaker 1: animal remains, but they were not necessarily in what we 191 00:12:13,840 --> 00:12:16,320 Speaker 1: call primary context. That is to say, they didn't enter 192 00:12:16,320 --> 00:12:18,679 Speaker 1: the deposit at the same time as those ancient animals 193 00:12:18,679 --> 00:12:21,720 Speaker 1: that are the deposit. And so you had, you know, 194 00:12:22,040 --> 00:12:25,559 Speaker 1: literally decades of people arguing back and forth over how 195 00:12:25,600 --> 00:12:28,800 Speaker 1: long people have been in the America's. When Folsom came along, 196 00:12:29,200 --> 00:12:32,640 Speaker 1: it was just as advertised. What you had was a 197 00:12:32,679 --> 00:12:37,840 Speaker 1: spot on the landscape where hunters had confronted and killed 198 00:12:38,200 --> 00:12:40,400 Speaker 1: a herd of bison, we now know there were about 199 00:12:40,400 --> 00:12:43,920 Speaker 1: thirty two animals that were dispatched that day and in 200 00:12:43,960 --> 00:12:48,760 Speaker 1: the process left behind their artifacts in ways that made 201 00:12:48,760 --> 00:12:54,040 Speaker 1: it absolutely clear that those animals and those people had 202 00:12:54,080 --> 00:12:57,000 Speaker 1: been on that very landscape at the same moment in time. 203 00:12:57,480 --> 00:13:00,800 Speaker 1: Because we had spear points what we know as falsome 204 00:13:00,840 --> 00:13:04,200 Speaker 1: fluted points in direct association with the bones. And what 205 00:13:04,280 --> 00:13:07,040 Speaker 1: I mean by that is we had a projectile point 206 00:13:07,120 --> 00:13:10,720 Speaker 1: in between ribs. Right, it had sat there since that 207 00:13:10,800 --> 00:13:14,000 Speaker 1: animal was killed. Right, There was no question that that 208 00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:17,040 Speaker 1: that that was some sort of adventitious association, that somehow 209 00:13:17,040 --> 00:13:19,760 Speaker 1: a projectile point had worked its way down into the dirt, 210 00:13:19,800 --> 00:13:22,560 Speaker 1: into the earth ten feet below the surface and ended 211 00:13:22,640 --> 00:13:26,040 Speaker 1: up in between two bison ribs. No. No, that animal 212 00:13:26,120 --> 00:13:29,880 Speaker 1: was stabbed by a human. And because that animal was 213 00:13:29,960 --> 00:13:33,400 Speaker 1: a now extinct form of bison, which when extinct at 214 00:13:33,400 --> 00:13:36,520 Speaker 1: the end of the Palistocene, that was the first absolutely 215 00:13:36,600 --> 00:13:40,400 Speaker 1: definitive proof that people had been in the Americas at 216 00:13:40,440 --> 00:13:43,320 Speaker 1: the end of the Palistocene. The only question remaining after 217 00:13:43,400 --> 00:13:46,520 Speaker 1: that was how much earlier might they have been? Right, 218 00:13:46,880 --> 00:13:49,920 Speaker 1: But that's that's what made fulsome different. It was just 219 00:13:50,000 --> 00:13:55,040 Speaker 1: as advertised. When you look back at the history of 220 00:13:55,280 --> 00:13:59,120 Speaker 1: archaeology itself as a study. There was an incredible amount 221 00:13:59,120 --> 00:14:03,640 Speaker 1: of drama and ego involved in the discussion of human antiquity. 222 00:14:03,920 --> 00:14:07,839 Speaker 1: It was highly competitive regarding who discovered what and where. 223 00:14:08,360 --> 00:14:11,480 Speaker 1: So it's hard to overstate how important to find was 224 00:14:11,679 --> 00:14:16,239 Speaker 1: because it was so indisputable. Here's another component of understanding 225 00:14:16,320 --> 00:14:21,160 Speaker 1: Falsome and archaeology that will help us. This is Steve 226 00:14:21,400 --> 00:14:27,440 Speaker 1: describing to us what is called a type site. A 227 00:14:27,480 --> 00:14:30,760 Speaker 1: lot of bygone cultures will have a thing called the 228 00:14:30,800 --> 00:14:33,480 Speaker 1: type site, and the type site is where they were identified. 229 00:14:33,560 --> 00:14:37,600 Speaker 1: When we talk about Fulsome hunters, the Fulsome culture was 230 00:14:37,680 --> 00:14:42,360 Speaker 1: identified at wild Horse or Royal. You're Fulsome, New Mexico 231 00:14:42,480 --> 00:14:45,280 Speaker 1: was when it was first identified the identifying feature of 232 00:14:45,320 --> 00:14:48,160 Speaker 1: the Foalsome culture. I was calling Folsome homes and they 233 00:14:48,160 --> 00:14:51,120 Speaker 1: took the name Falsome simply because that was the English 234 00:14:51,200 --> 00:14:54,240 Speaker 1: name of the town. Sure, that was probably a brand 235 00:14:54,240 --> 00:14:57,240 Speaker 1: new town. Has nothing to do as a descriptor of 236 00:14:57,280 --> 00:14:59,960 Speaker 1: these people, not at all, and just to to keeping 237 00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:02,240 Speaker 1: in the same state, just at the same point, in 238 00:15:02,240 --> 00:15:04,800 Speaker 1: the same state. When we talk about a Clovis hunter, 239 00:15:05,040 --> 00:15:10,120 Speaker 1: it just so happens that the projectile points which stand 240 00:15:10,200 --> 00:15:15,640 Speaker 1: for the hunters that made them were first identified near Clovis, 241 00:15:15,680 --> 00:15:19,080 Speaker 1: New Mexico. They were there over ten thousand years before 242 00:15:19,120 --> 00:15:23,200 Speaker 1: anyone even thought to name to make it, we happen 243 00:15:23,240 --> 00:15:28,120 Speaker 1: to right now be doing our conversation about Fulsome near Shadrin, Nebraska. 244 00:15:28,360 --> 00:15:30,840 Speaker 1: Were you and I to walk out and find Holy 245 00:15:30,920 --> 00:15:34,320 Speaker 1: Cow look at this insane projectile point, diagnostic unfound point, 246 00:15:34,360 --> 00:15:36,720 Speaker 1: and then we realized it was this whole culture of people. 247 00:15:36,760 --> 00:15:38,800 Speaker 1: And they made this point, they might wind up and 248 00:15:39,040 --> 00:15:41,400 Speaker 1: call them the shattern Hunters. I think they'd call it 249 00:15:41,440 --> 00:15:44,480 Speaker 1: Ronella newcom Okay, But if they were consistent with the 250 00:15:44,560 --> 00:15:47,200 Speaker 1: days of yore, that's what they would wind up naming them. 251 00:15:47,920 --> 00:15:51,560 Speaker 1: Fulsome Hunters were identified near Fulsom, New Mexico, and so 252 00:15:51,600 --> 00:15:55,280 Speaker 1: they just the name, the nearby town name was applied 253 00:15:55,480 --> 00:15:57,600 Speaker 1: to the culture. We talk about a culture. We're talking 254 00:15:57,600 --> 00:16:01,520 Speaker 1: about like what you imagine a culture of people. We 255 00:16:01,640 --> 00:16:04,600 Speaker 1: know them when we see them based on the point 256 00:16:04,840 --> 00:16:08,240 Speaker 1: with our understanding right now, it's the point. The point 257 00:16:08,520 --> 00:16:11,400 Speaker 1: has to be present, The projectile point that they like 258 00:16:11,560 --> 00:16:14,800 Speaker 1: to make has to be present, meaning if we know 259 00:16:14,880 --> 00:16:18,960 Speaker 1: that the Fulsome culture was active eleven thousand, seven hundred 260 00:16:19,040 --> 00:16:21,920 Speaker 1: years ago. If you went down to South Florida and 261 00:16:22,080 --> 00:16:25,960 Speaker 1: found a human camp site from eleven thousand, seven hundred 262 00:16:26,040 --> 00:16:29,600 Speaker 1: years ago that had a different projectile point, you wouldn't 263 00:16:29,600 --> 00:16:33,200 Speaker 1: call it a fulsome site. Okay, So it's not to when, Yeah, 264 00:16:33,280 --> 00:16:37,920 Speaker 1: it's not when it's who and when it describes a culture, 265 00:16:38,000 --> 00:16:41,840 Speaker 1: just like the culture of us to drive Chevrolet pickups 266 00:16:42,480 --> 00:16:45,320 Speaker 1: and there's another culture in France that drives some other 267 00:16:45,400 --> 00:16:49,960 Speaker 1: kind of pickup. The fulsome culture is identified by the 268 00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:53,560 Speaker 1: type of technology they used when making stone points. But 269 00:16:53,640 --> 00:16:58,400 Speaker 1: this culture was also associated with something else, much bigger. 270 00:16:59,600 --> 00:17:05,280 Speaker 1: They were highly associated with a relics form of bison 271 00:17:05,560 --> 00:17:08,320 Speaker 1: called bison antiquis, not something that went extinct, probably a 272 00:17:08,400 --> 00:17:11,840 Speaker 1: relic form of the animal that lives here now. It 273 00:17:11,920 --> 00:17:17,040 Speaker 1: was bigger, different sort of horn configuration was a bigger 274 00:17:17,200 --> 00:17:20,000 Speaker 1: they call it like bison antiquis. They had a lot 275 00:17:20,040 --> 00:17:23,719 Speaker 1: of fidelity to a certain style of points. They had 276 00:17:23,720 --> 00:17:26,800 Speaker 1: a lot seems to have a lot of fidelity to bison. 277 00:17:27,080 --> 00:17:30,359 Speaker 1: And they lived on what is now the American Great Plains. 278 00:17:30,480 --> 00:17:32,800 Speaker 1: That's where they're found. So you can find them in 279 00:17:33,280 --> 00:17:37,000 Speaker 1: the Panhandle of Texas, you can find them in New Mexico. 280 00:17:37,280 --> 00:17:40,360 Speaker 1: You can find them in Montana, you can find fulsome 281 00:17:40,359 --> 00:17:44,520 Speaker 1: points in southern Saskatchewan, you can find them all the 282 00:17:44,560 --> 00:17:48,399 Speaker 1: way in western Nebraska. But they stayed to the Great 283 00:17:48,440 --> 00:17:51,840 Speaker 1: Plains where the most of the plains Buffalo were. Yeah, 284 00:17:51,920 --> 00:17:55,479 Speaker 1: and at the time it was probably cooler and wetter, 285 00:17:55,720 --> 00:17:58,480 Speaker 1: but it was an open grassland, and it was just 286 00:17:58,680 --> 00:18:02,680 Speaker 1: going by how few fulsome sites there are and how 287 00:18:02,720 --> 00:18:05,639 Speaker 1: widely dispersed they are, and kind of the sort of 288 00:18:05,680 --> 00:18:09,920 Speaker 1: the imprint of those people, it was probably insanely low 289 00:18:10,000 --> 00:18:12,680 Speaker 1: population densities. I can't tell no one, no one can 290 00:18:12,680 --> 00:18:16,600 Speaker 1: say this for real, but I've run this by professional anthropologists. 