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Mick Ryan
Trad climber
The Peaks
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Jul 24, 2014 - 10:39pm PT
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Wouldn't they be better getting Norman on their side.
Give him a hat, a badge and a permit, some tools, a camera and a notebook and let him wander free exploring, discovering, collecting and recording?
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Flip Flop
Trad climber
Truckee, CA
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Jul 24, 2014 - 11:27pm PT
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Archaeological relics are only interesting to people if found and given context. When the coot dies they will become relics again. Remember that the government usually puts it away in a box. Maybe it's in a museum. Maybe it's not.
What Mick said ^^^
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franky
Trad climber
Bishop, CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 07:40am PT
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The goal isn't too collect artifacts. Mapping their location is useful for various reasons, but seldom is it the goal to actually excavate and collect artifacts from sites. Once again, most sites are best left in tact.
It isn't like what he is doing is particularly hard. The only reason he finds stuff is because other people don't loot arc sites.
It'd be like somebody climbing rnwf of half dome and collecting all the fixed gear because it was just there and nobody else had discovered it.
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
mammoth lakes ca
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Jul 25, 2014 - 07:54am PT
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53 government employees..? Why not 54..? Dude sounds like a Kleptomaniac..? For some reason , It's always bugged me when i see someone's arrowhead collection...? Maybe it's the greed factor..? Whatever..
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guyman
Social climber
Moorpark, CA.
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Jul 25, 2014 - 08:20am PT
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The goal isn't too collect artifacts. Mapping their location is useful for various reasons, but seldom is it the goal to actually excavate and collect artifacts from sites. Once again, most sites are best left in tact.
Franky..... I agree with you about raiding a "site".... sites are very rare and it is a wonderful thing to find one, look and leave.
I know of some in JT and Kings Canyon that looks like someone is going to return any day and resume daily life.
Now you have told me to return the flint knife I found out in the open desert....
to that I say no.
That would accomplish nothing.
I see it this way.... that knife was a mans tool, probably passed down from father to son for generations.
Now something went down to cause that man to loose that knife up at the base of those lonely rocks out near Ridgecrest.
I like to hold that knife and wonder why it was lost, the story from way back in time will never be known.
Now I am a man who works with tools, I earn my living with tools, so did the owner of that knife.
That knife is carefully packed away and it goes with me and my tools to work.
I break it out, sometimes, and think about how that knife ties me to people who lived and worked thousand of years ago, that makes me feel good.
Somehow connected to the human race.
Now, Franky, I can tell you feel very strongly about this issue and I can appreciate your feelings.
And I want to ask you this question.
What do you think about museums?
Places like the Bancroft?
The professional site raiders.
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franky
Trad climber
Bishop, CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 09:10am PT
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I think they are OK, nowhere near as impressive as seeing the the same artifacts in situ. Sometimes that stuff was taken in an earlier time with a less developed ethic regarding archaeology. Unfortunately there is no turning back the clock.
Some sites should be excavated by trained archeologists so understanding of past cultures can be gained, and those materials should be put in a museum to try and bring some of that story to the folks who can't or won't go see it in place. Some sites need to be excavated because of encroaching development.
Again, there is a deference in that a site can be excavated in a way that reveals and preserves the history contained within, or it can be looted with no regard for that history.
I'm glad you treat your knife with an appropriate amount of respect. I wouldn't say throw the book at you for taking it. That being said, you quite possibly have deprived other people of the joy of discovery and the kinship you feel with the past people who used that tool.
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franky
Trad climber
Bishop, CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 09:16am PT
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There is also the sad truth that a museum quality artifact worth hundreds or thousands of dollars can't be left in its original state once discovered. The risk of theft is too great.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 09:55am PT
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Thanks DMT. Wonderful writing there!
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Jul 25, 2014 - 11:03am PT
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Franky,
Hypothetical ...
Say you find/discover the World's largest gold nugget on public land. Should you be rewarded/compensated for your discovery?
Say you find an incredible remote Native North American dwelling wIth priceless artifacts and the site is prestine and intact. Should you be rewarded/compensated for your discovery?
Should there be any difference? It takes discoverers to make discoveries. It's not a crime to make discoveries. It's not a crime to do science.
Who gets to reap the rewards for their efforts?
I would surely say over-reaching and extremely heavy handed by government response.
Reminds me of a grandmother who was trying to sell a very small fragment of an Apollo Moon rock given to her late husband by an Apollo Moonwalker, to pay for medical treatment for her grandson. Her husband was in the space industry. The Feds came down on her extremely heavy handed at a Denny's in Lake Elsinore, CA. She was so scared she peed herself. Too much abuse and massive overstep by the government.
