Forbidden Archeology_ The Full Unabridged Edition - Michael A. Cremo [212]
As mentioned previously, Willis could have accurately determined how long a period was represented by the unconformity only by examining animal fossils above and below the line of unconformity. If the fossils in the layer above the unconformity were all recent, only then would he have been justified in concluding that this layer was recent. But Willis did not make the slightest attempt to establish this. In the absence of such an age determination (which today might be made by radiometric methods), the implement-bearing layer could very well be about the same age as the Puelchean formation below the unconformity, which it greatly resembles in content and texture.
Here is how Willis attempted to eliminate this alternative: “hand-chipped stones associated with the sands would mark them as recent, such objects being common in the belt of sand dunes which the Indians were in the habit of using as a line of march and cover in attacking Argentine settlements” (Hrdlicka 1912, p. 363). Willis simply assumed that the stone tools were recent and that the layer in which they were found also had to be recent. It would appear, however, that the implement-bearing gray gravelly sand may actually belong to the Puelchean formation, as Ameghino believed, and that the stone implements found there could be as much as 2.0 or even 2.5 million years old.
In short, the question of the age of the implement-bearing stratum below the dune sand at Monte Hermoso remains open. Ameghino’s assertion that it belonged to the Puelchean was not conclusive, but neither was the attempt by Willis and Hrdlicka to assign it to the most recent historical times. Since the stratigraphic units in question contain layers of volcanic ash, their ages could be investigated by applying the potassium-argon test, which is specifically used for dating volcanic material. It may also be possible to make a determination by conducting a more thorough search for faunal evidence. In short, the question is still open and should still be a matter of active research. But the report by Willis and Hrdlicka succeeded in closing the books on this intriguing case.
5.1.4 A Demolition Job by W. H. Holmes
Samples of stone tools from Monte Hermoso and other sites on the Argentine coast were sent by Hrdlicka to Washington, where W. H. Holmes of the Smithsonian Institution examined them. Concerning the attribution of any great antiquity to the implements, Holmes was as hostile as Hrdlicka or Willis. In opening his report, included by Hrdlicka (1912, p. 125) in Early Man in South America, Holmes stated: “No attempt is made in these notes to consider or weigh the published data relating to the stone implements of Argentina. The collections at hand are classified and briefly described, and such conclusions are drawn as seem warranted by their character and manner of occurrence.” In other words, Holmes plainly intended to completely ignore the reports of Ameghino and other professional scientists, who had given detailed evidence for the Early Pleistocene or Pliocene age of the stone artifacts.
We may recall that Hrdlicka, in the company of Ameghino, personally extracted stone tools at a depth of 1.5 feet in the upper layer of the Early Pleistocene–Late Pliocene Puelchean formation at Monte Hermoso (Hrdlicka 1912, p. 104). This fact was subsequently reported by Ameghino in a scientific publication. Hrdlicka and his associates were anxious to discredit this report. If accepted, Ameghino’s report on the discoveries he and Hrdlicka made together at Monte Hermoso would have contradicted the entire substance of the book Hrdlicka was then writing. Hrdlicka’s book was specifically designed to prove that the only early inhabitants of South America had been the Indians, who had arrived within the past few thousand years.
We detect a slight sense of panic in the following passages, hastily added by Holmes to the end of his report