Calico Early Man Site
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Calico Early Man is a possible archaeological site 15 miles NE of Barstow, California.
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[edit] Artifacts or Geofacts?
Over 12,000 possible stone implements have been found at Calico. Due to their shape and size, it has been hypothesized by many archaeologists that these objects are artifacts, that is, that they were shaped by human actions. If confirmed, dates for these objects would indicate human presence at Calico concordant with human presence at Topper (50,000 RCYBP- 200,000 B.P.uranium series). These dates are based on the age of the sediments containing the stones, which were most recently dated by thermoluminescence at 135,000 years BP, and by uranium/thorium analysis at 200,000 years BP .
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However, in 1979, James G. Duvall and William Thomas Venner published a statistical analysis showing that the stone objects were "not modified by man but, rather, were form selected by the archaeologists. Form selection . . . is the selection of naturally fractured lithics that resemble man-made tools and therefore create a biased sample of lithics from the total population of naturally fractured lithics at that site".
However, the foregoing 'kernel of real truth' was occasioned by letters written to Science News in response to B. Bower's article on the probability of human artifacts -- as old as 100,000 years -- having been found at the Calico site in California. (See SF#51.) First, J.G. Duvall, III, attacked Bower's article, asserting that the human origin of the Calico 'artifacts' had long ago been shown to be untenable. For a reference, he cited an article by himself and W.T. Venner in the Journal of Field Archaeology. Duvall's major point was that the Calico "tools" did not resemble proven Paleoindian tools. Responding to Duvall, G.F. Carter first pointed out that the Duvall-Venner paper was 'almost instantly shown to be erroneous' by L.W. Patterson in the pages of the very same journal. As for the differences in artifacts, Carter asked why one should expect 12,000-year-old Paleoindian artifacts to look like 200,000-year-old artifacts from an entirely different culture. (Duvall, James G., III; "Calico Revisited," Science News, 131:227, 1987. Carter, George F.; "Calico Defended," Science News, 131:339, 1987.)
Although both the Duvall/Venner and the Paven papers have been criticized on a number of levels, sadly, the present consensus in academia is that there is no evidence of human activity at the Calico Early Man site. Renewed interest in the site has been sparked by, in addition to many other indications of early man inhabiting the Americas, Al Goodyear's research at the Topper Site. General consensus is Topper's artifacts are dated securely at a minimum of 50,000 B.P.
[edit] History of Excavations
Louis Leakey visited the site in 1963, and the following year began a formal excavation, partially funded by the National Geographic Society. Leakey continued to visit the site several times a year and was connected with the project until his death in 1972. After Leakey’s death, the site was taken over by the California's Bureau of Land Management, and the site was opened to the public. The site presently offers a visitor center, gift shop, and guided walking tour.
[edit] References
- Budinger Jr., Fred E., Oberlander, Theodore Calicodig.com "This web site describes and analyzes the Calico Archaeological Site and the Calico Lithic Industry". With many stone object photos.
- Debenham, N., 1998 Thermoluminescence Dating of Sediment from the Calico Site (California) (CAL1), Quaternary TL Surveys, Nottingham, United Kingdom, 1998.
- Bischoff, J.L., R.J. Shlemon, T.L. Ku, R.D. Simpson, R.J. Rosenbauer, & F.E. Budinger, Jr., "1981 Uranium-series and Soils-geomorphic Dating of the Calico Archaeological Site, California", Geology V9 (12), pp. 576-582.
- Duvall, James G., and Venner, William Thomas, “A Statistical Analysis of the Lithics from the Calico Site (SBCM 1500A), California”, Journal of Field Archaeology, Winter 1979: Vol. 6, No. 4, pp. 455-462.
- Payen, L., “Artifacts or geofacts at Calico: Application of the Barnes test,” in Peopling of the New World, Ericson J., Taylor, R., and Berger, R., eds. Los Altos, California: Ballena Press, 1982, pp. 193–201.
- AmericanWest's North American Archaeology Section, Calico Site Update. ". . .over 60,000 tools and flakes have been collected".
