Review of America Unearthed S03E09 "The Blood Stone"

1/3/2015

The Waubansee Stone is, to my mind, not the most interesting of relics. It is a glacial erratic, a rock left behind by a retreating glacier, on which is carved a crude representation of a human face. Despite several descriptions by fringe history writers describing it as “expertly” carved, it is not a particularly excellent example of a human likeness, and for the most part it resembles late eighteenth or early nineteenth century folk art styles. In 1976 Richard F. Bales of the Chicago Historical Society suggested that a European immigrant serving in the U.S. Army carved the face because it gave him the “feeling” of medieval European art, though he admitted that it was too crude to form good judgment.

Background

According to hearsay recorded in 1881 by Henry Hurlburt, the image on the stone was carved before 1823 by one of the soldiers of Ft. Dearborn, on the site of the future city of Chicago, in honor of Chief Waubansee, a Potawatomi friend of the garrison. In 1837, Daniel Webster made a speech atop the stone. The stone stood inside the stockade at Ft. Dearborn until the Civil War, at which time it was moved to the docks before being drilled and piped into a fountain for the 1864 Northwestern Sanitary Fair at Dearborn Park. In 1866, the rock’s owner sold it to the sitting U.S. Rep. Isaac N. Arnold, the congressman who in 1864 introduced the first anti-slavery amendment proposal. He moved the stone to his yard, where it stood until the Great Fire of 1871. After that, Arnold moved it to his new residence at 104 Pine Street (now Michigan Avenue) and converted it into a fire memorial in honor of the house he lost. (Some sources give the address as 100 Pine Street or 104 Lincoln Boulevard, but contemporary news accounts say 104 Pine Street.)

The Waubansee Stone with relics of the Chicago Fire, as seen in 1911.

Thereafter, in 1914, the Chicago Historical Society, which Arnold once served as president, took possession of the stone upon its donation by Arnold’s daughters, and they have held onto it ever since. They immediately removed the bottom half of the rock and made it into a drinking fountain for children. They took the stone to their new headquarters in 1932. For most of the twentieth century, the stone was on display at the new headquarters, on the first floor behind the lobby. The Chicago Historical Society changed its name to the Chicago History Museum in 2006, and the stone was moved to storage, where Scott Wolter visited it in the spring of last year, as part of renovations to the museum building.

So much for the official history of the stone. The fringe history of the stone is slightly more interesting by dint of being disturbing. According to an 1893 book by Joseph Kirkland, some people in the nineteenth century speculated that the rock might have been an Aztec sacrificial altar, probably by comparison with the Mesoamerican chacmool figures used for human sacrifice and popularized in the Mayanist literature of the era.

Aztecs weren’t for everyone, though. Wilford Anderson, once of the Leif Erikson Society, claimed for more than twenty years that the stone was carved by Vikings and used—yes—as a mooring stone, with holes reminiscent of the alleged Norse “stone holes” of Minnesota, which archaeologists attribute to nineteenth century blasting activity. He made the claim in a 1975 letter to the Chicago Tribune’s “Action Line,” in which he asked the newspaper to expose the truth about the stone holes. The paper called the Chicago Historical Society, which denied that the holes on the Waubansee Stone resembled Viking mooring stones. Anderson spent the remaining 24 years of his life ranting about how “academia” was trying to hide the truth, eventually self-publishing a book to defend his views in 1996.

The stone was a tourist attraction in Chicago, but it didn’t become an object of national fringe interest until Frank Joseph, the former head of the Nazi party in America, read Anderson’s letter and remembered it when starting his own fringe history career in the 1980s. After his release from prison, where he served three years of a seven year sentence for child sexual assault, Joseph went to the Chicago Historical Society to view the stone, and a few years later he wrote an article about it. David Childress, of all people, was responsible for this. In the early 1990s Childress was publishing World Explorer magazine, and in its second issue he gave Joseph the space to speculate about the origins of the Waubansee Stone because he and Joseph were friends and colleagues in those years, a relationship they maintained down to the early twenty-first century (to judge by appearances from Childress in books edited by Joseph), at which point Childress must have discovered that Joseph was a former neo-Nazi and a convicted child sexual predator. Childress partially plagiarized and reprinted with credit sections of Joseph’s article in his Lost Cities of North & Central America (1992).

It was Joseph who first proposed that the Waubansee Stone was a Phoenician sacrificial altar. He tied this in to the alleged missing copper of Michigan, which he believed the Phoenicians were mining. Joseph dismissed Hurlburt’s claims as hearsay and argued that no soldier would waste time carving hard granite; instead, he claimed that the stone was used for mooring Phoenician ships since the Phoenicians were all about wasting time carving faces on functional objects. This, he says, is because the mooring stone did double duty as an altar, which he calls a Tophet, for infant sacrifice—oh, and Native Americans couldn’t grow beards, so the face had to be a Phoenician.

In 2 Kings 23:10 and Jeremiah 7:31 the Canaanites sacrificed their children to the god Moloch by burning them upon the fire altars of the precinct of Topheth. However, the pagan writers did not ascribe a stone altar to these sacrifices. Didorus, for example, says of the Phoenician offshoot at Carthage, “There was in their city a bronze image of Cronus, extending its hands, palms up and sloping toward the ground, so that each of the children when placed thereon rolled down and fell into a sort of gaping pit filled with fire” (Library 20.14.6; trans. Oldfather). The degree to which the Carthaginians and Phoenicians practiced child sacrifice is still in dispute, but even if they did so regularly, Joseph’s claim that the Waubansee Stone was meant for such sacrifices is illogical: Did they bring some babies with them? Father children with Native Americans just to kill? The logistics are mind-boggling. Here’s how Joseph explains them:

A possible scenario suggested by the Waubansee Stone includes a Phoenician sailing vessel loaded with timber, copper, and other materials—skirting the western shores of Lake Michigan on a southerly heading. The ship turns into the mouth of the Chicago River, where hawsers are thrown from bow and stern to hands waiting ashore at an improvised portage. The lines, passing through holes in the two granite mooring stones on the south bank, secure her fore and aft. Later, at some auspicious moment, an infant, possibly purchased in trade with local Indians, is placed in the hollow at the top of the Waubansee Stone. There, its throat is cut. Sacrificial blood courses through tubular channels in the stone and out the open mouth of the sculpted face (possibly meant to portray Moloch himself), into the river. It is a most important ritual dedicated to the gods for safe passage home during the long, perilous voyage to the Mississippi River, down to the Gulf of Mexico, and out across the Atlantic Ocean toward Africa and Carthage.

However, Joseph freely admitted that he was literally making the whole thing up. He told the Chicago Reader (my source for much of the above), for example, “Don’t take me as an authority. I just asked myself, what does [the Waubansee Stone] most resemble? There’s no firm answer, only speculations.”

The Episode

Segment 1
We open in Chicago, where the on-screen narration implies that the Waubansee Stone has been “hidden” until Scott Wolter uncovered it. It’s only been in storage for a few years, but we cut directly to the credits, after which Wolter tells us that he first learned about the Waubansee Stone from a letter from Scott Mastores or Richmond, Indiana. The two Scotts meet up so Mastores can tell Wolter what he learned about the Waubansee Stone from, frankly, Frank Joseph, though no one on the show will mention his name, and Scott Wolter told me today that he had no idea Frank Joseph first proposed the Phoenician connection until I told him about it today. Mastores talks about the Ft. Dearborn Massacre of 1812 and the early history of the Waubansee Stone, which, as mentioned above, is known mostly from hearsay and the fading memories of elderly soldiers who spoke about it in the 1880s.

