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30—Nevada State Journal Sunday, June 23,1963 SCIENCE IN N Indian Burial Honey Lake Important By PROF. WENDELL A. MORDY Director, Desert Research Institute University of Nevada, A new and possibly very significant archaeological find has been made at the south end of Honey Lake, which is on the border between California and Nevada. Dr. Charles Rosaire and Dr. Richard Shutler of the Nevada State Museum are investigating the find. On June 6, while they were digging a post-hole on their ranch, Bill West and his son discovered what ap­peared to be some Indian remains. They immediately reported their find to Dr. Warren d’Azevedo, anthro-potegist at the University of Nevada. When he noti­fied the m u s e u m , Dr. d’Azevedo was asked to take charge at the site until the mu­seum staff could take over. The Wests had found a burial which contained some bird-bone beads, 11 points clustered at the abdomen of the skeleton as if they had been in a pouch, sev­eral scraperi, and a grinding stone which apparently had been placed on top of the chest after the body was buried. Burials are rarely found in this area. Unfortunately, even more rarely does an archaeologist see them before they have been dis­turbed. Meaningful Experts can learn a lot from the position in which objects are found. If disturbed, the remain­ing pile of bones and artifacts is much less meaningful than the same material intact. The Wests are to be commend­ed for the very7 responsible way they reacted to their find. Dr. d’Azevedo was particularly im­pressed by the very expert work of young Billy West, a teen-ager, whom he says “would make a good archaeologist.” The Wests left the skeleton in position. They kept tourists and vandals away, although many people tried to vis­it the site as news of the find spread. They notified responsible experts at once. “If everyone who made such discoveries acted as the Wests have, it would be a great boon to science,” Dr. d’Azevedo said. At the site carp- Unfortunately there was no charcoal in the burial, and ra­dio- carbon dating is not possible. Although bones can be dated, they M imM.-i-;mm. PROF. MORDY are so easily contaminated that! the dating is not considered re­liable. Each find of this kind adds a few more pieces to the puzzle of j the cultures of prehistory. If all j such discoveries were promptly j, reported to the museum or the * university and excavation left td L experts, our knowledge of pre-!c history in Nevada would advance L much more rapidly than it has so L far. Billy West Jr., beside the site he and his father recently discovered, on the West ranch in Herlong Junction. Artifacts found in the burial on the West ranch. Eleven obsidian and basalt points (left), three bird bone beads (center) and a number of scrapers (right)*