291 00:18:16,720 --> 00:18:21,040 Speaker 1: It's not unreasonable to think that a band of these hunters, 292 00:18:21,320 --> 00:18:25,120 Speaker 1: which would be an extended family group, that these bands 293 00:18:25,160 --> 00:18:27,960 Speaker 1: of people, it makes sense that they were maybe you know, 294 00:18:28,000 --> 00:18:31,359 Speaker 1: they maybe didn't exceed ten or twenty individuals. It's not 295 00:18:31,560 --> 00:18:36,080 Speaker 1: unreasonable to imagine that they could go a generation without 296 00:18:36,400 --> 00:18:40,200 Speaker 1: encountering individuals that you're not immediately related to. It seems 297 00:18:40,480 --> 00:18:47,359 Speaker 1: very few people occupying that landscape at that time. Take 298 00:18:47,400 --> 00:18:51,240 Speaker 1: a minute and imagine the North American continent ten thousand, 299 00:18:51,400 --> 00:18:56,240 Speaker 1: three hundred years ago with human populations that scarce. By 300 00:18:56,280 --> 00:19:00,879 Speaker 1: the time Europeans arrived here roughly ten thousand years after 301 00:19:00,960 --> 00:19:04,159 Speaker 1: the Falsome Bison kill, which would be about six hundred 302 00:19:04,160 --> 00:19:07,320 Speaker 1: plus years from the present. Backwards from the present, the 303 00:19:07,359 --> 00:19:10,960 Speaker 1: place was basically like an urban center crawling with people. 304 00:19:11,320 --> 00:19:14,080 Speaker 1: The civilization of the American Indians was in full swing 305 00:19:14,119 --> 00:19:17,840 Speaker 1: and highly developed compared to when the Falsome Hunters were here. 306 00:19:18,440 --> 00:19:23,040 Speaker 1: Some American Indians are undoubtedly the descendants of the Folsome 307 00:19:23,119 --> 00:19:27,840 Speaker 1: Hunters wildly, though, of all the things these fulsome hunters 308 00:19:27,920 --> 00:19:31,640 Speaker 1: used in life, there is one thing that has outlasted 309 00:19:31,800 --> 00:19:35,960 Speaker 1: the rigor of time that we infer an incredible amount 310 00:19:36,080 --> 00:19:39,439 Speaker 1: of data from. One of the things I like about 311 00:19:39,680 --> 00:19:42,240 Speaker 1: the projectile point sin It's made of stone and it 312 00:19:42,359 --> 00:19:45,680 Speaker 1: lasts long time, so it winds up being Some people 313 00:19:45,720 --> 00:19:48,680 Speaker 1: that aren't into what we'd call Indian arrowheads sometimes don't 314 00:19:48,680 --> 00:19:51,600 Speaker 1: get the fascination with it. But wait to think about it. 315 00:19:51,800 --> 00:19:54,639 Speaker 1: It's not so much that it's the arrowhead. It's just 316 00:19:54,840 --> 00:19:59,320 Speaker 1: a It's it's a a piece of something that survived, 317 00:19:59,560 --> 00:20:03,399 Speaker 1: sometimes in a perfect state, from the time they handled it. 318 00:20:03,560 --> 00:20:08,160 Speaker 1: Their bones are gone to large measure, their homes and structures, 319 00:20:08,440 --> 00:20:12,080 Speaker 1: the things they wore the wood that they employed. I'd 320 00:20:12,119 --> 00:20:14,880 Speaker 1: be as excited to find a spear shaft, but they're 321 00:20:14,880 --> 00:20:16,800 Speaker 1: not laying around. It's like, but here's this thing that 322 00:20:16,920 --> 00:20:19,360 Speaker 1: like that. A guy can drop that thing and it's 323 00:20:19,359 --> 00:20:22,240 Speaker 1: gonna sit there for twelve years. What other thing can 324 00:20:22,280 --> 00:20:24,640 Speaker 1: you drop on the ground. We talked about how long 325 00:20:24,680 --> 00:20:27,480 Speaker 1: our stuff lasts, right, like how long plastic last? You said, 326 00:20:27,480 --> 00:20:30,000 Speaker 1: a plastic bottle on the ground for twelve thousand years. 327 00:20:30,040 --> 00:20:31,720 Speaker 1: To come back and look at there might be something, 328 00:20:31,720 --> 00:20:38,520 Speaker 1: but they look like a volsible. Imagine archaeologists ten thousand 329 00:20:38,680 --> 00:20:42,040 Speaker 1: years from now, Well, I doubt this place will be around. 330 00:20:42,560 --> 00:20:46,800 Speaker 1: But them taking just one of your material possessions and 331 00:20:46,880 --> 00:20:52,320 Speaker 1: making vast inferences about your entire life from it, I 332 00:20:52,320 --> 00:20:55,960 Speaker 1: wonder what they'd say. I had some questions about how 333 00:20:56,000 --> 00:21:00,560 Speaker 1: an archaeological site is verified, so it's legitimacy is known. 334 00:21:00,840 --> 00:21:03,240 Speaker 1: I think it's important for us to understand the bigger 335 00:21:03,280 --> 00:21:06,919 Speaker 1: picture of what's happening here beyond some dudes digging up 336 00:21:06,960 --> 00:21:11,560 Speaker 1: bones and finding stone points que the Randy Travis song. 337 00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:15,840 Speaker 1: It's a pretty complex world, and there were many missteps 338 00:21:15,880 --> 00:21:19,959 Speaker 1: in early archaeology and in the original excavation of the 339 00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:26,240 Speaker 1: fulsome site that almost disqualified it. So from an archaeological process, 340 00:21:26,640 --> 00:21:30,600 Speaker 1: there's a prescribed way that a site should be excavated 341 00:21:30,640 --> 00:21:34,080 Speaker 1: and understood. As I understand that there were other sites 342 00:21:34,280 --> 00:21:38,400 Speaker 1: in Texas and Nebraska and maybe even in Kansas that 343 00:21:38,520 --> 00:21:44,240 Speaker 1: potentially had similar type evidence of humans and these older 344 00:21:44,280 --> 00:21:46,679 Speaker 1: animals that are now extinct, but they were mishandled and 345 00:21:46,720 --> 00:21:49,000 Speaker 1: so they have to be It's it's like evidence coming 346 00:21:49,040 --> 00:21:51,320 Speaker 1: into a courtroom that was acquired the wrong way and 347 00:21:51,320 --> 00:21:54,680 Speaker 1: the judge goes, I can't use this. That's exactly how 348 00:21:54,720 --> 00:21:56,720 Speaker 1: it played out. But we also need to put a 349 00:21:56,760 --> 00:22:00,920 Speaker 1: little bit of historical context here. This is the eighteen nineties, 350 00:22:01,040 --> 00:22:06,120 Speaker 1: early nineteen hundreds, the teens. There weren't clear cut methods 351 00:22:06,320 --> 00:22:09,239 Speaker 1: for field excavation. A lot of these excavations were not 352 00:22:09,280 --> 00:22:11,840 Speaker 1: conducted by you know, what we would now recognize as 353 00:22:11,880 --> 00:22:15,480 Speaker 1: sort of professional scientists, professional archaeologist, professional geologists, and they 354 00:22:15,520 --> 00:22:17,119 Speaker 1: didn't know what they were doing is really what it 355 00:22:17,240 --> 00:22:20,000 Speaker 1: came down to. So, you know, we had this site 356 00:22:20,000 --> 00:22:23,240 Speaker 1: out in Frederick, Oklahoma, where it was a growl quarry, 357 00:22:23,359 --> 00:22:25,240 Speaker 1: and you know, the folks who were working the gravel 358 00:22:25,320 --> 00:22:28,720 Speaker 1: quarry said, oh yeah, we've got artifacts associated with mammoth bones. Well, 359 00:22:28,960 --> 00:22:31,359 Speaker 1: you know, it requires a certain amount of expertise to 360 00:22:31,400 --> 00:22:35,080 Speaker 1: sort of really be able to in an excavation. No, okay, 361 00:22:35,119 --> 00:22:37,640 Speaker 1: these are deposits of a certain age. These are things 362 00:22:37,680 --> 00:22:40,120 Speaker 1: that are associated with those deposits. We know that they 363 00:22:40,160 --> 00:22:44,199 Speaker 1: belong in those deposits. And so because there were not 364 00:22:44,280 --> 00:22:48,040 Speaker 1: agreed upon field techniques and clear cut field techniques at 365 00:22:48,040 --> 00:22:50,760 Speaker 1: the time, and because some of these discoveries were made 366 00:22:50,800 --> 00:22:53,840 Speaker 1: by folks who really didn't understand what they were seeing 367 00:22:53,800 --> 00:22:57,680 Speaker 1: an exactly, well, yeah, they weren't even archaeologists, you know. 368 00:22:57,720 --> 00:23:00,560 Speaker 1: They're the guys that work at the quarry. Yeah. Uh, 369 00:23:00,600 --> 00:23:02,000 Speaker 1: and they're just you know, their job is just to 370 00:23:02,000 --> 00:23:04,199 Speaker 1: shovel that stuff out of the way. Okay. So you 371 00:23:04,240 --> 00:23:06,880 Speaker 1: find an artifact in the in the spoil pile over here, 372 00:23:06,880 --> 00:23:08,920 Speaker 1: and you find some bones in the spoiled pile over there, 373 00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:10,959 Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that you know, that artifact and that 374 00:23:11,000 --> 00:23:14,080 Speaker 1: bone were associated back you know, twenty thousand years ago, 375 00:23:14,200 --> 00:23:18,800 Speaker 1: fifteen thousand years ago. In retrospect, a couple of those sites, 376 00:23:18,920 --> 00:23:22,480 Speaker 1: not the one in Frederick, but one out in Colorado City, Texas. 