Piltdown
name: label: Collection Creator
content: Spencer, Frank, 1941-1999
label: Collection Creator
content: Langham, Ian, 1942-1984
setName: label: See more items in
content: Frank Spencer Papers
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 5.35 Linear feet (12 boxes and 2 oversize folders)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1836-1997
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.2002-21, Series 2
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
arrangement: label: Arrangement
content: This series is arranged by topic. Documents within folders are arranged chronologically, with undated documents at the back. Correspondence is arranged alphabetically by correspondent.
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: Spencer became interested in the Piltdown hoax while working on his dissertation after coming across a suggestive letter between Aleš Hrdlička, who was suspicious of the Piltdown specimens, and Sir Arthur Keith. Spencer began to research Keith's involvement in the Piltdown dig and specimen study, but in 1983 he learned that another researcher, a man named Ian Langham from the History and Philosophy of Science Program at Sydney University, was also pursuing the same topic and the same suspect. Spencer believed that Langham would soon publish his theory, and he backed away from his research until Langham's sudden death in 1984. At that time, Spencer took over his project and, with the cooperation of Langham's widow and colleagues, extended Langham's research and published their theory in 1990 in Piltdown: A Scientific Forgery. An accompanying volume of primary documents, The Piltdown Papers 1908-1955: The correspondence and other documents relating to the Piltdown Forgery, was also published.

This series contains correspondence, research notes and materials (including newspaper clippings, publications, letters, and other Piltdown documents), and papers related to the publication of the two Piltdown books—drafts, edits, press releases, and reviews.  In 1983 Spencer received a grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation to prepare the Sir Arthur Keith (SAK) papers at the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS), and thus also included are papers related to this project.  Boxes 12-14 contain copies of scholarly and popular press articles related to Piltdown, arranged chronologically by Langham and Spencer.  Some are annotated, and there are some pages of notes by Spencer and Langham interfiled.  Other materials of special interest in the series are a movie script based on Spencer's Piltdown: A Scientific Forgery and a copy of an advance uncorrected proof of The Piltdown Confession, a novel by Irwin Schwartz.

The correspondence within this series primarily pertains to Piltdown research and book publication, but also includes some correspondence not related to Piltdown (regarding other projects on which Spencer was working during the same years). Included are a few letters between Ian Langham and Spencer, correspondence related to the transfer of Langham's research to Spencer after his death, and letters of Langham given to Spencer.

Since Spencer incorporated Langham's research into his books, many of the research notes and documents were prepared and annotated by Langham. In order to help researchers, some of the folders are marked "IL" and/or "FS" in order to distinguish Spencer's notes from Langham's. There are also handwriting samples in box 7, directly following the correspondence. Some of Langham's Piltdown correspondence is also included, as well as some of Langham's papers concerning other research projects, including work related to his dissertation for his PhD in the History of Science from Princeton University on British social anthropology (later published in 1981 as "The Building of British Social Anthropology") and biographical information about him.

Additional materials relating to Spencer's Piltdown research can be found in Series 7: Subject Files, Series 13: Photographs, and Series 14: Audiotapes. Please also see Series 5: Projects, Sub-series 5.1: Brixham Cave Project.