This article was originally published in The American Paleolithic, Volume 1 Number 1
Mick Hager, CAPR Board Member
The “New Discoveries in the American Paleolithic Conference” held in January 2019 included presentations numerous Paleolithic sites in the Americas that ranged in age from 16,000 to 130,000 years old. Sites in Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina contain an amazing variety of humanly modified animal bones and Paleolithic stone tools dating from 20,000 to 40,000 years before present. Nearly every presentation reported comments by critics claiming that sites are not archaeological because the dates were too old. Evidence to the contrary was not refuted but dismissed without thorough examination. The same unscientific criticism was leveled at the 130,000-year-old Cerutti Mastodon site without credible alternative explanations for the multiple lines of collaborating evidence documented at this site. As Dr. Ruth Gruhn stated in her presentation at the conference, “general acceptance of the field evidence from a pre-LGM entry will require a continual accumulation of verified archaeological sites dated before the LGM…” How will we ever discover the truth if we dismiss credible evidence by simply stating “it’s too old” and therefore not funding important research efforts?
That’s where you can make a difference. The Center for American Paleolithic Research is dedicated to multidisciplinary scientific research that seeks to find evidence of the earliest human dispersal into the Americas. Dissemination of these research findings is a crucial part of CAPR’s mission. CAPR provided funding to help support most of the international scholars who attended the conference. Research and publication of the Cerutti Mastodon site would not have been possible without CAPR support. You can help fund these exciting new discoveries with a tax-deductible donation to CAPR. A $500 contribution will help date an early site, and a $10,000 donation will fund a major excavation. Donations of any size support both field work, publication, public and professional presentations and future conferences.
These are exciting times in American Archaeology and your gift will have a huge impact on CAPR research efforts. If you would like to donate to support CAPR research go to our website at caprmammoth.org and use our PayPal account, or send a check made out to “CAPR” to:
Center for American Paleolithic Research, 27930 Cascade Rd., Hot Springs, SD 57747.
Center for American Paleolithic Research 