Thankfully now the courts have decided that the Moonwalkers can sell their memorabilia from their time on the Moon. It's the right thing to do.
Google that infamous story. Wow. The OP story reminds me of this story. Sad. Just look at all the hits for this infamous NASA nabs grandmother with Apollo Moon rock fragment story. The historical fragment was about the size of a grain of rice! Dang she needs a publicist and an agent.
https://www.google.com/search?q=grandmother+arrested+for+trying+to+sell+a+Moon+rock&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a
People should and must be rewarded for their discoveries.
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dirtbag
climber
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Jul 25, 2014 - 11:07am PT
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You're right. And hopefully the choppers who chopped off pieces of the petroglyphs outside of Bishop will be rewarded handsomely for their discoveries on eBay.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Jul 25, 2014 - 11:42am PT
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Jul 25, 2014 - 11:07am PT
You're right. And hopefully the choppers who chopped off pieces of the petroglyphs outside of Bishop will be rewarded handsomely for their discoveries on eBay.
Context Dirtbag. Not the same thing at all. That isn't a discovery. That is destruction and defacement of a known NNA site. That is a crime.
Hunting for arrowheads is not a crime. Weathering and the elements will vanish them eventually and they will be lost to time forever.
Allow people to find them. Take an in-situ image of the arrowhead and take careful notes about the find/discovery, and the time of discovery. Take an accurate GPS location coordinate for the discovery site. Collect it carefully. After you have done so, take close-up images (in stereo!), accurate measurements, measure its mass, and make impressions of both sides. Document it thoroughly. Now you have your memories of your discovery fully documented.
Then take it to the Feds. There should be a fair reward system in place to encourage people to do the right thing. The laws need to change.
Obviously, if its a site, then leave it alone. Do what you can to document the site and artifacts without disturbing it. Keep the location secret. Negotiate with the Feds. Once again there should be a fair reward system in place so that people are encouraged to share their discoveries and that these archaeological discoveries are not lost to time and the elements.
Without a reward/Finder's Fee system there isn't an incentive to bring forth your discoveries.
Franky said ...
Jul 25, 2014 - 09:16am PT
There is also the sad truth that a museum quality artifact worth hundreds or thousands of dollars can't be left in its original state once discovered. The risk of theft is too great.
And you risk losing your discovery too.
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Dave
Mountain climber
the ANTI-fresno
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Jul 25, 2014 - 11:56am PT
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What is the difference between an arrowhead collecting dust on someone's shelf in their house, and an arrowhead collecting dust in a shelf in the back of a museum?
The sad fact of the matter is that 80-90% of professional collected artifacts do not actually see the light of day in a museum display. (My uncle was a professor and ran one of Harvard's museums. I often got to see the shelves of artifacts in the back as a kid).
Why are items that truly were trash (obsidian chips, chipped arrowheads, etc.) now "sacred"?
Did you all really NOT look for these items and pick up some as a kid? I know I did, 25 years ago roaming the desert...
Here is another philosophical question for you all. When does "History" that should be preserved begin? 50 years ago? 100? 200? 500?
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 12:02pm PT
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The sad fact of the matter is that 80-90% of professional collected artifacts do not actually see the light of day in a museum display.
I would put that number at closer to about 98-99%. There really isn't much
science to be garnered from examining arrowheads. It ain't rocket science.
The understanding of the development of the 'technology' is probably about
as good as it is going to get. That said that dood is still a jerk and and
deserves the ant hill, although I differ with Piton Ron on the use of honey.
I wouldn't waste it unless it was cheap stuff.
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dirtbag
climber
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Jul 25, 2014 - 12:52pm PT
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Yeah klimmer, encourage people to further loot archaeological treasures by encouraging their sale. Great idea.
I'm not a trained archaeologist, but neither is anyone else here, and there are a lot of assumptions here about the artifacts' value to science and understanding of pre-contact cultures. And for that reason, in terms of the damage done to our understanding, there might not be a sliver of difference between the the petroglyph choppers and the Lone Pine Looter and his ilk. The Lone Pine Looter went far beyond picking up an arrowhead or two. He was a selfish as#@&%e. Sorry, it's true.
Oh yeah, this thread has the usual dose of Ayn Rand tit-sucking, knee jerk " government always screws up" diatribe from the usual suspects. To them: yawn. Grow up. Or move to Somalia. No pesky government there to whine about.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Jul 25, 2014 - 01:05pm PT
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Jul 25, 2014 - 12:52pm PT
Yeah klimmer, encourage people to further loot archaeological treasures by encouraging their sale. Great idea.