Wolter travels to the Chicago History Museum, the new name for the Chicago Historical Society, to view the Waubansee Stone, and his narration tries to spin into a conspiracy “claims” about the “last known location” of the stone. Wolter claims to have “pressed the issue” until the Society’s museum agrees to show it to him in a “secret” location—its storage area.

Segment 2
After an on-screen recap, Wolter views the Waubansee Stone, which looks even cruder and less Phoenician in high definition than it did in historical photographs. Wolter confidently declares the stone granite (no fooling!) and then looks very closely at the stone. He knows that the stone was used as a drinking fountain in the twentieth century, but he seems unaware that the stone had previously been used as a display fountain in the 1860s. He notes the triangular holes on the sides of the stone, and he relates them to Minnesota’s stone holes, which to his credit he declines to identify as mooring stones, citing a lack of evidence. If such holes are blasting holes, as archeologists argue, then the logical conclusion is that the holes on this stone were for a planned demolition to help clear land for Ft. Dearborn, perhaps put off because someone decided to carve a face in the stone.

Wolter presents as a revelation the idea that someone stood the stone up to carve the face on it (no fooling!), and he therefore concludes that this is similar to Stonehenge and rituals. The logic escapes me. Wolter says that the stone would have been erected thousands of years ago, but this is illogical. Whoever wanted to carve it into a face, bust, or statue would have stood it up to get enough of a surface to work with. That’s how sculptors work, today just as in the 1800s CE or BCE. The stone’s position implies nothing about its age since anyone could move it at any time. Indeed, think of how many times the stone has been moved since the 1860s!

Segment 3
At the beginning of this segment, Wolter acknowledges that the stone had been on display for all but a couple of the last 150 years and therefore isn’t the subject of a conspiracy to hide it. Wolter does not feel that the stone resembles a watercolor of Chief Waubansee, and he does not feel that the face looks like a Native American. He and Mastores believe that the face looks like a death mask. That it cannot be because a death mask is a cast from an actual dead person’s face. It is not a carving. Wolter isn’t quite clear what a death mask is and conflates this with any depiction of a corpse, even a stylized skull.

The museum’s archivist, Peter Alder, tells Wolter that there have been a number of speculations about the origins of the stone. One suggests that it might be a Mississippian carving, or an Aztec one. Stylistically, it doesn’t really resemble either. It looks European or Euro-American to me.

Mastores brings up Frank Joseph’s Phoenician theory, and Wolter starts to speculate about the possibility that the Phoenicians used the stone for human sacrifice. It “makes a lot of sense,” Wolter says, citing earlier (fictitious) claims from his show about Phoenicians in America.

Segment 4
After a verbal recap, Wolter plans to visit the former site of Ft. Dearborn, now a monument on Michigan Avenue. At the 360 Chicago tourist attraction, Wolter meets with John R. Schmidt, described as a blogger, who tells Wolter about the life of Chief Waubansee and the 1812 Battle of Ft. Dearborn, formerly called a massacre. Schmidt holds a Ph.D. in American history and is a former teacher who has written for a number of publications. But his information is relatively pointless and had little to do with the question at hand.

Wolter narrows down the carver of the stone to one of four people: a Ft. Dearborn soldier, an Aztec, a Mississippian, or a Phoenician.

Next, Wolter meets with Brad Olsen, an author who wrote a chapter for one of his books called Sacred Places North America: 108 Destinations in which he drew heavily (though without credit) on Frank Joseph’s 1991 article on the Waubansee Stone in order to argue that the Phoenicians were behind the stone. Wolter isn’t aware that Olsen is an idiot who accepted Joseph at face value, including Joseph’s incorrect claim that the Phoenicians used a Tophet for infant sacrifice. The Tophet was a Phoenician burial area, not a basin for catching blood. It was a type of cemetery.

Segment 5
Olsen explains Frank Joseph’s article to Wolter, and he misstates the Periplus of Hanno as stating that the Phoenicians “rounded” Africa, whereas they traveled only halfway down the west coast of the continent. Olsen then paraphrases Joseph again by citing Joseph’s claim that the Phoenicians mined copper in Michigan, and Wolter happily adds the Phoenicians to the Minoans that he previously (and wrongly) claimed mined copper. Olsen alleges that the Phoenicians sacrificed babies whenever they left on a journey, and this is false; even the most biased of ancient authors said they did so only in extremis. Olsen points to another stone with a similar carving, called the Sea Market Altar Stone, about which I know nothing. Olsen then tells Wolter that he just submitted an article on the Waubansee Stone to Ancient American and its owner, fringe writer Wayne May—who currently employs Frank Joseph as a special correspondent. May formerly employed Joseph as the longtime editor of Ancient American.

Segment 6
After a verbal recap, Wolter meets with Wayne May, who tells Wolter that he traded him an artifact that will help prove that the Phoenicians carved the Waubansee stone. The item is a miniature Egyptian sarcophagus, and May falsely claims that the Phoenicians copied slavishly Egyptian culture and brought this tiny piece with them, causing it to be buried in an American mound. There is no provenance for the piece, and we have only May’s assertion that the object was dug (illegally?) out of a Native American burial mound in recent years. Wolter says this “makes a lot of sense.” He and Wayne May conclude that the Phoenicians carved the Waubansee Stone to sacrifice babies en route to Michigan to collect copper.

So, let me get this straight: Frank Joseph admits that he made up the Phoenician story out of whole cloth, and we still have to sit through an hour pretending it was based in fact? And no one thought to check to see if the Phoenicians really did have carved stones with special faces for infant sacrifice because they all just took Joseph’s word for it?

Almost 25 years ago, Frank Joseph concocted a fantasy based on his own ignorance of Phoenician practice, and today fringe figures are still repeating it, turning Joseph’s speculation into fringe history folklore. That story is even more amazing than the Waubansee Stone.

The ghost of Frank Joseph—him who is not to be named--hangs heavily over this episode.

153 Comments

SouthCoast

1/3/2015 02:22:32 pm

Looks rather like an old Pontiac hood ornament.

tagbs

1/4/2015 09:32:35 am

Noticing the high cheek bones, I fully expected him to claim it was a carving of the first alien human hybrid.

1/4/2015 10:08:29 am

Nah. Wolter doesn't believe in ancient aliens. Because that would be silly, come on! ;)

CHV

1/3/2015 02:24:21 pm

As a lifelong Chicagoan, I have to give Wolter credit for using the Waubonsee Stone as a subject here. To be honest, I had no clue that it even existed beforehand.

However, Scott fails to grasp that a Phoenician fleet of low-bottom boats would have been useless going up the Mississippi (to Chicago) due to its frequent shallows that would have stranded any such boats early and often. Plus, there's the matter of Midwestern winters. Unless the Phoenicians took their boats out of the water each winter for storage, their transportation would have been destroyed annually by ice floes - which explains why Native American boats are both flat-bottomed and small to enable them to be easy to portage.

At any rate, I'll take the above theory with a massive chunk of salt. Yet it's sadly not surprising how Wolter seems to fall for it so easily when there's almost nothing to support it.

Marc Majus

1/4/2015 09:17:29 am

Maybe their is a "smoking gun" waiting to be announced into the main stream.
What if a 3000 + year old shipwreck exists.

