The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1922-05-18
AuCRDoIOG1uAL ErHNoLo0Y
]. D. GILLIAN

/. j.. ID. GILLIAN
G~rexSshairs usually accompany
persecution lfs much knowledge; but
Methuseiah Is never mentioned in
the lists of the wise of earth.
! am 20 sensible of personal de-
linQuency that ! dare not charge all
my failures to ancestry.
The "old inhabitant" may be
more voluble than valuable; and
some skeletal remains are more elo-
Quent than living oracles.
Mems minds have ever mined ma
terial resources SO far as they have
been capable of knowing them, and
in many cases the tracings of their
best thinking have been nor or less
plainly discoverable. 1t might not
be considered slougy to say that the
busy waves and the laundering
surges Of the restless sea Of life have
wasn't up many pebbles on times
beach and polished them we'll be-
fore we came. Like them we lie
|basking a while in the sunlight of
earthly consciousness to be swept
back finally by deaths undertow, 1t
may be "unkneld, uncoffind and un-
known" while the tickle 9 play?
fully filings up new marbles to make
brief markings on the sands Of time.
Our region is not destitut of rich
records, tho some Of them are as
indecipherable as were the hero
| glyphics Of Egypt until the happy
| discovery of the Rosetta Stone by
| Napoleon's soldiers in 1899. But
region is a word with a wide
border. 1t not unusually refers to a
space more rless bounded, but may
mean a homelogous piece of physical
geography. On this occasion l will
| allude to this whole inter-mountain
or Columbia Basin basaltic country.
| Guesses and more guesses have been
made about the lava headquarters
for Oregon and Idaho; but that lava
flowed in wide sheets and in river
like proportions is su%per-evident and
| better known that described. That
its flow was not all pre-human is
known; yet it may be really pre-
historic, for as the rule runs, history
means a record dated or dateable.
In proof of this statement / will
| give an incident which brought this
to- my knowledge; this occurred
down the John Day river in central
Oregon. At the home of Clarence
| Johnson in John Day l saw a piece
| of common pestle in length possibly
four or five inches. 1t was the hand
hold end and in addition to the un-
usual enlargement for knob appear
ance, it was carved making a decora-
ton l had never before seen on any
of the many l had known.
When l was examining it l saw
it had been lying once in something
%vitreous in nature, as in melted
glass or Stag from a smelter. l in
quired If they could tell me where it
had been picket up. The reply came
that Mr.. j. had taken it from a lava
flow, where he found it partially i'm
bedded. This caused me to know at
once that it had been in use before
that flow came; that the people who
had fled from that merciless tongue
of liquid fire had been persons of
sufficient ideas of the aesthetic they
had crudely carved their POSSIBLY
sole) kitchen utensil. How old that
pestle is, or that fracture Is none can
tell. Neither is there any way
whereby as yet any can know the
time of that lava flow. Yet we do
know that just below this place
there are the great Tertiary beds
above which there are to be enumer-
ated at least nine distinct strata OF
lava layrs.
The Nampa Image is a geologic
puzzle. 1t was found at great depth
after drilling thru a thick deposit of
lava, and is a female image an inch
and a half in length; it was dis
covered in the gravel underlying the
aforesaid deposit.
AS to the ancientry of mans op-
erations here none is mor relevant
I think than a discovery (uncovery)
of my own in Utah, both at Beaver
and at Castle Gate.
In the former location l opened a
mound just east of the town and in
it found some chard corn grains and
cobs; there were pieces of bones and
some little tools. In my ignorance
l sent them all to Smithsonian In
%stitute, as their records show, for
classification. The tools were bone
avis; the bones those of the Vir-
ginia deer, Cariacus Virginius, the
deer common to the Rocky mount
aims. Later at Castle Gate l found
something OF tar greater interest
to me. 1t was in the railway cut
below the stately gates; it was
thru a "hogback" extending from
the Price river back to the summit
Of the mountain. 1t looked as
ancient as the rock-rfbed ranges all
about. Time seemed to have
whetted his scythe for harvesting
any changes there. In the middle
of the cut, just about the center of
the ridge Of the hogback, a giant
boulder had been torn open by a
blast Of the excavators and under
side it were protruding %splinters Of
some sort. The stone itself was
buried deep under the common sur
face of the hill where it was en-
tombed. With a stick l scratched
away some earth and found to my
establishment the ~splinters ere
shattered bones. Then came out
chard Goals, more bone avis (such
as / had found at Beaver in the
mound:) all Of which I sent to the
Smithsonian. Bones of the Vir-
ginia deer" a my reply.