DB,
You have no reading comprehension. Not what I said at all. Didn't encourage anyone to loot archeological sites. Just the opposite. Not encouraging anyone to sell archeological treasures. Asking for a reward/Finder's Fee is not selling. Working with the government not against it. Didn't encourage anything you said.
By the way, I suppose we should give all our archeological treasures in all our museums, the Smithsonian included, back to Egypt, Mexico, Central America, South America, or what ever nations we plundered it from. Right? I mean fair is fair right?
Don't hold your breath. I don't see any museums doing that.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 01:14pm PT
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I'm not a trained archaeologist, but neither is anyone else here
Careful there, big fellow. In my yute I was president of one of two Explorer
Posts in the country that specialized in archaeology. I was a diggin' fool.
I dug under the auspices of the LA County Museum, the National Geographic
Society, UCLA, and Louis Leakey. No degree hast I but I do have some street cred. ;-)
But like I said, that dood is a jerk.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jul 25, 2014 - 01:20pm PT
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Places like the Bancroft?
The professional site raiders.
guyman, you have confused the bancroft with the getty.
the bancroft is not a museum, the b actually prefers not to acquire artifacts. it is an archival and rare book collection that didn't begin to get assembled until the 19th century.
no major museum with which i am familiar openly practices the kind of collection that went on in the 19th century. this is especially true with native artifacts due to a series of different pieces of federal legislation passed over the last several decades.
no one would have been knocking on starks's door i he had picked up a chipped blade at some point.
the cases seem very different-- unless you are confessing to us, here on a public forum, that you systematically loot native sites.
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StahlBro
Trad climber
San Diego, CA
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Jul 25, 2014 - 02:04pm PT
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I am not an archeologist, but I have a degree in Anthropology and have been on some digs. I spent a lot of time studying the southwest. As many have said, context, both physical and cultural, is almost as important as the artifact itself. Many times we would replace things after we had completed the stratigraphy. I do have a problem with mass collecting when there is no reason other than to fill a case or make a sale. Some things should just be photographed and left in place so the next person can have the discovery experience. Agree 99% percent of collected items end up gathering dust unless someone doing research happens to pull them out again. I know people enjoy their personal collections, but it is not the same. Saying someone else would take it anyway is rationalizing. I have found many items in Joshua Tree and Anza Borrego that I left in place. It is fun to go back to them occassionally. Unfortunately several have since been taken.
When I first went to Chaco Canyon you could walk around and find pot sherds with fantastic designs, arrowheads, chipping waste etc. lying around everywhere. They intentionally left many ruins unexcavated for the future. It was fantastic. The second time years later, not so much.
My brother and I found a perfect, clear quartz point. It was one of the most beautiful I have ever seen. We put it in a little leather pouch I carried with me and took it with us.
For two days we sat around the campfire and debated what to do with it. We looked at it and discussed each night under the stars. We finally decided to put it back. So we hiked out to the place we found it and I took out the pouch. When I opened it, it was empty. There was no whole in the pouch and it had not been opened since the night before. One of the strangest things I have ever experienced, but we figured it was a sign we had made the right choice.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Jul 25, 2014 - 05:01pm PT
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i have several fine examples of obsidian and flint knives and spear heads and other less durable primitive artifacts...i made them myself...
at DOI USFWS my GIS mapping job included designating precise GPS locations for hundreds of sensitive ancient sites, in direct support for DOI archeologists
these precision maps are not in the public domain and i certainly have no interest in revealing these locations to the public or to commercial trophy hunters
a neighboring fourth generation rancher friend owned and respectfully protected the site of a native American village whose location was unknown to my DOI archeologist colleagues...who professionally admitted not having a clue what to do about it even if they were taken to the site
i also knew an old grandmother with a several generation collection of arrow heads collected on the family ranch...and i have no interest in turning her into authorities
one might ask why are we so obsessed with discarded remnants of great civilizations that our barbaric ancestors destroyed, largely still perpetuated by our current government
this is a subject that generates a lot more heat than light, and unfortunately is symptomatic of much larger problems in our society
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okie
Trad climber
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Jul 25, 2014 - 05:20pm PT
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I learned at the facelift that any discarded object over 50 years old is considered an aritfact by the feds. So I left the really old trash in-situ for the next person to enjoy.
At least we still have Yosemite "Golden Age" steel beer cans to enjoy, if not Salathe's can of dates in the Narrows.
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