377 00:23:23,080 --> 00:23:27,480 Speaker 1: Um in retrospect, we looked at the artifacts and we said, well, 378 00:23:27,480 --> 00:23:30,840 Speaker 1: you know what, there is a possibility those artifacts could 379 00:23:30,840 --> 00:23:33,359 Speaker 1: have been associated with that bison. But the problem was 380 00:23:33,440 --> 00:23:36,480 Speaker 1: in and this is a few years before folsome the 381 00:23:36,480 --> 00:23:40,199 Speaker 1: bison was being excavated by a fella who was just 382 00:23:40,280 --> 00:23:42,720 Speaker 1: a local guy. Uh. He had discovered this bison in 383 00:23:42,720 --> 00:23:44,680 Speaker 1: this creek bed and he wrote to the museum and said, 384 00:23:44,800 --> 00:23:47,640 Speaker 1: you guys wanted so the folks folks in Denver said yeah, 385 00:23:47,640 --> 00:23:50,320 Speaker 1: we'd really like to have that bison skeleton. And they 386 00:23:50,320 --> 00:23:52,760 Speaker 1: gave him instructions on how to get it out of 387 00:23:52,800 --> 00:23:55,560 Speaker 1: the ground, plaster it and put it into crates and 388 00:23:55,600 --> 00:23:58,119 Speaker 1: ship it up to Denver. He excavates the bison, he 389 00:23:58,200 --> 00:24:00,439 Speaker 1: plasters it up, he puts it into a crate. And 390 00:24:00,440 --> 00:24:02,359 Speaker 1: the crate had been you know the folks in Denver 391 00:24:02,400 --> 00:24:04,080 Speaker 1: and said, make a crate. You know this big by 392 00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:06,080 Speaker 1: this big, by this big. And so he had this 393 00:24:06,160 --> 00:24:09,280 Speaker 1: giant plastered bison, couldn't fit it into a crate. Instead 394 00:24:09,320 --> 00:24:12,040 Speaker 1: of building a bigger crate, he simply knocked off chunks 395 00:24:12,040 --> 00:24:15,240 Speaker 1: of the bone shoved it in there. So this was 396 00:24:15,280 --> 00:24:19,200 Speaker 1: not done well right, And even though they found artifacts 397 00:24:19,200 --> 00:24:21,520 Speaker 1: with the bison, they didn't realize that that was of 398 00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:24,919 Speaker 1: interest or significance, and so they just ignored them. And 399 00:24:24,960 --> 00:24:27,560 Speaker 1: it was only after the fact somebody was visiting Denver 400 00:24:27,640 --> 00:24:30,000 Speaker 1: and said, hey, you know, I'd watched your guys excavate 401 00:24:30,040 --> 00:24:31,920 Speaker 1: this thing down in Texas, and did you know they had, 402 00:24:32,000 --> 00:24:33,720 Speaker 1: you know, points that came out with the bison. And 403 00:24:33,720 --> 00:24:36,159 Speaker 1: the folks in Denver said, we had no clue. So, 404 00:24:36,880 --> 00:24:40,120 Speaker 1: you know, you can't base a case for people having 405 00:24:40,160 --> 00:24:42,320 Speaker 1: been here a very long time ago or hunting bison 406 00:24:42,359 --> 00:24:45,240 Speaker 1: a very long time ago when you had that kind 407 00:24:45,280 --> 00:24:48,199 Speaker 1: of excavation, And so that very well could have been 408 00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:50,960 Speaker 1: a totally legitimate site, and I think it is actually 409 00:24:52,640 --> 00:24:56,440 Speaker 1: the Fulsome site was originally excavated by an amateur archaeologist 410 00:24:56,560 --> 00:25:00,080 Speaker 1: named Carl Schwaheim. He was a friend of George's. He 411 00:25:00,160 --> 00:25:02,840 Speaker 1: was hired by the Denver Museum of Natural History to 412 00:25:02,880 --> 00:25:06,040 Speaker 1: get them a bison and tick with skeleton. But while 413 00:25:06,119 --> 00:25:09,000 Speaker 1: he was digging, he found a stone point. He made 414 00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:12,439 Speaker 1: some sketches and notified the museum and this really perked 415 00:25:12,440 --> 00:25:15,000 Speaker 1: their ears up, and they told him if you find 416 00:25:15,040 --> 00:25:19,880 Speaker 1: another one, Carl, don't dig it up, leave it in place. Luckily, 417 00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:22,560 Speaker 1: he did find another one, and they were able to 418 00:25:22,720 --> 00:25:25,920 Speaker 1: send down a bona fide archaeologists to verify it in 419 00:25:26,119 --> 00:25:31,359 Speaker 1: C two or in place. This then attracted the attention 420 00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:36,560 Speaker 1: of the world. But I've got more questions, you know, 421 00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:39,560 Speaker 1: and that brings me to kind of my biggest overarching 422 00:25:39,680 --> 00:25:42,880 Speaker 1: question inside of archaeology, that is just it's so it's 423 00:25:42,960 --> 00:25:45,800 Speaker 1: intriguing to think about this, is that how much of 424 00:25:46,200 --> 00:25:51,560 Speaker 1: planet Earth have we excavated to understand what is here? 425 00:25:51,560 --> 00:25:53,960 Speaker 1: I mean, it feels like we're just going off these 426 00:25:54,160 --> 00:25:56,359 Speaker 1: very like if you took the volume of the Earth 427 00:25:56,560 --> 00:25:59,920 Speaker 1: and said how much how much of that volume had 428 00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:03,960 Speaker 1: as a professional archaeologist and modern times actually excavated, it 429 00:26:03,960 --> 00:26:06,520 Speaker 1: would be a number so small it would be unbelievable. 430 00:26:06,760 --> 00:26:08,760 Speaker 1: And so we're basing so much what we know off 431 00:26:08,800 --> 00:26:11,520 Speaker 1: these little bit spots. But who's to say there's not 432 00:26:11,680 --> 00:26:16,120 Speaker 1: another incredible spot fifty feet from the Falsome site that's 433 00:26:16,160 --> 00:26:20,640 Speaker 1: gonna redirect history again, you know. But you're absolutely right. 434 00:26:20,680 --> 00:26:23,640 Speaker 1: A lot of these sites are deeply buried. A lot 435 00:26:23,680 --> 00:26:27,000 Speaker 1: of these sites will never see the surface again. A 436 00:26:27,000 --> 00:26:30,720 Speaker 1: lot of these sites disappeared over time. You've got erosion. 437 00:26:31,119 --> 00:26:33,119 Speaker 1: If you were around on the high Plains in the 438 00:26:33,200 --> 00:26:35,919 Speaker 1: nineteen thirties during the dust Bowl. It would have been 439 00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:37,639 Speaker 1: the worst time to live there, but it would have 440 00:26:37,680 --> 00:26:40,080 Speaker 1: been the best time to do archaeology there because what 441 00:26:40,119 --> 00:26:43,320 Speaker 1: was happening was that basically the surface is blowing away, 442 00:26:43,400 --> 00:26:45,840 Speaker 1: and what it did was is exposed a lot of 443 00:26:45,840 --> 00:26:50,200 Speaker 1: these old Ice Age Pleistocene Age lake beds, and they're 444 00:26:50,240 --> 00:26:53,240 Speaker 1: all manner of bones and artifacts that came out of 445 00:26:53,280 --> 00:26:56,400 Speaker 1: these sites. But of course, once all that stopped blowing, 446 00:26:56,960 --> 00:27:00,640 Speaker 1: a lot of the archaeological discovery is necessarily based on 447 00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:05,000 Speaker 1: chance encounters where you've got ranchers that are putting in 448 00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:08,400 Speaker 1: a stock tank, you've got farmers that are plowing, you've 449 00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:10,920 Speaker 1: got a road that's getting cut, and you just get 450 00:27:11,040 --> 00:27:15,719 Speaker 1: lucky or a guh George mcjunkin exactly Occult of wild 451 00:27:15,760 --> 00:27:19,560 Speaker 1: Horse Rodeo. You know, that's George mcjunkan is such an 452 00:27:19,560 --> 00:27:22,000 Speaker 1: interesting character to me. You know, this is a guy 453 00:27:22,119 --> 00:27:27,080 Speaker 1: who is clearly really intrigued and interested and fascinated wants 454 00:27:27,119 --> 00:27:29,600 Speaker 1: to learn about what's around him. So he was the 455 00:27:29,720 --> 00:27:32,240 Speaker 1: right guy at the right moment, in the right spot, 456 00:27:32,800 --> 00:27:37,280 Speaker 1: and it changed American archaeology. We just can't get away 457 00:27:37,320 --> 00:27:40,520 Speaker 1: from old George now Canley, I kind of get obsessed 458 00:27:40,560 --> 00:27:42,880 Speaker 1: with these characters that I learned about them, and I'm 459 00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:47,439 Speaker 1: considering them a junking tattoo. Bad That's not true. I 460 00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:50,920 Speaker 1: don't do tats, but I do need some more info 461 00:27:51,160 --> 00:27:54,920 Speaker 1: on the actual site. From this, I think will begin 462 00:27:55,000 --> 00:28:01,480 Speaker 1: to understand how archaeologists think. Let's talk in specifics about 463 00:28:01,520 --> 00:28:05,720 Speaker 1: the Falsome site and what was found there. So this 464 00:28:05,760 --> 00:28:09,560 Speaker 1: flood in nineteen o eight unearthed these bones that George 465 00:28:09,640 --> 00:28:12,320 Speaker 1: mcjunkin found, so we know how they were found in 466 00:28:12,640 --> 00:28:15,600 Speaker 1: kind of the series, but what did they find there? 467 00:28:16,119 --> 00:28:20,240 Speaker 1: So the initial excavations at Fulsome took place in ninety 468 00:28:20,320 --> 00:28:26,800 Speaker 1: seven in night as well. Unfortunately, the site was excavated 469 00:28:26,840 --> 00:28:30,480 Speaker 1: by paleontologists. The site was excavated by folks that were 470 00:28:30,600 --> 00:28:33,720 Speaker 1: interested in bones, and while they did a decent job, 471 00:28:34,040 --> 00:28:37,639 Speaker 1: they well, the term is telling. They referred to the 472 00:28:37,680 --> 00:28:41,360 Speaker 1: Fulsome site as the Fulsome bone quarry. Right, they're coreying 473 00:28:41,400 --> 00:28:43,680 Speaker 1: bone out of this thing, So they're not they're not 474 00:28:43,800 --> 00:28:46,720 Speaker 1: viewing it as an archaeological site. Where an archaeological site 475 00:28:46,800 --> 00:28:49,880 Speaker 1: meaning it has huge evidence of humans. Well, I mean 476 00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:51,840 Speaker 1: they saw it as a bone quarry that had evidence 477 00:28:51,880 --> 00:28:54,640 Speaker 1: of humans. But what they weren't doing was paying really 478 00:28:54,680 --> 00:28:57,480 Speaker 1: close attention to things that we as archaeologists pay attention to. 479 00:28:57,920 --> 00:29:02,120 Speaker 1: Where exactly were those artifacts found, how were the bones distributed. 