1/4/2015 09:31:38 am

Then such a wreck would have to be found first, but I'm not holding my breath. To date, the only Midwestern shipwrecks known (of any era) are at the bottom of the Great Lakes or major rivers like the Mississippi. But if Scott Wolter wants to scour the Illinois prairie for evidence of Phoenician wrecks, he's welcome to do so.

Jokerx44

1/4/2015 01:47:24 pm

If you hold your breath while waiting for Scott Wolter to "Unearth" something, you will surely die. I've seen every episode. "America Unearthed", doesn't.

Matt Mc

1/3/2015 02:30:23 pm

What cracked me up about this episode was when the historian should Wolter the article from the late 1800's on the carving of a stone Wolter quickly dismissed it. Now given it was said that the article was written by an amateur historian and somehow that must of turned Wolter off because in paste episode articles just like the one present where accepted as fact.

Other part that cracked me up when they returned to the car and the other Scott said "So tell me what you really think." and Wolter did not play along.

Other than that this was a boring episode and even less interesting than the treasure hunt episodes.

RLewis

1/3/2015 02:34:58 pm

Well, you can't argue with his logic: "I don't believe a soldier carved it - therefore, Phoenicians". You can't argue with that logic, because there is none.
Also, if you plan to examine an ancient artifact, wouldn't you want a little more lighting than a flashlight? Couldn't the film crew help you out with that?
Finally, if someone was able to somehow "cast" a death mask in a sold block of granite - are there any known examples of death masks where the mouth is open? That seems somewhat distasteful to me.

Tim/

1/3/2015 05:54:53 pm

i don't undetstand why a soldier couldn't have been exposed to sculpting as a child or teen before joining the military, or for that matter why an artist couldn't join the military. Wolter talks the carving up like its Michealangelos David, and I just don't see that on the Waubansee stone. But I'm speculating, ah hell so is Wolter so who cares.

FrnkenNewYork

1/4/2015 05:16:23 pm

A soldier carved it? Are there records? No. That's just speculation! Hilarious.

Tim/1

1/5/2015 09:30:51 am

Exactly. What makes this speculation hilarious, yet the one about Phoenicians coming over is serious ?

I do give you credit for making my point better and in fewer words.

1/3/2015 02:35:48 pm

Just so we're clear: Scott Wolter just based an episode on an admitted fantasy of child sacrifice concocted by a Nazi child molester.

1/3/2015 02:38:39 pm

But Wolter is known to be an man who is mostly honest and has a most okay level of integrity - so says his not so racist friend of 25 + years, whoever his name is.

1/3/2015 02:41:08 pm

On the other hand, Scott Wolter just based an episode on an admitted fantasy of child sacrifice concocted by a Nazi child molester!!!

1/3/2015 02:58:00 pm

but integrity

1/3/2015 03:21:07 pm

Admitted. Fantasy. Of. Child. Sacrifice. Concocted. By. A. Nazi. Child. Molester.

1/3/2015 03:23:18 pm

I would say that is very Gonzo of you EP

but in this case not it is the truth.

1/3/2015 02:48:07 pm

I just went back and read the blog articles here and comments for related Frank Joseph associations and SW. I think I'm apprised now, especially regarding the Rev's dogmatic defenses. Looking forward to watching this train wreck on DVR asap..

InquisitorX

1/3/2015 04:54:39 pm

Scratch the surface of these odd self proclaimed historians and Nazism is almost always just beneath the surface.

Anyone have insight on just why that's the case?

1/3/2015 05:12:49 pm

Because in nazism psychopaths get to define reality.

1/4/2015 03:05:20 am

InquisitorX, I recommend you read Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke's "Black Sun". It's way too broad a subject for these comments.

1/4/2015 03:29:31 pm

"InquisitorX, I recommend you read Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke's "Black Sun". It's way too broad a subject for these comments."

Ordered it today on your recommendation. Thanks, mate!

Deb

1/29/2015 10:01:53 am

A large part of Nazi propaganda was rewriting history to show German superiority. Or should I say making up history based on the rantings of a known schizophrenic who guided much of the research of the Ahernabe, the Nazi antiquities division. Take from this what you will....

Clete

1/3/2015 02:49:35 pm

Watched the episode. I fully expected that when the cloth was removed from the stone, it would show Scott Wolter's ant farm. That would have been more interesting than the episode. The ants would at least be doing something constructive.

Only Me

1/3/2015 03:27:49 pm

AU should just forego all pretense of "scientific investigation". Let the guests offer their favorite theories, then let Scott pick the one that's most outlandish and unsupportable...because that's going to happen anyway.

The stone was, according to local folklore, associated with Potawatomi chief Waubansee. So why was it out of the question to talk to the Potawatomi? Was it thought they would have nothing to offer about a stone carving that has been in the Chicago area for over two hundred years? But, I forget: Phoenicians.

I really liked how May asserted the shabti was discovered in a Native American burial mound, without mentioning when and where it was found or who found it. No mention if it was ever given an analysis, or, if it had, what the result might have been. Also no mention of the chain of custody prior to it falling into May's possession.

By the way, did anyone else notice Scott contradicted himself at least twice? He spent an entire episode trying to prove the Aztecs originated in Wisconsin and Aztalan was constructed by them. This episode, he attributes Aztalan to the Mississippians and says the Aztecs originated in the southwestern U.S. and Mexico.

1/3/2015 03:53:28 pm

Of course the Native American theory was a non-starter. Just like for the "bored" soldier theory, there's no documentary evidence. Of course this doesn't preclude the Phoenician theory, but that's splitting hairs I guess.

I digress: SW should give himself a Hot Carl, THEN punch himself in the face ;)

1/3/2015 03:56:53 pm

What's with y'all and Hot Carls all of the sudden?!

1/3/2015 04:00:42 pm

Haha! I saw someone dust that off on another post and found it quite amusing, so I'm paying tribute!

1/3/2015 04:03:12 pm

But I'm sure there's an applicable metaphor...

Jason D.

1/4/2015 05:59:44 am

Don't expect any consistency from America Unearthed. Remember season 1 when the Holy Grail started as a cup, became the 'holy bloodline' of Davinci Code fame, then went back to being a cup.

JokerX44

1/4/2015 01:53:15 pm

Only Me don't you know the math? Mississippi Mound People minus Potawatomi equals Phoenicians?

1/4/2015 02:19:05 pm

Are we talking megalithic math? ;)

Zach

1/3/2015 03:40:01 pm

What I loved was how Wolter said as went about "evaluating" the stone is that he "works from a blank slate and doesn't ASSUME anything," even though he has done the entire opposite for a long time now. I also laughed at how he said that a crude, extremely exaggerated, bas-relief carving in granite is a death mask. I'm starting to wonder if Scott Wolter is one of the aliens that the idiots on Ancient Aliens keep ranting about.

lurkster

1/3/2015 04:33:26 pm

Did I just space due to boredom, or was the oh so annoying repetitive recaps (first onscreen then verbal) mostly missing from this episode?

1/4/2015 06:03:00 am

They were replaced by a map showing us any time Wolter moved 50ft. Cause we needed to know on a map of Chicago exactly where Wolter was and that he drove up a few blocks.

Rick

1/3/2015 04:39:52 pm

Im watching this on the DVR so I'm just a little over halfway through. But I can't help notice John Schmidt is wearing an IZOD shirt. I haven't seen one of those in like 30 years. I didn't realize they were still made like the old style polos. I fully expect to see a members only jacket now somewhere. Lol.

