Evening star., 1915-06-26
A FOSSIL BONANZA.
By Frederic J. Haskin.

A veritab1e glimpse into a prehistoric
age when er-toothed cats as big
as cows preyed on giant ground sloths
and elephants thirteen feet tall in
these United States; when camels
ranged the western plains in herds as
great as those of the buffalo hundred
years ago; when man, if he existed
at all, was a covering, hiding, low
browed cave dweller, is afforded by the
discovery of a remarkable deposit of
bones in Los Angeles county, Cal In
der the auspices of the county museum,
these relics of an age millions of years
gone by are being carefully exhumed
and preserved.
This prehistoric boneyard is a bed of
asphalt on tract of land known as
the Rancho la reBa, located just out
side the corporate limits of Los An
geles. The asphalt beds date from the
pleistocene era, which occurred only
few million years ago, Immediately
antedating the modern period. At
some time during the pleistocene. oil
began seeping to the surface through
a fault in some buried strata of rock.
The more volatile portions of the oil
quickly evaporated, leaving lakes and
pools of tar which remain to this day
much as they were during pleistoceue
times. And just as the prehistoric an
imals were trapped millions of years
ago, SO jack rabbits and prairie dogs
and birds are trapped by the asphalt
today. So tenacious are these puddles
of tar that if a skimming swallow dips
his wing he is more than apt to be
held fast.
x x
c. <ha nf oil
kinds have been caught in this natural
trap. Their bones
Skeletons Preserved have sunk into
by the Asphalt. which v permeated
and preserved them, while the softer
portions remained on the surface and
decayed. In this way whole skeletons
of creatures that were dead a million
years before man came to live upon
the eartL have been preserved in their
natural substance. These are not,
strictly speaking. fossils: they are the
actual bones preserved in asphalt. their
color changed, but their substance un-
altered.
The tremendous significance of this
find to science may be judged from the
fact that most of our knowledge of pre-
historic animals has been CLEANED from
scattered remnants of bone. mineralized
by the slow action of water. When a
creature dies in the ordinary way his
bones are quickly scattered; most of them
are destroyed Perhaps a single tooth,
or the skeleton of foot, is buried in
the sand and turned to stone by the
slow process of ages. Found by sci
enlist, this fossil will afford a valuable
clue as to the kind of creatures that
lived in that remote age. But In the
Rancho la Brea deposits skeletons of
great variety Of creatures are preserved
as perfectly any collector could de-
sire From this rich mass of evidence
the scientist can veritably reconstruct
vanished age.
one of the dominating types of the
of which numerous complete
Skeletons have been found. was the giant |
safa toothed cat. predatory beast |
larger than the largest African lion and
having its upper front teeth developed |
into saberlike tusks about foot long. |
In build and general chara racteristics II |
rrsembL>d modern tiger. A more for |
mida bic beast could scarcely be designed. |
nnd the sa ber- toothed cat was probably |
the most ferocious creature that ever |
lived upon the continent. In the la |
nren deposits It's skeleton In found in |
close proximity with those of the pre- |
historic bison. the giant ground Sluth. |
bigger than "A horse. and even the mas
Iodon. IN. ancient form OF the elephant.
IA In believed that the Habsr-toothsd cat
with It's unique and destructive dontition |