480 00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:03,920 Speaker 1: This is one of the things that really challenged us 481 00:29:03,960 --> 00:29:07,160 Speaker 1: when we started excavating there, was that there's basically where 482 00:29:07,160 --> 00:29:10,960 Speaker 1: no maps of their excavations. Now, we're archaeologists, were fairly 483 00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:14,240 Speaker 1: compulsive about things. We're fairly compulsive about a lot of 484 00:29:14,280 --> 00:29:17,800 Speaker 1: things because when you're excavating an archaeological site, you're destroying it. 485 00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:20,600 Speaker 1: So you've got to make very very careful records all 486 00:29:20,640 --> 00:29:24,800 Speaker 1: the way through the process. Maps, photographs, detailed measurements, all 487 00:29:24,800 --> 00:29:27,880 Speaker 1: this stuff. And the folks who were basically coreying this 488 00:29:27,960 --> 00:29:29,640 Speaker 1: for bone, we're doing none of that. And so when 489 00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:32,760 Speaker 1: we started they had identified on their maps, you know, 490 00:29:32,960 --> 00:29:35,200 Speaker 1: here's a skeleton here, here's a skeleton here, here's a 491 00:29:35,240 --> 00:29:39,840 Speaker 1: skeleton over here. They weren't nice, discrete skeletons of animals. 492 00:29:39,880 --> 00:29:42,600 Speaker 1: These were bone piles, and they hadn't quite recognized that 493 00:29:42,680 --> 00:29:45,360 Speaker 1: these were discard piles. They were not you know, here's 494 00:29:45,360 --> 00:29:48,040 Speaker 1: an animals stretched out on the ground. And of course, 495 00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:49,800 Speaker 1: you know, they weren't paying attention to a lot of 496 00:29:49,800 --> 00:29:53,160 Speaker 1: the things that we only subsequently started paying attention to, 497 00:29:53,880 --> 00:29:57,120 Speaker 1: like what's the surface condition of the bone, because that 498 00:29:57,160 --> 00:29:59,640 Speaker 1: tells you something about how long it was sitting out 499 00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:02,600 Speaker 1: posed before it got covered by the sediment. They weren't 500 00:30:02,640 --> 00:30:05,240 Speaker 1: really paying much attention to the sediment itself. What's the 501 00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:07,720 Speaker 1: nature of the sediment, how did it originate? Why is 502 00:30:07,760 --> 00:30:10,440 Speaker 1: the site in this particular spot, Where did the kill 503 00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:13,520 Speaker 1: take place? There were so many unanswered questions. The thing 504 00:30:13,560 --> 00:30:15,800 Speaker 1: that they that they did in the nineteen twenties was 505 00:30:16,200 --> 00:30:18,680 Speaker 1: they clearly showed people have been here since the Pleistocene. 506 00:30:18,720 --> 00:30:21,120 Speaker 1: They did that just fine, But there were so many 507 00:30:21,200 --> 00:30:24,880 Speaker 1: questions about the site that were unanswered. That's why I 508 00:30:24,920 --> 00:30:27,600 Speaker 1: went back seventy years later because I said, you know, 509 00:30:27,640 --> 00:30:29,960 Speaker 1: it's the most famous site in North America, one of 510 00:30:29,960 --> 00:30:31,960 Speaker 1: the most famous sites in North America, and we know 511 00:30:32,040 --> 00:30:34,800 Speaker 1: almost nothing about it in terms of what we what 512 00:30:34,920 --> 00:30:38,400 Speaker 1: we hope and expect to know nowadays about an archaeological site. 513 00:30:38,760 --> 00:30:42,480 Speaker 1: It's funny in when they finished up the excavations, barn 514 00:30:42,520 --> 00:30:45,360 Speaker 1: and Brown, who had been in charge, said, there's nothing left. 515 00:30:45,680 --> 00:30:48,320 Speaker 1: Don't bother to come here. We've excavated the whole thing 516 00:30:48,720 --> 00:30:50,880 Speaker 1: what I realized. And this was actually before we went 517 00:30:50,920 --> 00:30:53,240 Speaker 1: out there. I was talking to a verder of paleontologists 518 00:30:53,280 --> 00:30:55,720 Speaker 1: here at the university and he said, oh, Barne Brown 519 00:30:55,760 --> 00:30:57,840 Speaker 1: said that about all his sites. And the reason he 520 00:30:57,880 --> 00:30:59,440 Speaker 1: said that about all his sites is he didn't want 521 00:30:59,440 --> 00:31:02,880 Speaker 1: anybody coming in after him to go to dig the sites. 522 00:31:03,160 --> 00:31:06,040 Speaker 1: So he said, you can probably ignore that, And wow, 523 00:31:06,120 --> 00:31:10,520 Speaker 1: I bet that was encouraging. How many more bison did 524 00:31:10,560 --> 00:31:14,480 Speaker 1: you discover when you did excavations in the late nineties, Well, 525 00:31:14,600 --> 00:31:16,800 Speaker 1: because we know there were thirty there was a bison 526 00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:19,960 Speaker 1: kill of thirty two animals. We know that now, and 527 00:31:20,160 --> 00:31:22,320 Speaker 1: so how many did they find and how many did 528 00:31:22,320 --> 00:31:24,840 Speaker 1: you find? Well, so this gets back to the issue 529 00:31:24,920 --> 00:31:26,920 Speaker 1: of you know, they were just counting a pile of 530 00:31:26,960 --> 00:31:30,720 Speaker 1: bones as as an animal, right, they didn't really have 531 00:31:30,760 --> 00:31:32,800 Speaker 1: a clear sense of how many animals they were. They 532 00:31:32,800 --> 00:31:35,200 Speaker 1: had a clear sense of how many animal piles, how 533 00:31:35,200 --> 00:31:38,719 Speaker 1: many bones piles that there were, but they did estimate 534 00:31:38,760 --> 00:31:41,959 Speaker 1: that they were probably at least a couple of dozen. Okay, okay, 535 00:31:42,400 --> 00:31:45,600 Speaker 1: what we did, and this is sort of the the 536 00:31:45,720 --> 00:31:48,280 Speaker 1: typical way in which you estimate the number of animals 537 00:31:48,280 --> 00:31:50,800 Speaker 1: that were once present in a kill, is that you 538 00:31:50,920 --> 00:31:54,320 Speaker 1: take bones that well, in this case, we were taking 539 00:31:54,320 --> 00:31:58,800 Speaker 1: basically bison ankles. So bison have two ankles left and right. 540 00:31:59,040 --> 00:32:00,800 Speaker 1: And so what you do if you count up how 541 00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:03,480 Speaker 1: many right ankles you have or how many left ankles 542 00:32:03,520 --> 00:32:05,960 Speaker 1: you have, and you say, okay, I got thirty two 543 00:32:06,040 --> 00:32:08,480 Speaker 1: right ankles, or I got thirty right ankles and thirty 544 00:32:08,480 --> 00:32:11,360 Speaker 1: two left ankles. Well, there wasn't an animal walking around 545 00:32:11,360 --> 00:32:14,720 Speaker 1: on three legs. You probably had thirty two animals. Where 546 00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:18,240 Speaker 1: did they teach you this kind of reasoning? This is brilliant. No, 547 00:32:18,520 --> 00:32:21,880 Speaker 1: well it's not me um no. But see, this is 548 00:32:21,880 --> 00:32:23,200 Speaker 1: the kind of thing that you didn't do in the 549 00:32:23,240 --> 00:32:25,760 Speaker 1: nine twenties. This is why we had to go back 550 00:32:25,920 --> 00:32:29,000 Speaker 1: and in fact by literally counting up all of the 551 00:32:29,120 --> 00:32:33,200 Speaker 1: elements that gave us insight into what the hunters were 552 00:32:33,240 --> 00:32:37,240 Speaker 1: eating and what they took off site. Because you know, okay, 553 00:32:37,240 --> 00:32:40,520 Speaker 1: so there's two hundred plus or minus change of bones 554 00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:43,160 Speaker 1: and a bison skeleton, there is you know, X number 555 00:32:43,240 --> 00:32:46,680 Speaker 1: of ribs, there's X number of thoracic vertebrae, and so 556 00:32:46,800 --> 00:32:49,440 Speaker 1: you've got thirty two animals. So if you've got thirty 557 00:32:49,440 --> 00:32:53,800 Speaker 1: two animals, and you know X number of ribs thirty 558 00:32:53,800 --> 00:32:56,880 Speaker 1: two times X gives you the total number of ribs, 559 00:32:57,320 --> 00:32:59,080 Speaker 1: and then you double it because you got a left 560 00:32:59,080 --> 00:33:00,880 Speaker 1: side and the right side. So then when you go 561 00:33:00,960 --> 00:33:02,640 Speaker 1: to the site and you say, well, I've only got 562 00:33:02,720 --> 00:33:05,440 Speaker 1: three ribs here, you know what you're missing. They took 563 00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:08,120 Speaker 1: those ribs with them. And we have pretty clear evidence 564 00:33:08,160 --> 00:33:11,200 Speaker 1: that these folks were literally taking rib racks off of 565 00:33:11,240 --> 00:33:14,080 Speaker 1: these animals because we have an under account of what 566 00:33:14,120 --> 00:33:17,200 Speaker 1: we ought to have in terms of ribs, in terms 567 00:33:17,200 --> 00:33:21,040 Speaker 1: of thoracic vertebrae. Those are the big sort of structural 568 00:33:21,720 --> 00:33:25,320 Speaker 1: high spinus process ribs on a buffalo hump. That's what 569 00:33:25,400 --> 00:33:29,840 Speaker 1: makes the hump right really good meat there. So we're 570 00:33:29,880 --> 00:33:34,080 Speaker 1: missing a bunch of upper leg bones and that's where 571 00:33:34,080 --> 00:33:36,120 Speaker 1: the bulk of the meat would be in the hams 572 00:33:36,160 --> 00:33:39,640 Speaker 1: of those big bison. Think of them as bison drumsticks. 