Ok I'm back to serious TV watching and blog reading now. So far it's boring episode with less info than the background part of Jason's blog entry.

1/3/2015 05:58:23 pm

Well where was his eye glass and camera adapter so he could age the carving?

Bill

1/4/2015 03:17:34 am

I was wondering that as well. You'd think it would be the only thing he'd have to prove the stone is older then 1800. Maybe he used it but the results weren't in line with the script??

1/3/2015 04:45:11 pm

Okay, a "sacrificial basin" on top of what used to be an eight foot tall stone. I'm surprised that the "giant cannibal theorists" haven't jumped into this one. Pardon the pun.

1/3/2015 05:10:23 pm

This show belongs on Tru TV not History. This rock looks weathered it proves there was pre Colombian contact made in North America, it must be the the love child of the Templars and the Phonecians!

1/3/2015 05:48:48 pm

I was going to respond, but I don't want to use "love child" and "Frank Joseph" in the same sentence.

1/3/2015 05:22:22 pm

Looking at the Waubansee stone and the Sea Market Stone both appear to have closed eyes, but the Sea Market Stone appears to have a closed mouth as well.

1/3/2015 05:46:32 pm

Why does this Ushabti have to have been deposited in America at the time of the Pheonicians? I can't remember the dates but I seem to remember surges and ebbs in Egyptian popularity in America in the 19th century and from what I've read they seemed pretty loose with taking artifacts for themselves or readily purchasing said artifacts without any fear of getting in trouble like today.

So why is Wolter so quick to dismiss a hundred or more years worth of people running around collecting, digging, doing whatever they want pretty much with artifacts? It's like finding that Chinese disc in North Carolina, why does it HAVE to be the original chinese who, not dropped, but placed it there and nobody else in between?

Kristin

1/3/2015 06:21:04 pm

I thought so, too. I'm still trying to figure out when the Sea Market stone was discovered. I was born in St Petersburg and lived there over 40 years. I know quite a lot about the Native American sites and discoveries there (lived next to one of the Tocobaga mounds) and I've never heard of it. Our next door neighbors started Piper Archaeology in St Petersburg, so I should have been aware of something like the stone they showed.

Mike Morgan

1/3/2015 05:26:02 pm

??? "....and Scott Wolter told me today that he had no idea Frank Joseph first proposed the Phoenician connection until I told him about it today."

I thought SW wasn't accepting your communications anymore. Could you enlighten us about this please?

1/3/2015 06:07:55 pm

I would guess (but I could be wrong) it could be over a post that somebody put over on Scott's blog about an email between Jason and Scott in regards to the court case where Scott was sued. I can't remember exactly what he was sued for, but i remember Jason talking about it a couple months back.

1/3/2015 08:05:09 pm

From your answer, I'm guessing you may have missed a few of Jason's recent posts.

This one started the ball rolling.
http://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/review-of-america-unearthed-s03e07-marco-polo-discovers-america

SW invited skeptics to his blog and Jason accepted his offer. During their exchange, SW brought up the lawsuit he lost, and later became frustrated and banned Jason from posting on his blog.
http://scottwolteranswers.blogspot.com/2014/12/scott-and-mr.html

And here we have the details of said lost lawsuit.
http://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/my-conversation-with-scott-wolter

Since Jason was banned, I am curious as to the type of communication, whether SW was civil, and if perhaps, Jason would share more of the exchange if there was more than the above quote.

1/3/2015 08:38:09 pm

@ Mike Morgan

Also, since Frank Joseph's name was brought up, I was wondering if Wolter shed any more details on how well he knew him, and what kind of relationship he has with him.

Jason Colavito link

1/3/2015 10:33:40 pm

I have exchanged a few emails with Wolter over the last week regarding the blog dust up, and he was for the most part cordial and civil. I asked about his relationship with Frank Joseph, and he said that his relationship with Joseph does not extend beyond a "cordial" conversation strictly about history at the various conferences they attend. Beyond that, I think you'll need to ask Wolter yourself since I don't have permission to disclose our discussion.

1/4/2015 03:08:26 am

Not to intrude upon your ethics, but as far as the law is concerned would you even *need* his permission to discuss your correspondence with him if there was no prior agreement that it would be confidential?

1/4/2015 03:23:38 am

Jason, thank you for your response. Your correspondence with SW is private and of course, none of my business. Thank you for posting what you felt comfortable with sharing with us. My curiosity has been satisfied.

Greg V.

1/3/2015 06:34:38 pm

Not really relevant I guess, but, the Chicago skyline flyover view at the beginning is at least eight years old. I know from the Northwestern Hospital buildings, and lack of some, southeast of the John Hancock. Also I remember that stone from a grade school field trip to the Chicago Historical Society in 1959 or so. Most of us kids looked at the former drinking fountain and thought, so what. (At that time it was situated near the entrance in front of a recreation of a Ft. Dearborn wooden blockhouse.)

1/4/2015 09:44:12 am

I find it odd, though, that the so-called "Battle of Fort Dearborn" did not occur at the fort at all.

1/3/2015 06:54:47 pm

Did anybody else notice Wolter complaining about how museum staffers from a century ago ruined the stone while he ruined the KRS, because of his shitty silicone mold that he made? He's the one that goes on about preserving that thing, so why should he be talking? He compromised any further research on the stone he supposedly cares about.

1/4/2015 09:48:30 am

Historic artifacts are often abused.

The star-spangled banner (of Key's poem and the national anthem) now under preservation at the Smithsonian is missing a star because it was literally cut out of the fabric and given to someone as a souvenir in 1814.

Patrick

1/4/2015 12:56:13 am

I bet Edvard Munch carved it!

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/The_Scream.jpg

Titus pullo

1/4/2015 01:41:31 am

Not a bad episode in terms of entertainment but the logic is faulty on multiple levels. The one point scott seems to have little understanding is the supposed ease of grabs atlantic crossings. It isn't easy with sails and no real navigational tools. Sailing from the med with the technology and ships of 300 bc around Florida and up the Mississippi would take years, and large ocean going vessels could not get to the Great Lakes copper areas anyway. Go does the st Lawrence and you get hammered at the Rapids if Montreal and then have no way to get to Lake Superior unless you portage. Up the Mississippi you have the same problem. And try to row against the current on the big Mississippi in a large vessel? Bottom line as someone who has been on ships across the Atlantic, it is a long and dangerous journey for a ship before 1000 ad.

1/4/2015 09:36:36 am

Exactly.

Had the Phoenicians truly had such an intense lust for copper there would have been far, far easier and less labor-intensive ways to obtain it than what Wolter suggests (via Lake Superior).

1/4/2015 10:05:40 am

http://catherinemayoauthor.com/a/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/ores.jpg

LOL

1/6/2015 12:47:21 am

Right. I guess based on Titus's comment, the most logical route would be Hudson Bay and then portage, but that isn't American enough, I suppose, so SW went with the illogical route up the Mississippi.

1/4/2015 05:58:36 am

Scott Wolter's multidisciplinary think-tank of a blog has posted a follow-up :)

Gunn: "I suppose I should digress here long enough to mention that a skeptic’s blog (Jason Colavito’s) is currently addressing this very American Earth episode, and this “debunker” has once again openly disregarded these medieval stoneholes as being the multiple evidences of Scandinavian forgetfulness, which I think is extremely unfair. I myself have had countless blog discussions with this “Columbus-loving, stonehole-and-waterway-hating” skeptic about this..."

