Tribesman: According to the Associated Press, this is a 1973 photo of war chief Ajam, of the Dani Tribe of New Guinea, who told missionaries he killed U.S. anthropologist Michael Rockefeller in 1961. However, Hoffman's research disputes this
Posted on 02/23/2014 1:09:37 PM PST by afraidfortherepublic
A journey to the heart of New Guinea’s Asmat tribal homeland sheds new light on the mystery of the heir’s disappearance there in 1961
smat is, in its way, a perfect place. Everything you could possibly need is here. It’s teeming with shrimp and crabs and fish and clams. In the jungle there are wild pig, the furry, opossumlike cuscus, and the ostrichlike cassowary. And sago palm, whose pith can be pounded into a white starch and which hosts the larvae of the Capricorn beetle, both key sources of nutrition. The rivers are navigable highways. Crocodiles 15 feet long prowl their banks, and jet-black iguanas sun on uprooted trees. There are flocks of brilliant red-and-green parrots. Hornbills with five-inch beaks and blue necks.
And secrets, spirits, laws and customs, born of men and women who have been walled off by ocean, mountains, mud and jungle for longer than anyone knows.
Until 50 years ago, there were no wheels here. No steel or iron, not even any paper. There’s still not a single road or automobile. In its 10,000 square miles, there is but one airstrip, and outside of the main “city” of Agats, there isn’t a single cell tower. Here it’s hard to know where the water begins and the land ends, as the Arafura Sea’s 15-foot tides inundate the coast of southwest New Guinea, an invisible swelling that daily slides into this flat swamp and pushes hard against great outflowing rivers. It is a world of satiny, knee-deep mud and mangrove swamps stretching inland, a great hydroponic terrarium.
(Excerpt) Read more at smithsonianmag.com ...
I guess he found the lost city of Y and didn’t ever get to Z.
Actually, I read that book Lost city of Z, was really really interesting.
They were going to make it into a movie, with Brad Pitt, I think was going to play Fawcett, but it got shelved.
Seems it’s coming back. Hopefully, but without the Pitt.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1212428/
I remember first hearing about Michael Rockefeller by reading an article in one of those 1960s men’s magazines, either “True” or “Argosy” — the article showed some photos, including a smiling Michael (I think in a canoe), another of Nelson Rockefeller being shown some objects, perhaps human bones, and a photo of the guy who purportedly had killed Michael and eaten part of him.
“I was part of the search and rescue fleet. USS Princeton sailed out of Subic Bay with a Marine helicopter squadron. We searched for days before we were recalled,”
Really? That is epic. What an experience. Did you all just figure it was cannibals?
“Money can’t buy everything.”
That picture of him sitting in the middle of a bunch of natives dancing around him...I know it is from another area and they are not cannibals but it is frightening to see how a privileged youth can be so deceived as to thing the world is just one big friendly place.
and say ‘hi’ with that same smiling face to cannibals.
Damn, no matter where you go, Jews are always running things!
Eat em’ up, yum yum, eat em’ up.
That was a very interesting story.
Those missionaries had their hands full with that group.
Most of us at the time thought he drowned.
“Most of us at the time thought he drowned.”
What a shock it must’ve come as.
Well the first lie is that he wouldn’t have been swimming in a river with fifteen foot crocs, especially in the evening. Seems like the natives want to cover up the fact that it was wholly premeditated, and that they went and got him. Maybe he jumped into the river to try to escape
“Well the first lie is that he wouldn’t have been swimming in a river with fifteen foot crocs, especially in the evening. Seems like the natives want to cover up the fact that it was wholly premeditated, and that they went and got him. Maybe he jumped into the river to try to escape.”
I never thought of this. Good point! I spent the whole day reading this and thinking about it, looking at the ‘art’ of New Guinea natives, blah blah blah.
Somehow this story really grabbed me. I remember hearing about it when I was a kid and my mother always figured he was cannibalized. I thought it was the most frightening thing I ever heard of.
That picture of him smiling while they dance around him...!
Tribesman: According to the Associated Press, this is a 1973 photo of war chief Ajam, of the Dani Tribe of New Guinea, who told missionaries he killed U.S. anthropologist Michael Rockefeller in 1961. However, Hoffman's research disputes this
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.