573 00:33:39,680 --> 00:33:41,440 Speaker 1: So when we go to the site, we do all 574 00:33:41,440 --> 00:33:44,440 Speaker 1: these detailed counts of all the bones. How many should 575 00:33:44,480 --> 00:33:47,280 Speaker 1: there be? How many are we missing? And are we 576 00:33:47,360 --> 00:33:50,880 Speaker 1: missing them because of erosion or the bones you know, 577 00:33:50,960 --> 00:33:53,800 Speaker 1: fell apart, or are we missing them because the hunters 578 00:33:53,920 --> 00:33:55,760 Speaker 1: when they did all of them took them with them 579 00:33:55,800 --> 00:34:04,880 Speaker 1: exactly right. So Dr Meltzer never fully got to the 580 00:34:04,880 --> 00:34:08,040 Speaker 1: answer my question about how many more bison he found 581 00:34:08,160 --> 00:34:13,120 Speaker 1: when he redug fulsome we need some answers. How many 582 00:34:13,200 --> 00:34:17,360 Speaker 1: bison did your team find that we're not found in 583 00:34:17,400 --> 00:34:20,640 Speaker 1: the original excavations, because just an estimate, I mean, did 584 00:34:20,760 --> 00:34:24,640 Speaker 1: did you find five more? Or well, whole skeletons are 585 00:34:24,719 --> 00:34:28,279 Speaker 1: numbers of bones. Well, let me how many? How many 586 00:34:28,320 --> 00:34:31,680 Speaker 1: bison skulls did you find that they had not found? Oh, 587 00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:34,200 Speaker 1: let me think about that. You know, usually the people 588 00:34:34,239 --> 00:34:36,640 Speaker 1: that I deal with, Dr Meltzer kind of can say 589 00:34:36,760 --> 00:34:39,720 Speaker 1: offhand how many bison and tick with skulls they've found 590 00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:42,759 Speaker 1: in their life. You're the only one I've talked to 591 00:34:42,800 --> 00:34:45,200 Speaker 1: you that it's like, well, I don't know. You know. 592 00:34:45,239 --> 00:34:47,360 Speaker 1: I talked to a guy on one of my previous 593 00:34:47,520 --> 00:34:51,080 Speaker 1: Burgaris podcasts and I asked him how many times he 594 00:34:51,200 --> 00:34:55,319 Speaker 1: been bit by venomous snakes and he said, uh, he said, 595 00:34:55,560 --> 00:34:58,200 Speaker 1: I don't know, I've lost count, and he had been 596 00:34:58,200 --> 00:35:02,239 Speaker 1: bit by twenty venomous snakes in his twenty plus You're 597 00:35:02,280 --> 00:35:06,040 Speaker 1: kind of like that guy. Well, you know, I'm talking 598 00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:10,680 Speaker 1: about Mr Fred episode twelve. Um. Actually I have the 599 00:35:10,680 --> 00:35:16,440 Speaker 1: total numbers. So the Colorado Museum collected sixteen hundred elements, 600 00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:21,040 Speaker 1: the American Museum two thousand, we collected about seven hundred. 601 00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:23,720 Speaker 1: Uh So there's a total of about forty three hundred 602 00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:29,319 Speaker 1: bison elements. So you probably found more. Yeah, mind you, 603 00:35:29,440 --> 00:35:32,440 Speaker 1: we're not finding you know, whole bison and complete parts. 604 00:35:32,719 --> 00:35:37,000 Speaker 1: Uh So, we found about seventeen cranial parts. We found 605 00:35:37,000 --> 00:35:40,279 Speaker 1: at least three. Yeah, we have at least three intact 606 00:35:40,400 --> 00:35:45,040 Speaker 1: crania and many more. That's exciting to dig up a 607 00:35:45,040 --> 00:35:47,239 Speaker 1: bison skull. Were you there when they I mean, were 608 00:35:47,239 --> 00:35:50,440 Speaker 1: you the one digging when this happened? Um? Actually no, 609 00:35:50,560 --> 00:35:53,040 Speaker 1: I got out of the way. So did your team 610 00:35:53,120 --> 00:35:57,160 Speaker 1: find any points? No, it was that surprising to you know. 611 00:35:57,480 --> 00:36:01,239 Speaker 1: And the reason is is that they literally ad excavated 612 00:36:01,239 --> 00:36:04,160 Speaker 1: back in the nies most of the site. So if 613 00:36:04,160 --> 00:36:07,400 Speaker 1: you if you imagine to kill site with that many animals, 614 00:36:07,440 --> 00:36:10,120 Speaker 1: I guess there would be kind of a central area 615 00:36:10,200 --> 00:36:13,760 Speaker 1: and then kind of fringe animals out to the side 616 00:36:13,800 --> 00:36:17,600 Speaker 1: of it, and you guys kind of we're finding well leftovers, 617 00:36:17,960 --> 00:36:20,640 Speaker 1: we were finding the leftovers of the excavation rather than 618 00:36:20,680 --> 00:36:22,839 Speaker 1: the leftovers of the kill because I think we were 619 00:36:22,840 --> 00:36:25,319 Speaker 1: in an area of the kill where a lot of 620 00:36:25,320 --> 00:36:28,719 Speaker 1: the processing and butchering was taking place. But because we 621 00:36:28,719 --> 00:36:32,440 Speaker 1: were where the area of processing and butchering was taking place, 622 00:36:32,719 --> 00:36:35,680 Speaker 1: there weren't necessarily points there. Okay, so let's think about 623 00:36:35,719 --> 00:36:39,560 Speaker 1: this is in terms of a bison kill. Okay, So 624 00:36:39,600 --> 00:36:43,040 Speaker 1: we've got a conundrum. We have no way of knowing 625 00:36:43,120 --> 00:36:45,680 Speaker 1: really what happened that day in the fall some ten 626 00:36:45,800 --> 00:36:49,839 Speaker 1: thousand years ago. I wanted to get some clarity from 627 00:36:49,960 --> 00:36:55,680 Speaker 1: Dr Meltzer about what we one hundred no. So we're 628 00:36:55,680 --> 00:37:00,200 Speaker 1: trying to make sense of how the heck that these 629 00:37:00,480 --> 00:37:04,279 Speaker 1: ancient humans could have killed that many big animals in 630 00:37:04,440 --> 00:37:09,560 Speaker 1: one spot. How how certain are you your hypothesis? I mean, 631 00:37:09,680 --> 00:37:11,799 Speaker 1: when you really think about the amount of evidence that 632 00:37:11,840 --> 00:37:14,880 Speaker 1: we have and the kind of conclusions that we're coming to, 633 00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:17,800 Speaker 1: it's kind of mind boggling to me. Because we have bones, 634 00:37:17,800 --> 00:37:20,839 Speaker 1: and we have points, we have the topography, and now 635 00:37:20,920 --> 00:37:24,080 Speaker 1: you have in depth researched what the land would have 636 00:37:24,120 --> 00:37:27,440 Speaker 1: looked like at that time from the from the excavations 637 00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:30,439 Speaker 1: that you've done. How certain are you? I mean, you 638 00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:36,560 Speaker 1: being the chief authority on this, are you just guessing question. Well, no, 639 00:37:36,680 --> 00:37:40,040 Speaker 1: you asked two questions there, Clay, Okay, how it went down, 640 00:37:40,560 --> 00:37:44,400 Speaker 1: that's inference, right, How they made the kill, um, the 641 00:37:44,480 --> 00:37:46,839 Speaker 1: time of the year they made the kill. Uh. Did 642 00:37:46,880 --> 00:37:49,080 Speaker 1: they maneuver the animals and kill them in the in 643 00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:51,400 Speaker 1: the arroyo or did they kill them in the tributary? 644 00:37:51,440 --> 00:37:53,919 Speaker 1: I have to infer that right, Okay, So that part 645 00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:59,359 Speaker 1: you're making absolutely and in fact, you know, when we 646 00:37:59,400 --> 00:38:01,120 Speaker 1: wrote all this up in the Folsome book, you know 647 00:38:01,160 --> 00:38:04,720 Speaker 1: I made it clear. Here's one alternative explanation, here's another. Now, 648 00:38:05,040 --> 00:38:07,279 Speaker 1: the first part of your question was, am I sure 649 00:38:07,360 --> 00:38:11,960 Speaker 1: this is a kill of thirty two animals? Yes? Absolutely, yes, yeah, 650 00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:14,520 Speaker 1: because there's no other way to account for it. Right. 651 00:38:14,760 --> 00:38:16,800 Speaker 1: So one of the things that we do is archaeologists, 652 00:38:17,160 --> 00:38:21,960 Speaker 1: um is Okay, You've always got to make sure that 653 00:38:22,160 --> 00:38:26,120 Speaker 1: things are not there naturally before you can conclude that 654 00:38:26,160 --> 00:38:28,480 Speaker 1: they're there culturally, that is to say, before you can 655 00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:30,800 Speaker 1: conclude that they're there is a consequence of human action. 656 00:38:31,040 --> 00:38:33,680 Speaker 1: You've got to illuminate the possibility that nature could have 657 00:38:33,719 --> 00:38:36,640 Speaker 1: done it. Precisely, how they did it and how the 658 00:38:36,640 --> 00:38:39,960 Speaker 1: thing played out that that day in the fall ten 659 00:38:40,040 --> 00:38:44,399 Speaker 1: thousand four, ninety plus or minus twenty years ago. Those 660 00:38:44,440 --> 00:38:47,680 Speaker 1: are educated inferences based on all of the evidence that 661 00:38:47,760 --> 00:38:50,960 Speaker 1: we've accumulated in terms of what the landscape look like, 662 00:38:51,560 --> 00:38:54,360 Speaker 1: where we find bones, where we find bone parts, that 663 00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:59,279 Speaker 1: kind of thing. It's time to get into the meat 664 00:38:59,440 --> 00:39:03,239 Speaker 1: of this story. Let's talk about the day of the kill. 665 00:39:03,960 --> 00:39:08,920 Speaker 1: Here's Steve and I talking about it. Talk to me 666 00:39:08,960 --> 00:39:12,880 Speaker 1: about what you think happened on that day. We have 667 00:39:13,120 --> 00:39:18,960 Speaker 1: one isolated bison kill site, thirty two animals, roughly twenty 668 00:39:19,120 --> 00:39:21,920 Speaker 1: points that were found in this kill site. We have 669 00:39:22,080 --> 00:39:24,640 Speaker 1: radio carbon dates that take us back to that time. 670 00:39:24,920 --> 00:39:27,200 Speaker 1: We know how far it was below the surface. It's 671 00:39:27,239 --> 00:39:29,680 Speaker 1: like you only have so many data points to begin 672 00:39:29,760 --> 00:39:32,359 Speaker 1: to make conclusions. What do you think happened that day? 673 00:39:32,560 --> 00:39:35,160 Speaker 1: These animals wait over a thousand pounds. You didn't drag 674 00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:37,520 Speaker 1: them around and pile them up, but they're in a 675 00:39:37,560 --> 00:39:40,680 Speaker 1: big pile. The understanding based on every way you look 676 00:39:40,719 --> 00:39:43,399 Speaker 1: at it, including like the proximity of the animals where 677 00:39:43,400 --> 00:39:45,759 Speaker 1: they were killed, the fact that they were in a 678 00:39:46,000 --> 00:39:49,200 Speaker 1: high box canyon, is that someone didn't come up and 679 00:39:49,239 --> 00:39:52,160 Speaker 1: surprise them. Thirty some animals in a tight little bundle 680 00:39:52,200 --> 00:39:54,520 Speaker 1: at the head of a box canyon. They weren't in 681 00:39:54,520 --> 00:39:57,239 Speaker 1: there sleeping. It just goes against everything we understand about 682 00:39:57,239 --> 00:40:00,839 Speaker 1: how bison act. These are an open country animal. They're 683 00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:02,560 Speaker 1: not in there like, oh, they're all in there asleep, 684 00:40:02,600 --> 00:40:05,640 Speaker 1: We're gonna sneak in. It's just not what they were doing. 