Wolter: "Skeptic's on that website look for whatever they can for the sake of taking an opposing viewpoint... The face carved on the stone looks nothing like Chief Waubansee and there's no way a carving would be made of proud Native American chief with his eyes closed and pursed lips. It's an insulting pose and I don't buy that for a second."

1/4/2015 07:15:12 am

"And completely redeem yourself!!"

1/4/2015 09:02:50 am

Personally, I'm getting a kick out of Scott's reply to the latest comment by Dickey, AKA "."

[I'm not really sure what to make of this post except that it appears to refer to comments on a different blog. Let's try to keep comments germane to discussions here for the simple reason that it's easier to track.]

1/4/2015 09:08:16 am

Scott Wolter is such a pleasant man! :)

Dan

1/4/2015 01:40:08 pm

Gunn's own website now admits that the "stoneholes" were not related to the mooring of ships, so I'm not sure to what his "stonehole-and-waterway-hating" silliness refers.

1/6/2015 12:54:27 am

Ironically, SW, knowing his theory is illogical, has decided to accuse the real historian (Jason) of committing the same error. Obviously, SW chose to ignore what Jason actually said in favor of spinning his bogus "cover-up" story. I bet he'd refused to believe that Jason actually agrees it's not Native.

Kal

1/4/2015 07:15:47 am

Ah, yet another SW episode where he completely ignores real stories for completely fabricated fake ones, and now is kissing up to Indians because he got called out about those walls. He is so full of himself, and his made up stories, he has begun to believe some of them. I'd go on about how utterly fake the show is,or about how he ignored the 1800s story (the correct one) but you have already gone there.

Suffice it to say, someone in modern times, well the 1800s, carved the fountain stone.

Ironically he likes talking about child sacrifice and the person that toted the item as legit years ago apparently was into gross things involving children. Well the guy long ago should know then. SW should not associate with such people if he wishes to remain employed by History,

1/4/2015 07:17:38 am

SW also speaks to "not too distant technology"! No doubt a reference to V2's and the like!

1/4/2015 07:17:57 am

The 1980s guy, Joseph, not the 1880s guy.

1/4/2015 09:23:30 am

Scott Wolter's reply to a recent comment:

"Unfortunately, you won't be seeing Frank Joseph as a guest on America Unearthed anytime soon."

You heard it, folks! Scott Wolter would sure like to have a Nazi child molester on his show, but alas! It is not to be. (But maybe one day.)

Or so the plain sense of his words suggests.

1/4/2015 09:38:55 am

Or it could be that this will be AU's final season - making the idea of future guests irrelevant.

1/4/2015 10:02:45 am

Saying "any time soon" is highly misleading, then.

I mean, perhaps Wolter was going for sarcasm, but if so, then it is very poorly set up (because he doesn't want to mention that Frank Joseph is a Nazi child molester, no doubt).

In any case, what we see is Scott Wolter saying that he regrets not having a Nazi child molester appear on his show in the foreseeable future...

Shane Sullivan

1/4/2015 10:24:54 am

EP, have you seen this video?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AzcM1gyu2g

Frank Joseph, former leader of the National Socialist Party of America, advocating Afrocentrism. West African sailors in America, black Muvians, the whole nine yards.

Can't say I saw that one coming.

1/4/2015 10:38:16 am

Haven't seen this video, but it doesn't surprise me. After being outed as both half-Jewish and a pedophile, Frank Joseph's prospects in the Nazi movement became somewhat dim.

1/4/2015 11:40:04 am

That he was able to just flip a switch like that is so much creepier than if he had just stayed a white supremacist, or even simply retired from racial extremism altogether and kept his head down for the rest of his life.

If being a Nazi child molester hadn't already made him the scum of the scum of the earth...

John

5/6/2015 05:36:55 pm

@ EP

The funny thing is the conversation in regards to Frank Joseph, and that specific reply of Scott's you quoted EP now DOESN'T EXIST. I remember reading it back when it was posted in January too. I wonder why Scott is deleting posts on his ASSOCIATION WITH A CONVICTED NAZI CHILD MOLESTOR. Here's a link to the post he originally had the reply on:

http://scottwolteranswers.blogspot.com/2015/01/who-carved-waubansee-stone.html

Brian link

1/4/2015 12:24:48 pm

I believe it could be much older than other's are giving it credit, however, I believe some on this site are just too jealous of Scott to even think clearly!
Aloha Snackbar!
God Bless America!

1/4/2015 01:28:19 pm

Jealousy card AGAIN? How many of those do you people carry around? For that matter, have you read half of the stuff Scott has done to ruin both his credibility and public image? Why would anyone be jealous of THAT?

1/4/2015 01:36:05 pm

Once day, I too want to have my spotty legal history an association with Nazi child molesters to be widely spread on the Internet. Just like Scott Wolter.

Hey, a boy can dream... :)

1/4/2015 01:58:58 pm

Personally, I'm jealous of the Waubansee Stone itself. The sculpture is almost 200 years old; I'll probably never live to be that old. I bet it's pretty sweet.

1/4/2015 02:14:54 pm

Just close your eyes and pucker up :P

1/4/2015 03:04:10 pm

Hello Jason,
It is clear to me what passion you have in your analysis of America UnEarthed and Ancient Aliens. If these shows were on a different channel, or disclaimed that they are speculation and entertainment (albeit for the serious mind), would that put your analyses into a different frame of reference? For example, if you noticed, Giorgio Tsoukolos' newer show, "In Search of Aliens" clearly states he occupies an area between science and speculation. Doesn't that let him off the hook, academically speaking, and permit him to flex his speculation glands for the purposes of inspiring contemplation and entertainment? Any informed mind can see that Scott Wolter (who never "unearths" anything) is playing fast and loose with pure scholarship, even though his format takes the (in the vaguest of ways) appearance of pure scholarship. We know he is not submitting evidence or papers for peer review. You are far more informed on these matters than myself, and even I can see this tripe is meant for a bowl of microwave popcorn and a wine cooler, comfortably resting next to the remote. Having said that, and knowing what we all know about this stuff, why do they piss you off so much? I pose these questions with the most sincerity and respect.

1/4/2015 03:09:46 pm

I think you're confusing being critical with being "pissed off".

1/4/2015 03:16:54 pm

EP you are correct. I was using sarcasm in pursuit of a chuckle, or at least a smile. For the purposes of my prior post, please accept that "why do they piss you off so much" means, "why does it engender such exhaustive criticism". To have to offer this explanation is exactly why I will never, ever start a blog.

1/4/2015 03:29:01 pm

What degree of criticism do you think is appropriate for a show that treats as serious hypothesis an admitted fantasy of child sacrifice concocted by a Nazi child molester, passes it off its examination as serious historical research, and doesn't even have the courage to mention who the author of the hypothesis really is?

How about the baseless and self-serving accusations being leveled against serious scholars, which contribute to public distrust of science?

Or regular flirtation with racially tinged ideas of America's past?

