Posted on 10/19/2003 1:08:35 PM PDT by blam
The mystery of Brazoria Woman: Is she the oldest North American?
Star-Telegram
STAR-TELEGRAM/RODGER MALLISON
Texas A&M University doctoral students Jason Wiersema and Bill Dickens gently push aside mud to reveal the burial of Brazoria Woman.
STAR-TELEGRAM/RODGER MALLISON
Joining them is Mike Waters, who documents the site.
STAR-TELEGRAM/RODGER MALLISON
While the dating of the skeleton may ultimately depend on high-tech radiocarbon tests, the field tools on this dig, included such everyday items as the ever-present sunscreen and paintbrushes to gently move earth away from artifacts.
STAR-TELEGRAM/RODGER MALLISON
Although most of Brazoria Woman's bones were found intact, some bone fragments also were unearthed and collected in bags, that mark the area where they were dug up.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife workers excavating on the coastal plains along the Gulf of Mexico in 2001 accidentally clipped off the top of a human skull.
Alarmed, they contacted an archaeological consultant, Bob d'Aigle of Spring. The bone appeared ancient. D'Aigle wondered if this person had sunk into the boggy coastal marsh. He wondered if the skeleton would be found in a standing position.
A piece of skull sent to the University of Arizona radiocarbon laboratory dated the bone at 13,000 years old. D'Aigle called in archaeologists from Texas A&M University.
An archaeological dig this summer uncovered the rest of the skeleton. It was a woman who had been buried face- down with her arms resting across her chest.
But the soil level she was found in appears to be 5,000 years old, says Mike Waters, Texas A&M archaeologist.
More bone samples are to be tested. If the older date proves true, she is one of the oldest human skeletons to have been found on this continent.
Her age could help to prove new theories that would rewrite history and show that the first North Americans came here thousands of years earlier than was previously believed.
In the top photo, Texas A&M University doctoral students Jason Wiersema and Bill Dickens gently push aside mud to reveal the burial of Brazoria Woman. Archaeologists requested that photographs of the whole skeleton not be shown out of respect for Indian tribes who may feel a connection. Joining them is Mike Waters, far right, who documents the site. Although most of Brazoria Woman's bones were found intact, some bone fragments also were unearthed and collected in bags, inset, that mark the area where they were dug up. While the dating of the skeleton may ultimately depend on high-tech radiocarbon tests, the field tools on this dig, above, included such everyday items as the ever-present sunscreen and paintbrushes to gently move earth away from artifacts.
No. Helen Thomas is, followed by Maddie Albright.
FMCDH
Modern dating techniques do not impress me with the current state of the art.
This is becoming truly irritating.
Indians have no more a connection to these artifacts than I do. They just have found a means of "screwing" the white man which for the moment remains unassailable.
The quest for knowledge trumps PC in any sane society.
I could care less about their primitive and savage culture and any accidental contribution they might have made to our modern society.
What will it take to relegate them to the importance they deserve?
That they would influence our archeologists and historians to the level of mouthing inanities is both embarrassing and a drag on that unique and civilized quality of man, intellectual curiosity.
I wonder what it will take? Sign me aboard!
Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this ping list.
Modern dating techniques do not impress me with the current state of the art.
LOL! Well, granted, they do appear to be a bit "overly flexiable", shall we say?
And that alone (plus no photo) speaks volumns. Sort of like when the media fails to note the skin color of a criminal suspect.
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