685 00:40:05,920 --> 00:40:09,160 Speaker 1: They got driven up in there. That's like the understanding 686 00:40:09,160 --> 00:40:12,000 Speaker 1: of everyone looks at the landscape is these things were herded, 687 00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:15,800 Speaker 1: driven into a box canyon where there was no escape. 688 00:40:15,880 --> 00:40:17,640 Speaker 1: They got him up to the head of the box canyon, 689 00:40:17,760 --> 00:40:20,920 Speaker 1: big high walls. I'll tell you I've I've managed to 690 00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:25,200 Speaker 1: do that on two occasions, almost accidentally, and caught dear 691 00:40:25,239 --> 00:40:27,200 Speaker 1: at the head of box canyons where they had to 692 00:40:27,239 --> 00:40:29,520 Speaker 1: come back out through me to get out, heard him 693 00:40:29,560 --> 00:40:32,240 Speaker 1: into a box canyon, and then this rain down spears 694 00:40:32,280 --> 00:40:36,960 Speaker 1: on him and killed him. Very interesting, Steve Ronnella. But 695 00:40:37,080 --> 00:40:42,239 Speaker 1: our old buddy Kyle Bell disagrees with you. Kyle was 696 00:40:42,320 --> 00:40:44,360 Speaker 1: the cowboy on part one that I said was the 697 00:40:44,440 --> 00:40:48,719 Speaker 1: guardian of George McJunkins character and legacy. We're standing in 698 00:40:48,840 --> 00:40:51,879 Speaker 1: the wild horse arroyo at the sight of the kill 699 00:40:52,040 --> 00:40:56,800 Speaker 1: as he's telling me what he thinks happened, and This 700 00:40:57,000 --> 00:41:04,279 Speaker 1: is strictly my theory on this, and everybody does. When 701 00:41:04,440 --> 00:41:06,680 Speaker 1: the first time I ever came down here and looked around, 702 00:41:07,520 --> 00:41:10,120 Speaker 1: I saw some things that didn't fit some of the 703 00:41:10,239 --> 00:41:14,040 Speaker 1: stories that I had heard. But I have been a 704 00:41:14,160 --> 00:41:17,719 Speaker 1: guide for the last thirty years and probably been in 705 00:41:17,880 --> 00:41:22,080 Speaker 1: on at least two hundred buffalo kills, and my theories 706 00:41:22,120 --> 00:41:28,560 Speaker 1: are based on if bison antiquous acted like the bison 707 00:41:28,680 --> 00:41:31,800 Speaker 1: that we deal with today, and that's what I'm basing 708 00:41:31,920 --> 00:41:35,040 Speaker 1: my theories on. There was a reason that the bison 709 00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:37,879 Speaker 1: almost got wiped out in North America. They're not hard 710 00:41:37,920 --> 00:41:41,960 Speaker 1: to kill and you can't make them go anywhere they 711 00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:45,879 Speaker 1: don't want to go. If there was a migration path 712 00:41:46,000 --> 00:41:50,839 Speaker 1: through and bison came through here in the fall, then 713 00:41:50,880 --> 00:41:53,719 Speaker 1: the people that followed the bison that lived off of 714 00:41:53,800 --> 00:41:56,720 Speaker 1: them would know that they're gonna be in this valley 715 00:41:57,080 --> 00:42:01,120 Speaker 1: this time of year. In this particular drag cameras probably 716 00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:04,680 Speaker 1: had a couple of drones, you know. And I believe 717 00:42:04,719 --> 00:42:08,640 Speaker 1: in this drainage that there's a mineral in here that 718 00:42:08,960 --> 00:42:14,080 Speaker 1: the buffalo knew about and that we're after. And selenium 719 00:42:15,520 --> 00:42:20,120 Speaker 1: is a mineral. It doesn't get in the grass no 720 00:42:20,239 --> 00:42:22,200 Speaker 1: matter how much grass they eat, they don't get the 721 00:42:22,239 --> 00:42:25,160 Speaker 1: selenium that they need. So they need to know where 722 00:42:25,200 --> 00:42:29,000 Speaker 1: there's a lick, a salt lick of some sword. Then 723 00:42:29,080 --> 00:42:31,920 Speaker 1: the people would know it too, and they said, we 724 00:42:32,000 --> 00:42:34,160 Speaker 1: don't have to drive them in there. Oh we gotta 725 00:42:34,200 --> 00:42:36,080 Speaker 1: do is wait until they go up in there on 726 00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:41,360 Speaker 1: their own, and then we'll put hunters in a circle 727 00:42:41,440 --> 00:42:45,799 Speaker 1: around them. The men back then were proficient with an 728 00:42:45,840 --> 00:42:49,360 Speaker 1: addle addle. That's what was used here to kill the 729 00:42:49,440 --> 00:42:57,320 Speaker 1: buffalo with very interesting kyle, the old salt lick, bush whack, 730 00:42:57,640 --> 00:43:00,720 Speaker 1: the oldest trick, and the paleolithic hunter's bag of tricks. 731 00:43:01,120 --> 00:43:03,920 Speaker 1: They were probably hanging in tree saddles and using commercial 732 00:43:04,040 --> 00:43:08,880 Speaker 1: scent control products too. But let's see what the doctor 733 00:43:09,040 --> 00:43:12,800 Speaker 1: Meltzer has to say about it. So I think it 734 00:43:12,880 --> 00:43:15,560 Speaker 1: was an accident. I think these folks were hid in 735 00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:18,000 Speaker 1: someplace else. I think they were heading for a pass 736 00:43:18,120 --> 00:43:20,920 Speaker 1: that's about eight eight or so kilometers north of there. 737 00:43:21,080 --> 00:43:24,040 Speaker 1: I think they spotted a herd. And you know, with bison, 738 00:43:24,239 --> 00:43:27,279 Speaker 1: the image that you have is lots of noise, lots 739 00:43:27,320 --> 00:43:30,640 Speaker 1: of stampedes, animals flying over a cliff. I think a 740 00:43:30,760 --> 00:43:34,560 Speaker 1: lot of of these hunts in These kills were based 741 00:43:34,640 --> 00:43:38,400 Speaker 1: on very careful maneuvering of the herd Bison. You know, 742 00:43:38,480 --> 00:43:41,040 Speaker 1: their eyesight is not so good. They smell good in 743 00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:43,920 Speaker 1: the sense that they smell well, not that they bathe regularly, 744 00:43:44,800 --> 00:43:47,840 Speaker 1: and so you can kind of get behind them and 745 00:43:48,080 --> 00:43:50,160 Speaker 1: make them a little bit nervous. I mean, you don't 746 00:43:50,160 --> 00:43:52,560 Speaker 1: want to make them too nervous, because you know, those 747 00:43:52,600 --> 00:43:55,600 Speaker 1: animals can go at upwards of almost forty miles an hour. 748 00:43:55,680 --> 00:43:57,839 Speaker 1: They can turn on a dime. They're dangerous. But if 749 00:43:57,880 --> 00:44:00,640 Speaker 1: you can get them maneuvered, and if you can get moving, 750 00:44:01,040 --> 00:44:03,000 Speaker 1: and if you can move them up in arroyo that 751 00:44:03,080 --> 00:44:05,759 Speaker 1: has a nickpoint, a point beyond which they can't go, 752 00:44:06,520 --> 00:44:09,480 Speaker 1: you got them trapped. The thing about fulsome it's a 753 00:44:09,600 --> 00:44:13,680 Speaker 1: very interesting land form because you've got this arroyo what 754 00:44:13,840 --> 00:44:16,480 Speaker 1: we now call a wild horse arroyo, and it had 755 00:44:16,520 --> 00:44:20,120 Speaker 1: a tributary coming in. You think that the animals were 756 00:44:20,200 --> 00:44:23,719 Speaker 1: moved up that arroyo, they hit that bottleneck, they hit 757 00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:26,160 Speaker 1: that nick point, and they couldn't go anywhere, and I 758 00:44:26,239 --> 00:44:29,120 Speaker 1: think the hunters had kind of gone around. So you 759 00:44:29,200 --> 00:44:32,839 Speaker 1: had hunters maybe behind them, moving the herd small herd, 760 00:44:33,239 --> 00:44:35,480 Speaker 1: and then you had your hunters who had flanked them 761 00:44:35,800 --> 00:44:39,799 Speaker 1: gone around, and we're on the uplands above that bottleneck, 762 00:44:39,960 --> 00:44:42,920 Speaker 1: above that nick point. Some of the bones that we found, 763 00:44:43,200 --> 00:44:45,600 Speaker 1: or the bulk of the site was actually in the 764 00:44:45,719 --> 00:44:49,919 Speaker 1: tributary that's leading down into what was then wild Horse 765 00:44:50,000 --> 00:44:52,759 Speaker 1: Arroyo ten thousand plus years ago. Most of the bones 766 00:44:52,840 --> 00:44:55,840 Speaker 1: that were found were found up in that tributary. Some 767 00:44:56,000 --> 00:44:57,960 Speaker 1: of the bones were found down in the arroyo. So 768 00:44:58,080 --> 00:45:00,719 Speaker 1: either the kill took place in the arroyo and some 769 00:45:00,840 --> 00:45:03,359 Speaker 1: of the animals were trying to escape up that ramp 770 00:45:03,480 --> 00:45:05,840 Speaker 1: of the tributary, or the kill took place in the 771 00:45:05,920 --> 00:45:08,759 Speaker 1: tributary and they were fleeing down the tributary and trying 772 00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:12,080 Speaker 1: to escape out the channel. Either way, it appears as 773 00:45:12,120 --> 00:45:14,200 Speaker 1: though a number of the animals were sort of piled 774 00:45:14,280 --> 00:45:17,439 Speaker 1: up against the walls of the arroyo, and the royal 775 00:45:17,520 --> 00:45:20,040 Speaker 1: walls were, you know, four meters high plus or minus. 776 00:45:20,080 --> 00:45:21,600 Speaker 1: A bison is not gonna be able to jump out 777 00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:24,480 Speaker 1: of that thing, right, So they were trapped and and 778 00:45:24,560 --> 00:45:27,120 Speaker 1: the bottleneck point is literally about a foot and a 779 00:45:27,160 --> 00:45:29,279 Speaker 1: half wide, so they wouldn't been able to squeeze up 780 00:45:29,440 --> 00:45:36,040 Speaker 1: and get past um that bottleneck, having dedicated much of 781 00:45:36,160 --> 00:45:39,680 Speaker 1: his life to this kill. Dr Meltzer's opinion carries a 782 00:45:39,719 --> 00:45:42,319 Speaker 1: lot of weight with me. Both he and Steve think 783 00:45:42,440 --> 00:45:46,600 Speaker 1: the bison were herded into the Box Canyon. Dr Meltzer 784 00:45:46,880 --> 00:45:50,080 Speaker 1: continues on with its story. So the kill takes place, 785 00:45:50,520 --> 00:45:53,400 Speaker 1: and it's a it's a god awful, bloody, messy affair. 