1/4/2015 04:00:07 pm

EP you have honed into the very heart of the framing of my questions (which, not for nothing, but were addressed to Jason). IF these shows presented themselves as speculation for entertainment purposes (which anyone with even a casual knowledge of true scholarship knows that is precisely what they are) would this transform into a first amendment discussion, and no longer be framed as an academic one? For the record, I too, am not in favor of convicted, Nazi sympathizing child molesters. I too, am in favor of academic honesty and public trust in science. (I just ended a relationship with an evangelical who thinks the world is 6000 years old. How can I even have the simplest of science related conversations with her? Which section of the NY Times could I pass her across the breakfast nook on Sunday morning? You catch my drift, I'm sure. But I digress.)

What I am driving at is this, serious scholars do not get their information from H2, and I don't think anyone truly thinks this tripe is scholarship in ANY form. I see it as entertainment. Pop the popcorn, good for a laugh...how many aliens dance on an H block at Pumapunku while Scott Wolter is in a mini sub, pissing off the guys who lent it to him while he bubbles through the mirky lakes looking for stuff we all know is not there? Catch my drift? I want to know if this was labeled speculation or entertainment more clearly (if you can imagine that anyone can't figure that out) that would quell the flames of Jason's critique?

Additionally I can't take SW seriously (not that I did before) after he joined the Little Bighorn reenactment (as if he didn't know he was going to do it.)

I can't imagine anyone thinking this stuff Is any more serious than, "Mermaids: The Body Found" or " This is Spinal Tap". Same tripe, different flavors. Can you sit here and tell me that you honestly believe the Cousteau Society or National Geographic are firing up the blogging posts against the lack of scholarship of "Mermaids..."? This is my point and hence, the basis for my questions (to Jason).

1/4/2015 04:46:29 pm

Go back and read some of the comment sections to this blog from a couple years ago and see the abundance of supporters for SW on here. He is making a detrimental effect on history in the world view of those with little education or prone to conspiracy theories.

1/4/2015 05:09:52 pm

Rick thank you for your insight. I fear now that I've come across as arrogant and snobbish. I was trying to, well, I think you know what I was trying to say. Who was it who said that the difference between a conspiracy theory and a conspiracy are facts? I've just never taken these programs seriously and as a result, couldn't imagine that anyone else would, either. I'm very happy that both the shows and the critics have discussion forums such as this, to provide an opportunity to fully explore these issues. I learned something from your very straightforward post. Thanks.

Jerky

1/4/2015 05:22:52 pm

JokerX44, Some folks back during america unearth season 1, bought into SW's show so much that they trespassed onto my property and vandalized an old homestead that was built by a free mason in the 1900's looking for "hidden free mason documents" and "other items" to prove the knights Templar had come to America before Columbus. They also tore out sections of my fence line, damaged my wheat crop, and the holes in the fences let some of my cattle get out. I left a full detailed description of the event on a post last year. I'm sure EP will remember witch blog posting it was on, I would have to go back and look at my email to find it.

1/4/2015 07:10:04 pm

Jerky, how sad and unfortunate that the sanctity of your domicile and private property were violated in such a crass manner. Upon further reflection, I am shocked and amazed that people would actually view these programs as a call to action. Considering the fragmented nature of today's cable audiences, I would not think the sheer numbers exist to encompass an entire bell curve distribution of potential behaviors and thereby logically, the potential for behaviors which lie in the extreme narrow ends of the distribution. In other words, fringe lunatic behavior. I would have contemplated a more consistent slice out of the middle of the curve. Clearly, I would have contemplated incorrectly.

1/4/2015 07:54:40 pm

Truth is JokerX44, I have only my self to blame, I decided to leave the big rock block over the old buildings doorway, It has a free mason symbol on it, The square and compass with a G in the middle that has been the hallmark symbol of free masonry shown in movies, book covers, and TV shows talking about the subject. That and that dang sign cemented into the side of the old Free Mason's lodge. Nothing I can do about that one, witch has the name of the man who built the house on it.

Any ways, that was my first introduction to this show.. and it was looking up info on this SW guy that lead me here. I'm not kidding you, I have over heard so many folks in my town, and the surrounding towns in this county and the counties bordering this one. And every time, they talked about how he is uncovering the truth about our history.

As I said before, there are people out there who really think Columbus came over here on the Mayflower.

1/5/2015 09:36:21 am

http://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/review-of-america-unearthed-s03e02-guardians-of-superstition-mountain#comments

4 graet justice, as they used to say.

1/4/2015 05:45:49 pm

"would this transform into a first amendment discussion, and no longer be framed as an academic one?"

Your question rests on a false assumption, since no one is questioning anyone's right to express themselves. Besides, First Amendment only protects speech from government control anyway. Also, you're seem to be setting up a false dilemma.

"if this was labeled speculation or entertainment more clearly (if you can imagine that anyone can't figure that out) that would quell the flames of Jason's critique?"

You would be surprised how many people "can't figure it out" as it stands. However, if this was just a shitty mockumentary (as opposed to a shitty pseudo-documentary that purports to examine legitimate ideas), I, for one, would not care. What matters is how it is perceived and how it is meant to be perceived. Labeling may absolve the show and the networks of some legal responsibility and some of the more pointed official criticisms, but it doesn't make a difference in most people's minds.

1/4/2015 07:59:41 pm

Thank you for your input. Now I something new to think about. However, I didn't think Spinal Tap was shitty. I laughed my ass off. Also, I had to scratch my head and think for a minute the first time I saw Mermaids before I said, "What? No way...oh, ok I get it."

Regardless of the form of my question, and as correct as you are about my incorrect characterization and use of the words, "First Amendment", I still maintain that I was seeking a response from Jason, and I have crafted this input casually, on a whim, in my recliner, at midnight, with only a passing interest in the topic. Had I even the vaguest notion that my whimsy would be quoted, dissected and analyzed by someone to whom my inquiry was not even addressed, I would have put my iPad back down on my coffee table, proceeded to the fridge and pulled out another wine cooler, which is precisely what I am poised to do now.

You are far more serious and engaged in this than I could ever hope to or want to be, quite frankly. I certainly never contemplated, not for even a single moment, that my inquiry to Jason...again note...Jason, would attract an uninvited interloper, albeit an organized and thoughtful one, but interloper nonetheless, to comment on my musings to the point where I've felt (and the reason why at this point is inexplicable to me) the need to clarify, restate, engage, defend and ultimately tire of, (not to mention spending about 45 more minutes of my life in doing same than what is personally worth to me, regardless of the quality of the discourse) the entire topic.

Maybe someday I will see a response from Jason. In the meantime, well, I know what you think about my questions.

If and when the time comes when I'm prepared to post a comment on a topic in full and proper forensic format, with every possible nuance, misinterpretation and potential impact on world peace AND the whales taken into account, and am further prepared to engage in and endless thread which requires at least three corrections of my initial question before any actual response is forthcoming, AND once I have scrubbed my inquiries clean of false dilemma and assumptions, I will seek you out, fleeting of foot and mind, as I breathlessly await your next sage input and glowing pearls of wisdom. Until that time arrives, I believe I shall remain conspicuously...silent.

1/5/2015 12:18:05 am

I'm not sure that you get how discussions on *public* Internet foums work...

1/5/2015 03:49:44 am

I'm scratching my head on this one. This was an unexpected, sarcasm-laden Parthian shot toward one of your tamer responses.

1/5/2015 04:15:55 am

Jason has an e-mail listed on this site. If you e-mail him directly I'm sure he will respond. If you post your comments on an open, public blog, you can expect others to do the same, If you are not interested in their responses - you are not obliged to read or respond to them.

