Bones Discovering the First Americans

by Dewar, Elaine

• ISBN13: 9780786713776
• ISBN10: 0786713771
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-07-21
• Publisher: Basic Books

Summary

Award-winning journalist Elaine Dewar explores new terrain with Bones, uncovering evidence that challenges the conventional wisdom on how the Americas were peopled in early history. In her probing investigation, Dewar travels from Canada's Mackenzie River to the Brazilian state of Piaui, from the offices of the Smithsonian Institution to the Washington state riverbank where the remains of Kennewick man were found. Dewar captures a tale of hard science and human folly where the high stakes include professional reputations, lucrative grants, fame, and the resting places of wandering spirits.

Author Biography

Elaine Dewar is an award-winning investigative journalists whose beats include culture, international politics, science, business, and the environment. Reviewing Bones, historian Peter C. Newman has called Dewar “the Rachel Carson of Canada,” whose work “is aimed always at expanding mental horizons . . . This is a must read.” Dewar lives in Toronto.

Table of Contents

Introduction	1	(10)
PART ONE
Asian Origins?	11	(16)
Clovis First Across the Bering Strait
Bones 101	27	(24)
A Sordid History Begets a Compromised Science
Found and Lost	51	(20)
The Misplaced Remains of the Accepted Path
The Battle for Monte Verde	71	(31)
Rewriting the First American Story---by Committee
The Founding Mothers	102	(28)
The Spectral Trail of Mitochondrial DNA
Virtual Bones	130	(23)
Are Reburied Remains Hard Evidence?
The Kennewick Chronicles	153	(32)
Science, History, Politics, Religion... and the United States Army
Excavating the Museum Shelves	185	(21)
Weaving a New Image of Ancient Americans
We were Always Here	206	(20)
Some Native American Histories
Pendejo Cave	226	(29)
Indiana Jones Digs Down to the Foundation
PART TWO
Beneath the Southern Cross	255	(7)
The Road Leads Back in Time
Lunch with Luzia	262	(18)
The Fine African Features of the Oldest Woman in the Americas
Proof Parasite	280	(11)
A Wormhole in the Bering Strait Theory
Revisionist Prehistory	291	(23)
Bones Beyond the Bounds of Accepted Theory
Brazilian Edens	314	(37)
The Sheltered Finds of Minas Gerais
Science Contender	351	(27)
Dispatches from the Most Ancient Trenches
Pedra Furada	378	(21)
Ancient Arts of the Little People
PART THREE
Science under Fire	399	(18)
The Inquisition of Karl Reinhard
The Kennewick Shuffle	417	(31)
Dancing Around the Hard Questions
The Reverse Migration	448	(22)
North, by Boat
The Corridor That Wasn't	470	(27)
The Cold Facts Behind the Absence of Evidence
Hard Science, Hardball Politics	497	(22)
Kennewick Reevaluated
Going Home	519	(26)
Burying the Bones, Treasuring the Past
Epilogue	545	(8)
Acknowledgements	553	(4)
Endnotes	557	(24)
Bibliography	581	(30)
Index	611