786 00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:57,200 Speaker 1: You've got thirty two animals. It's it's the fall. You've 787 00:45:57,280 --> 00:46:00,560 Speaker 1: got calves there, you've got cows. They're they're making a ruckus. 788 00:46:01,040 --> 00:46:03,640 Speaker 1: You make the kill, you start to butcher the animals 789 00:46:03,719 --> 00:46:07,120 Speaker 1: your field. You know, you're doing your field processing. Points 790 00:46:07,160 --> 00:46:10,080 Speaker 1: will have broken off inside the carcass points will have 791 00:46:10,200 --> 00:46:12,400 Speaker 1: broken off when you've shoved the spear into them and 792 00:46:12,680 --> 00:46:14,759 Speaker 1: it's snapped and you pull out the spear and all 793 00:46:14,760 --> 00:46:16,439 Speaker 1: you've got is a little butt end of the point 794 00:46:16,520 --> 00:46:19,240 Speaker 1: that's still attached to the spear. You're doing the butchering. 795 00:46:19,400 --> 00:46:22,279 Speaker 1: You know there's blood, there's gore, there's everything all over 796 00:46:22,360 --> 00:46:24,760 Speaker 1: the place, and you're kind of in a hurry because 797 00:46:24,840 --> 00:46:27,160 Speaker 1: we know they didn't stay there for very long, so 798 00:46:27,480 --> 00:46:30,239 Speaker 1: you're just getting everything ready to transport. And so the 799 00:46:30,360 --> 00:46:33,000 Speaker 1: main area where the kill took place is where you're 800 00:46:33,040 --> 00:46:37,240 Speaker 1: going to find the busted up points that they couldn't retrieve, 801 00:46:38,040 --> 00:46:40,200 Speaker 1: or that they found that they said, you know what, 802 00:46:40,360 --> 00:46:42,799 Speaker 1: this thing is so busted up, there's no point trying. 803 00:46:43,080 --> 00:46:45,360 Speaker 1: Those points would have been found at the point of 804 00:46:45,440 --> 00:46:48,640 Speaker 1: the kill where the action took place, right, and then 805 00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:51,080 Speaker 1: where they may have drugs. Some of them to butcher 806 00:46:51,320 --> 00:46:54,480 Speaker 1: would have been right and so but when you're butchering, 807 00:46:54,680 --> 00:46:57,279 Speaker 1: you got your hand on the stone knife, you've got 808 00:46:57,360 --> 00:46:59,360 Speaker 1: your hand on the scrapers, so you're not gonna lose that, 809 00:46:59,760 --> 00:47:04,080 Speaker 1: right understood. So um, but that's the stuff that you're 810 00:47:04,080 --> 00:47:06,640 Speaker 1: going to very carefully curate and take with you onto 811 00:47:06,800 --> 00:47:08,719 Speaker 1: the next place, right, because that's part of your tool kits. 812 00:47:08,800 --> 00:47:11,520 Speaker 1: So that explains why your team wouldn't have found any 813 00:47:11,640 --> 00:47:14,359 Speaker 1: points because you guys were I think where the main 814 00:47:14,480 --> 00:47:17,120 Speaker 1: excavations that had taken place in the nineteen twenties pretty 815 00:47:17,200 --> 00:47:20,960 Speaker 1: much removed the principal kill area we were excavating. And 816 00:47:21,040 --> 00:47:23,080 Speaker 1: we know this partly by looking at the bones. What 817 00:47:23,239 --> 00:47:26,759 Speaker 1: we were finding were discard piles where carcass parts that 818 00:47:26,880 --> 00:47:30,600 Speaker 1: were not nobody's gonna transport a bison skull, It had 819 00:47:30,680 --> 00:47:33,080 Speaker 1: no no use for it. It's too heavy, there's no 820 00:47:33,280 --> 00:47:35,560 Speaker 1: use for it. And once you chop the tongue out, 821 00:47:35,760 --> 00:47:37,840 Speaker 1: and we know they did that at the spot, you 822 00:47:37,880 --> 00:47:40,480 Speaker 1: don't need the jaws either, So they're just throw that 823 00:47:40,600 --> 00:47:43,480 Speaker 1: off to the side. So we were excavating where they 824 00:47:43,520 --> 00:47:45,480 Speaker 1: were just pushing off the stuff to the side that 825 00:47:45,520 --> 00:47:49,600 Speaker 1: they were not going to transport. I had some more 826 00:47:49,719 --> 00:47:54,880 Speaker 1: questions about the kill. Here's Steve. How many people do 827 00:47:54,960 --> 00:47:56,320 Speaker 1: you think would have been there to have done that. 828 00:47:56,600 --> 00:48:02,239 Speaker 1: I think it's uh, No, one knows. No, I think 829 00:48:02,280 --> 00:48:05,440 Speaker 1: it was. It was probably a major kill man. It's 830 00:48:05,480 --> 00:48:07,520 Speaker 1: interesting that they were able to do that because one 831 00:48:07,560 --> 00:48:09,960 Speaker 1: of the things think about return when we were talking 832 00:48:09,960 --> 00:48:13,200 Speaker 1: about um, just the very low population density of people 833 00:48:13,560 --> 00:48:16,400 Speaker 1: and the isolation of it, and the fact that they 834 00:48:16,440 --> 00:48:19,520 Speaker 1: seemed to wander a lot. These guys and false in 835 00:48:19,520 --> 00:48:23,400 Speaker 1: New Mexico are carrying toolstone from the Texas Panhandle. You 836 00:48:23,440 --> 00:48:25,200 Speaker 1: can say like, oh, they had this trade route and 837 00:48:25,320 --> 00:48:27,279 Speaker 1: traded it. They went there and got it, and they 838 00:48:27,360 --> 00:48:31,239 Speaker 1: wandered around, and they kept on the move, and they 839 00:48:31,360 --> 00:48:35,520 Speaker 1: hunted animals that experienced no hunting pressure that they were 840 00:48:35,920 --> 00:48:40,440 Speaker 1: dispersed and moved, and they'd find animals where in that 841 00:48:40,600 --> 00:48:43,160 Speaker 1: group of animals there's no experience with humans because that 842 00:48:43,360 --> 00:48:45,320 Speaker 1: we know that means a lot in terms of the 843 00:48:45,400 --> 00:48:47,799 Speaker 1: ability for a human to kill an animal. For them 844 00:48:47,840 --> 00:48:50,040 Speaker 1: to not have figured out what was going on, it 845 00:48:50,160 --> 00:48:52,600 Speaker 1: might have been just that these are just animals with 846 00:48:52,920 --> 00:48:57,439 Speaker 1: very little exposure to humans and perhaps very easily manipulated 847 00:48:57,640 --> 00:49:00,040 Speaker 1: by humans. You can get real close to them, you 848 00:49:00,080 --> 00:49:02,160 Speaker 1: can kind of make a half surround and you know, 849 00:49:02,640 --> 00:49:05,480 Speaker 1: nudge them along. They're not immediate like you see one 850 00:49:05,480 --> 00:49:08,160 Speaker 1: of those things on two legs. I don't care what 851 00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:12,600 Speaker 1: you're doing. You get there. Perhaps they're responding to the 852 00:49:12,719 --> 00:49:16,120 Speaker 1: human predators no differently than they respond than how we 853 00:49:16,239 --> 00:49:19,960 Speaker 1: see the same species respond to wolves, which is your 854 00:49:20,000 --> 00:49:23,440 Speaker 1: bunch up. Maybe when approached by a bunch of bipedal predators, 855 00:49:23,840 --> 00:49:26,760 Speaker 1: these bipedal predators could just mimic the activity of wolves, 856 00:49:27,040 --> 00:49:29,440 Speaker 1: kind of get roughly around them, they sort of bunch up, 857 00:49:29,440 --> 00:49:31,600 Speaker 1: and then you kind of like gently nudge them along 858 00:49:31,680 --> 00:49:34,040 Speaker 1: and nudge them into this thing, and then nudge them 859 00:49:34,120 --> 00:49:35,920 Speaker 1: up this canyon, and when they can't get away, you 860 00:49:35,960 --> 00:49:37,960 Speaker 1: start killing them. May be like a walk in the park, 861 00:49:38,280 --> 00:49:41,080 Speaker 1: but here's your thing. Maybe that day, because we don't 862 00:49:41,120 --> 00:49:43,200 Speaker 1: there's not tons of these sites. It's like it's hard 863 00:49:43,280 --> 00:49:45,680 Speaker 1: to nothing last that long, or it's all it's twenty 864 00:49:46,000 --> 00:49:48,040 Speaker 1: under sand and gravel, whatever. There's not a lot of 865 00:49:48,080 --> 00:49:49,839 Speaker 1: these sights to compare it to. Or as far as 866 00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:52,440 Speaker 1: we know, those people talked about that day for the 867 00:49:52,520 --> 00:49:56,720 Speaker 1: rest of their lives, that's the weirdest day that ever happened. 868 00:49:57,239 --> 00:49:59,360 Speaker 1: They're like, no, man, I'm telling you, dude, do you 869 00:49:59,400 --> 00:50:01,640 Speaker 1: remember that one time they just were up in there. 870 00:50:01,719 --> 00:50:03,480 Speaker 1: I don't know what they were doing. I never see 871 00:50:03,480 --> 00:50:05,600 Speaker 1: anything like it. My dad never saw anything like it. 872 00:50:06,040 --> 00:50:08,440 Speaker 1: Or it was just another day. You know, when you 873 00:50:08,480 --> 00:50:10,200 Speaker 1: get this any kind of like some sort of like 874 00:50:10,320 --> 00:50:13,160 Speaker 1: statistical thing, if you only find one thing, you have 875 00:50:13,320 --> 00:50:18,040 Speaker 1: to assume that you were looking at like something happened. Well, no, no, 876 00:50:18,120 --> 00:50:20,200 Speaker 1: I was gonna say the other point that let's say 877 00:50:20,280 --> 00:50:22,520 Speaker 1: that at some point in time, someone was gonna like 878 00:50:22,640 --> 00:50:26,640 Speaker 1: freeze an American household. Here's an American household frozen in place. 