1/5/2015 04:16:46 am

I know, right? I literally didn't say anything I wouldn't say to you, for example. Like, I wasn't even being a dick to this guy or anything...

1/5/2015 08:08:21 am

EP you are always a dick, but we love you for it. :)

1/5/2015 09:24:21 am

Only two inches... *Megalithic* inches! :D

1/5/2015 09:32:25 am

Are the megalithic inches the unit of measurement to be used in next weeks phallic guide to NYC episode?

Will the sacred vagina show up? .

1/5/2015 09:39:47 am

...but enough about Kathleen McGowan :P

1/5/2015 02:39:10 pm

I like the previews for next week. That lady says the obelisk wasn't placed there "by accident".

Really? I accidently place very large and difficult to move obelisks all the time. Hell last week i accidently placed one in our road and didn't realize until I got back from work.

THE KING

1/5/2015 02:43:59 am

I found it amusing when he smelled smoke / burnt smell from the stone.

1/5/2015 04:09:53 am

I think I get the 'disclaimer' blogger above, but it won't really help, even if they moved AU to syfy channel. People are still going to think it's 'real' if they're inclined to. The poster might want to check out SW's actual blog and rant at the source of his troubles, or perhaps rant about it on his own blog and hope to get more attention.

SW touted that should as 'everything you knew in school about history is wrong' which is a bold and crass statement from a conspiracy driven TV host who is smart and knows how to rook people into thinking he's right, denying the facts entirely if need be.

People used to believe the X Files episodes were based on real events. Now it's become a catch phrase. 'Based on real events' makes it sound so much more convincing. But sometimes a rock is just a rock.

I don't take these blogs all that seriously, or the blog of SW, which is funny but not intended to be, but it's fun ti kill time and come here. That's probably why people come to the blogs.

Taking a few minutes to type it on a cell phone is too hard. Try a laptop.

I suspect we all know these shows are phony, and that's the fun of discussing them.

I have also seen highly opinionated conspiracy guys who think that these shows are real because it said so on TV, but they usually think the other stuff is real, and get a lot of personal grief.

I did once except a higher standard from History, but look at how that channel has turned all of their programming into softball reality TV shows.

It's like that on Animal Planet too. They just showed that Mermaid body one again days ago.

People run around convinced they've seen bigfoot after watching that, or ghosts after Ghost Hunters. 'Usually those same people say but Ancient Aliens is stupid...but ghost are so real.'

SW was just in my hometown recently hitting native American rock walls with a hammer. It doesn't surprise me he'd have some followers come later and vandalize some other sites.

All this over a freaking fountain head? He should come back and do a show about Muscle beach and claim that they were here before the Masons. Ha.

Denise

1/5/2015 05:19:51 am

to enforce the above statements as to why these critiques are important, these shows do cause both physical damage and widespread belief in these ideas. For example, my husband and I work at historic sites and believe in showing how interesting real history is. Recently one of SW guests has been writing incorrect history about certain sites that are pretty well documented. The problem? Local papers ran with this info, causing great interest in looting and trepassing on state protected land. This individual has at least three separate theories about the local area that many people honestly believe (its in the paper, and talked about in local history groups, so it must be true.) I don't blame the public, a lot of these ideas are obsure (or even nonexistent) history. That's why people like Jason are important: I personally don't have the time or patience to watch these shows. By coming here I can get the info and learn about potential issues I may have to deal with.

Concrete example: by reading Jason's critique of "Lost Giants" I realized that my Uncle was getting sucked into possibly disinterring colonial remains. He doesn't watch tv and thought the History Channel was still credible.

It was asked why Jason was so meticulous in his criticism. First he is following proper historic research by documenting his sources. Second by doing this, I myself learn about things I didn't know ( there were some times I bought into some claims that were in regards to areas of history I was not familiar with). I can then take this information and confidently use it when dealing with the public.

Jason does this hard work for me and helps me in dealing with potential issues I may encounter. I know that your post was for Jason and I cannot answer for him. However if I was in the position he is in being a professional writer with more time (possibly) and more historic resources at hand (most definately) I would have done the same thing.

If anyone is wondering about the trepass and looting that I babbled about above, see my forum discussion under UA and Richard Thornton.

Again I am not Jason (I apologize if by posting this offends you, but I truly believe that his work helps, ignorance is bliss and rampant, I don't think basic history is being tought in my state anymore). I know this doesn't answer your question of why he does this, but I suggest you email him. I have done this and he answered within 48 hours.

respectively,
Denise Spear, MHP
(Masters of Historic Preservation)
former National Park Service Curator and Park Ranger

Walt

1/5/2015 08:11:11 am

But what you can't see due to your love of history is that "these shows causing physical damage and widespread belief in these ideas" just doesn't matter, at least not any more than how to properly restore a vehicle or rebuild an engine. There are critics for every show on TV, and if Jason has a show, he'll be mocked and ridiculed relentlessly as well.

Somebody somewhere cares deeply about the subject matter of every useless show on TV, and everybody thinks their own beliefs are important. Car guys mock the car shows for doing things incorrectly, and get just as worked up about it as people here do about history.

Ultimately, it all accomplishes nothing. The shows will be cancelled and forgotten about, and all of your local history will be lost someday. The old saying applies, I think. Those who can, do, and those who can't, write about it. Jason is a heck of a researcher and could be significantly contributing to society, instead of just being a fringe author interested in silly topics.

spookyparadigm

1/5/2015 10:56:36 am

I'm beginning to think this is a POE.

You don't believe, apparently, in the BS tv sells. But you also don't care if historical sites are destroyed.

So why do you return? I'm not trying to get you to leave, But seriously, it's baffling.

1/5/2015 11:26:16 am

I'm with spookyparadigm.

Either you're terrible at expressing yourself, or you just said, in effect, that it doesn't matter if these shows cause people to do bad things because no show can please everyone.

I mean... huh?

1/5/2015 11:38:04 am

It's a guarantee that all historical sites will ultimately be destroyed, regardless of what idiots may or may not do. I'm just not interested in fretting over whether it happens today or tomorrow. Tomorrow would be better, but nothing anybody does or says can change what will ultimately happen.

1/5/2015 11:43:25 am

Walt, would you apply the same reasoning to people? Like, "we're all going to die eventually; therefore, let's not get too upset about war and murder". Because your reasoning is identical, as far as I can tell.

1/5/2015 12:18:45 pm

It doesn't matter to me if shows get people to do bad things because they would've done them anyway. People do dumb things. The show will be gone someday, and people will still be doing dumb things at historical sites. I'd love to live in a perfect world where it never happens, I just don't see that happening.

1/5/2015 12:26:50 pm

Ladies and Gentlemen! Is it okay at this point to conclude that Walt is an idiot and/or a troll? Or do we need further evidence?

1/5/2015 12:46:50 pm

So, I make a perfectly sane and rational statement that people damaged historical sites before the show existed and will again after, and you respond with a personal attack calling me a troll and an idiot. You've really dumbed down this blog.

Clint Knapp

1/5/2015 12:57:34 pm

Not quite, Walt. You said no one should care because they'll eventually not be there. The same would go for this blog. So why do you care enough to argue about how little you care? See the problem yet?

You're arguing that folks will mock anything that someone else does or likes, while failing to notice that you're doing exactly that; mocking Jason's blog and the people who do like it and participate in it for the sake of pointing out how little you care.

You don't have to like history, or the quest for truth in claims about it, but you don't have to troll people who do, either.

