Indiana daily times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1914-1922, 1922-03-17
Haze You o. PLesiOsGurus?
Order Before Price Rises
EUen Scientists Admit Possibility by Going in
Quest of OLd-THner.
BY BLYTHE O. .;ENDRICKs.

BY BLYTHE Q. .4ENDRICKS.
| Have you a little plesiosaurus in your
home? OF course you have not, but If the
stories which have been coming out of
the Patagonian wilds prove to have a
basis Of fact it may not be so very long
until you receive funny looking boxes
with air holes punched in them, contain
ing couple Of cute little plesiosauri, just
as you get baby alligators from alleged
friends in Florida nowadays.
Until recently any one coming in with
a tale of seeing a plesiosaurus Hopping
his eighteen feet of length around in q
lake would have been given the merry
razz by his friends and asked what kind
Of STUFF his bOotlegger was putting out,
for, according to the best knowledge of
up-t date scientists, the last plesiOsaur-
US took his last swim somewhere be-
tween 100000 and 100000 years ago
at the close of the reptilian age.
Now the ground ape, or whatever It
was that finally decided to stand up and
be man. came several million years
later: so it seemed safe bet any one
reporting the presence of q sportive
member Of the plesiosaui tribe in the
citing safely could be branded an ex-
aggerator of facts.
EVEN SCIENTISTS
BECOME INTERESTED.
But so persistent did the stories Of
some great water animal in lake in the
Patagonian Highlands become that at
last even scepdcal from Missouri, cool.
headed scientists become convinced there
was something more to it than high
powered Andean white-llama. or what
ever name moonshine goes by in the
southern end Of South Africa, and began
to take the matter seriously.
Descriptions of the animal agreed in
many details with that Of the supposedly
ex. met pleslosaurus, and a scientific ex
petition is now on its way to the Pata-
gonia Lake to Investigate.
Professor Henry Lane Bruner Of But
Ter College, an acknowledged authority
on zoology, says If the plesiosaurus
turns out stil1 to be in existence 1t will
be the oldest member Of the reptile fam
lily in the world.
Science never admits the impossibility
Of the survival of old forms of life" Pro
fessor Bruner said. There always is
that possibility, Of course, although in
this case I consider 1t only the barest
possibility the plesiosaurlan family has
been able to survive. II certainly IS not
at all probable such is the case How
ever, II 1t turns out this Is true, then
it viii be oldest form Of reptile survi-
ing In the world"
NEW ZEALAND LIZARD
METHUSELAH OF BEASTS.
At present, Professor Bruner says. this
distinction belongs to the New Zealand
lizard, which is almost as old. geologi-
cally speaking, as the plesiosaurus.
When asked II the pleslosaurus If sur
yiving would be the oldest form Of ami
NAL life IN the world. Professor Bruner
answered in the negative and said that
there are some still older though mostly
in the lower form
with all his eighteen feet Of length
"Pleasy" (as he Undoubtedly was known
to his buddies back in the far OF
MesOzoic aRe), was no heavyweight
among his reptiIian brethren.
As a matter OF fact. when compared to
his cousin. Dippy Diplodocus. and some
Of the still greater reptiles that attained
over all length OF more than one hun
dred feet, he was in featherweight class
However, his history seems to be more