879 00:50:26,920 --> 00:50:29,960 Speaker 1: What are the odds that of all the American households 880 00:50:30,000 --> 00:50:32,960 Speaker 1: at at eleven PM that you would have frozen place 881 00:50:33,520 --> 00:50:37,000 Speaker 1: a murder in progress, or would have more likely have 882 00:50:37,080 --> 00:50:39,759 Speaker 1: been some people in their living room watching TV. It's like, 883 00:50:39,880 --> 00:50:42,680 Speaker 1: it's just more likely that you would have catch just 884 00:50:42,800 --> 00:50:46,480 Speaker 1: this randomized American household at eleven PM. You catch some 885 00:50:46,640 --> 00:50:49,640 Speaker 1: sort of thing that seemed normal multiple rather than like, 886 00:50:49,840 --> 00:50:52,920 Speaker 1: oh my god, this one spectacular always murdering each other 887 00:50:53,000 --> 00:50:55,600 Speaker 1: at eleven at night, because you capture the spectacular event 888 00:50:55,640 --> 00:50:58,160 Speaker 1: and isolation. So you look at like this one thing, 889 00:50:58,280 --> 00:51:00,360 Speaker 1: we don't have many of them, This one thing, like 890 00:51:00,520 --> 00:51:02,479 Speaker 1: you have to go like, I don't know, man, there's 891 00:51:02,480 --> 00:51:04,279 Speaker 1: these people out there. They are killings of all time. 892 00:51:04,440 --> 00:51:06,959 Speaker 1: Here's this pretty well preserved scenario where they killed stuff. 893 00:51:07,040 --> 00:51:09,040 Speaker 1: I'm just gonna have to go on the assumption that 894 00:51:09,160 --> 00:51:11,440 Speaker 1: this is like indicative of what these people did and 895 00:51:11,560 --> 00:51:15,279 Speaker 1: not that it was a weird day. We've talked about 896 00:51:15,360 --> 00:51:18,319 Speaker 1: these stone points, but we haven't talked about how they 897 00:51:18,360 --> 00:51:21,360 Speaker 1: were used to kill the bison. At the time in 898 00:51:21,480 --> 00:51:25,080 Speaker 1: North America, there were two options for throwing sticks with 899 00:51:25,239 --> 00:51:29,960 Speaker 1: sharp rocks on the end, bows and addle addles. Here's 900 00:51:30,040 --> 00:51:37,080 Speaker 1: what Dr Meltzer had to say, were these hand projected spears? 901 00:51:37,160 --> 00:51:40,400 Speaker 1: Were these ad laddles? Well, now, so that's something I 902 00:51:40,480 --> 00:51:43,279 Speaker 1: cannot answer, right. You need a lot of force. Think 903 00:51:43,320 --> 00:51:45,920 Speaker 1: about a bison. The side of a bison is basically 904 00:51:45,960 --> 00:51:49,640 Speaker 1: a picket fence of ribs, and they're fairly wide. You've 905 00:51:49,680 --> 00:51:53,279 Speaker 1: got hair, you've got hied, you've got bone, you've got fat. 906 00:51:53,480 --> 00:51:56,360 Speaker 1: All that stuff has to get penetrated. The thinking is, 907 00:51:56,560 --> 00:51:58,560 Speaker 1: the suspicion is and this, you know, this gets to 908 00:51:58,680 --> 00:52:00,400 Speaker 1: another one of those things that we just have to 909 00:52:00,480 --> 00:52:03,040 Speaker 1: infer this because we don't really know that these were 910 00:52:03,080 --> 00:52:07,080 Speaker 1: either thrust or thrown at high velocity. And we know 911 00:52:07,520 --> 00:52:10,920 Speaker 1: that in fact, there was some velocity involved because we 912 00:52:11,040 --> 00:52:14,000 Speaker 1: have what are known as impact fractures. Basically, when bone 913 00:52:14,040 --> 00:52:16,799 Speaker 1: meat stone at high velocity the front end, you get 914 00:52:16,880 --> 00:52:20,520 Speaker 1: some serious front end damage. So the points that they found, 915 00:52:20,560 --> 00:52:24,400 Speaker 1: though were not diagnostic in terms of at lett or 916 00:52:24,640 --> 00:52:28,040 Speaker 1: hand thrusted spear, No, because you know, whether it was 917 00:52:28,200 --> 00:52:31,360 Speaker 1: thrust or throne, it's the same size point. You know, 918 00:52:31,640 --> 00:52:34,279 Speaker 1: regardless of how it happened, it would have had to 919 00:52:34,480 --> 00:52:37,719 Speaker 1: bend some pretty bad to the bone people to have 920 00:52:38,000 --> 00:52:41,160 Speaker 1: killed thirty two bison. It was a cow calf herd 921 00:52:41,520 --> 00:52:44,239 Speaker 1: and the kill took place in the fall. How do 922 00:52:44,360 --> 00:52:48,040 Speaker 1: we know the dental eruption patterns? So bison tend to 923 00:52:48,160 --> 00:52:51,360 Speaker 1: have between about mid April and mid May, and their teeth, 924 00:52:51,480 --> 00:52:56,120 Speaker 1: their molars grow at a fairly regular rate. And these 925 00:52:56,400 --> 00:52:58,880 Speaker 1: these molars or these pre molars have already you know, 926 00:52:59,000 --> 00:53:02,719 Speaker 1: busted over and are on the surface. Now you can say, okay, 927 00:53:02,760 --> 00:53:05,360 Speaker 1: well it's probably been about four months. So if you go, 928 00:53:05,719 --> 00:53:09,000 Speaker 1: you know, mid April age of the calves, that then 929 00:53:09,080 --> 00:53:11,840 Speaker 1: understand that they we been born in the spring. And 930 00:53:12,200 --> 00:53:14,200 Speaker 1: and you've got a bunch of four month old calves, 931 00:53:14,360 --> 00:53:17,000 Speaker 1: that tells you you've got a kill that took place, 932 00:53:17,080 --> 00:53:25,480 Speaker 1: you know, September plus or minus. We're going to halt 933 00:53:25,560 --> 00:53:29,960 Speaker 1: the conversation right here. It's so interesting to ponder our 934 00:53:30,040 --> 00:53:32,960 Speaker 1: ancient history as humans. You have to wait for part 935 00:53:33,040 --> 00:53:35,640 Speaker 1: three to hear the rest of the story. We live 936 00:53:35,680 --> 00:53:39,279 Speaker 1: in such a weird concoction called time that binds us 937 00:53:39,360 --> 00:53:42,239 Speaker 1: so tightly to the present, it's hard to imagine any 938 00:53:42,280 --> 00:53:45,839 Speaker 1: other form of life beyond what we experience with their 939 00:53:45,920 --> 00:53:50,600 Speaker 1: own life, that is, unless we strain our brains to 940 00:53:50,760 --> 00:53:54,759 Speaker 1: think back. But maybe it's not a cognitive exercise as 941 00:53:54,880 --> 00:53:57,239 Speaker 1: much as it is a spiritual one to try to 942 00:53:57,400 --> 00:54:01,120 Speaker 1: understand ancient man. But a bigger question is why do 943 00:54:01,239 --> 00:54:04,600 Speaker 1: we care or even want to understand them? And I 944 00:54:04,760 --> 00:54:08,840 Speaker 1: cannot fully answer that, but I am convinced that the 945 00:54:08,960 --> 00:54:12,040 Speaker 1: lives of these people that left these stone points are 946 00:54:12,160 --> 00:54:16,560 Speaker 1: still relevant in regardless of the barrier of time that 947 00:54:16,719 --> 00:54:20,279 Speaker 1: separates us. We're in the process as a culture of 948 00:54:20,480 --> 00:54:25,920 Speaker 1: redefining modern humanity. Who we are, why we're here, Why 949 00:54:26,000 --> 00:54:29,040 Speaker 1: are we so clearly different than the other beasts of 950 00:54:29,120 --> 00:54:31,799 Speaker 1: this planet? And now the heck did we go from 951 00:54:31,920 --> 00:54:37,160 Speaker 1: slinging stone tip spears advising to driving testlas? Why is 952 00:54:37,239 --> 00:54:40,600 Speaker 1: there such turboil in the earth. These are just some 953 00:54:40,760 --> 00:54:44,840 Speaker 1: of the questions that we have. The fulsome sight gives 954 00:54:44,960 --> 00:54:50,160 Speaker 1: us an indisputable data point, a moment frozen time that 955 00:54:50,440 --> 00:54:53,480 Speaker 1: shows us what men were doing during a couple of 956 00:54:53,560 --> 00:54:58,480 Speaker 1: days stretch over ten thousand years ago. As rudimentary as 957 00:54:58,600 --> 00:55:02,560 Speaker 1: this info may seem, this data point anchors part of 958 00:55:02,640 --> 00:55:06,239 Speaker 1: our identity as humans. It reminds us of a more 959 00:55:06,440 --> 00:55:10,440 Speaker 1: simple definition of humanity. This was a group of people 960 00:55:10,600 --> 00:55:14,759 Speaker 1: connected together by a common cause. These hunters were undoubtedly 961 00:55:14,840 --> 00:55:18,040 Speaker 1: a family group trying to make a living and survive 962 00:55:18,440 --> 00:55:21,879 Speaker 1: in a hostile place. The complexity of modern life can 963 00:55:21,920 --> 00:55:24,800 Speaker 1: be bewildering, but I don't think it has to be. 964 00:55:25,400 --> 00:55:28,080 Speaker 1: There are a lot of mysterious questions about these people 965 00:55:28,200 --> 00:55:31,080 Speaker 1: that I'm very interested in, like where the heck did 966 00:55:31,120 --> 00:55:33,719 Speaker 1: they come from? And what was the construct of their 967 00:55:33,800 --> 00:55:38,320 Speaker 1: spiritual belief system which they undoubtedly had. Atheism seems to 968 00:55:38,360 --> 00:55:41,920 Speaker 1: be a pretty new phenomena in our species. These are 969 00:55:42,000 --> 00:55:46,120 Speaker 1: questions that stone points and bones can't answer, but it's 970 00:55:46,200 --> 00:55:48,960 Speaker 1: all we have to go off of. But isn't this 971 00:55:49,120 --> 00:55:53,480 Speaker 1: the cool thing about being human? This rare cognition and 972 00:55:53,560 --> 00:55:57,239 Speaker 1: this awareness that we possessed is a gift, and our 973 00:55:57,360 --> 00:56:02,080 Speaker 1: curiosity about past humans on this planet is also a gift. 974 00:56:04,360 --> 00:56:07,120 Speaker 1: I can't thank you enough for listening to Bear Greece. 975 00:56:07,480 --> 00:56:10,680 Speaker 1: On Part three of this podcast, will continue in our 976 00:56:10,760 --> 00:56:14,880 Speaker 1: conversation with Steve Rinella and Dr Meltzer. We've got several 977 00:56:15,080 --> 00:56:19,000 Speaker 1: interesting topics yet to explore, one of them being how 978 00:56:19,200 --> 00:56:23,680 Speaker 1: the Fulsome Sight upended many people's understanding of the Bible's 979 00:56:23,760 --> 00:56:27,319 Speaker 1: teaching on the Age of men and the Earth. I've 980 00:56:27,440 --> 00:56:30,960 Speaker 1: got a few thoughts on that. Leave us a review 981 00:56:31,120 --> 00:56:34,279 Speaker 1: on iTunes and tell some of your friends about this 982 00:56:34,480 --> 00:56:38,719 Speaker 1: podcast and tune in next week when myself, along with 983 00:56:38,880 --> 00:56:44,880 Speaker 1: a whole New Render crew discuss the Fulsome Sight Sorry 984 00:56:45,000 --> 00:56:48,080 Speaker 1: Old Render regulars have a great week,