1/5/2015 03:29:30 pm

Walt is schooling us in the "perfectionist fallacy".

If you can't do it perfectly, or account for all results of your intentions, then why bother?

1/5/2015 09:17:08 am

Oh Denise, I feel like you've been swept up into something unfairly. You seem so sweet and genuine and serious. If I had to guess, I would say you are a good person. I am also a good person. In this case however, I was pranking the bloggers here, trying to make a larger point. I refrained from 'fessing up until somebody "got it". That "somebody" was Walt.

Frankly I expected EP to call shenanigans on me much earlier. The fact that it did not happen, further illustrates the point I was trying to make through my prank. I hung a worm out and he totally swallowed. Sorry, EP. No disrespect. All in good fun. If you look at my other responses to other bloggers, you will notice the difference in tone. More of the setup. I am a copy writer and a professional traveler. I write comedy and do voice over work, among other things. My nom de guerre has no connection to anything. I'm not the gamer you will find if you Google it, so please don't start flaming him.

Walt completely gets it. As a result, I can emerge from the shadows and own my prank. I think the illustrative example of my blog character's interaction with EP, and how I could feel him slowly growing in personal satisfaction as he continued to correct me and "show me the truth", illustrates Walt's "get"...to quote Shatner on SNL, "it's a tv show...get a life!"

Regarding those who have foolishly been "called to action" by the various storylines on AE, and the bloggers here who shame SW for motivating them, they fall into the same drawer that Tipper Gore tried to open and the Religious Right tries to open with programming content and how it effects the impressionable.

The morons who vandalized Jerky's property on a Freemason context will surely do something just as dumb, somewhere else, motivated by some other dumb TV show. Like those seen on "Top 10 dumbest...whatever" on TruTV.

So on that note...let's not take ourselves too seriously. Let us be skeptical by default, and keep the preaching to a minimum. Let us demand the highest quality from Academia, and realize that cable television shows are not legitimate academic venues. Let us also remember that Scott Wolter's mission is not to "unearth" anything. His mission is ratings, and social media presence. The more you try to squeeze "the truth" out of him, the more you are playing right into his hands by expanding his digital footprint. I'm only using him as an example. Same is true with Kardashians, Tsoukolos and the rest.
Cheers.

1/5/2015 09:26:38 am

"Guys, guys! I was totally not being serious! I was trolling you all along! You've been puppetmusta'd! Successful troll is successful!"

1/5/2015 11:26:43 am

Uh huh. So, self-important troll finds no value in education, history, or getting things right. Has to explain he was joking, and expected well-read adults to go flame a gamertag.

Says quite a bit about quite a bit, doesn't it? Cream of society, ladies and gentlemen; the wannabe comedy writer.

1/5/2015 02:53:37 pm

Problem with thinking History channel and H2 are junk TV and glowing in the realization that you think you have really stumbled upon some simple truth nobody is aware of because they are too deep into the shows and the stories to step back and demand less from cable TV shows us that I and im sure several others remember when the History channel first debuted.

Now if I never watched the original history channel I would be like you. But I didnt. I watched the original History channel. The one that ran revolutionary war documentaries around the clock. The one that ran biographies of founding fathers, presidents, important historical figures. I remember watching Alexander the great shows for days on end only to be replaced with French revolution week, etc.

Then people who think cable TV is a waste of time and take nothing serious anyway same along and here came the Armageddon, Bigfoot, Templars, masons, you name it and now we have the History channel of today. A worthless representation of actual history. And people like me who watched it when it was actually about history are still pushed about it.

1/5/2015 06:42:00 pm

@jokerx44

Tipper Gore? Really? Who do you write comedy for, Dan Quayle?

It's hard to believe you are a a copywriter. If you hadn't been in such a hurry to be clever and had done any research, like a REAL writer, you would have discovered your "insight" has been addressed on this blog several times. And we all see dozens of examples of top quality copywriting every day. Most are clear, concise, and to the point. But when I see your writing style, which is stilted, long winded, and achingly pompous, I don't think of a writer. I think of someone who is trying to hide a lack of depth, or trying to justify a lack of ethics. The popcorn and wine coolers (blecchh!) don't help the image.

1/6/2015 01:31:21 am

@Rick

I completely agree with you. I too am nostalgic, so to say, for the era when the History Channel actually meant History, not reality TV. And, frankly, H2 is a terrible attempt at "history". Even Brad Meltzer had more credibility than SW.

Steve StC

1/6/2015 01:20:38 pm

Denise, very nice post. You make some very good points and clearly have an open mind.

Unfortunately you are among a highly arrogant bunch of armchair quarterbacks (sorry Jason, football reference. I know how you hate football players) who don't need to read any critical research such as "The Kensington Rune Stone: Compelling New Evidence" before damning the work of Wolter or others. I wish you luck here. I long ago gave up on reasonable debate here among a group so supremely arrogant.

1/6/2015 02:17:52 pm

"sorry Jason, football reference. I know how you hate football players"

Get it? It's 'cause Scott Wolter used to be a football player. Clever, no?

ShawnO

1/5/2015 06:47:06 am

Why does it always have to be that the maker of whatever the object of the show is about must have come from thousands of miles away and/or across some vast ocean in order to leave some small marker deep into the interior of the North American continent, or to mine some metal (also deep within the interior, rather than near the shore) that they could have much easier found and mined on their own continent? Aztecs in Chicago? Phoenicians sailing up the Mississippi? Mayans in Georgia? Egyptians in the Grand Canyon? Hebrews on an island in the Great Lakes? How did they even know where to go? Maybe aliens gave them aerial photos, or did they land on the coast, meet up with the natives, and ask, "Hey, you guys got any copper?"

1/5/2015 07:16:37 am

Wolter only meets with Native Americans to tell them that the people who stole there land where in fact stealing the land from a second group of people that stole Native American land.

1/5/2015 10:02:23 am

And to pretend-kill them in Indian Wars re-enactment.

1/5/2015 08:43:44 am

One of these people that is on his show should tell him something obviously bogus but in another language it means something dirty, and he doesn't know, so he runs with it an calls the episode that. The laughter would bring ratings. Maybe he should find the mystical cous cous stones to prove Persians were here also, or that rocky mountain oysters and prairie oysters prove some kind of anglo contact before the colonial times, only to find out that he;s been suckered for once.

1/5/2015 01:08:53 pm

When my dad used to be involved with local pow wows, there was a white woman who used to hang around asking to be given an Indian name. They refused several times. Finally, one guy thought about it for awhile, and gave her a name: Miizii Quay. She was so proud, she went around telling everyone the name she had received.

What they didn't tell her was that the name meant "shit woman".

1/5/2015 01:18:07 pm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-vPzfo2CHM

1/5/2015 04:13:11 pm

I miss that show. And I miss the reruns they used to show on Comedy Central.

1/5/2015 02:23:30 pm

Wolter was punked badly by a group of University of Minnesota archeology students who carved their own rune stone, which Wolter then used his pseudoscience to conclude was an ancient rune stone.
He backstepped rather quickly after the students admitted doing the stone a mere 15 years prior.
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2001/11/06/viking.htm

1/6/2015 01:33:33 am

Thanks for the link to the article. It goes to show that some people are too far gone to be told they're wrong.

1/5/2015 11:22:41 am

Greg Little (who, lest we forget, once wrote a book about sperm collecting UFO demons), has stopped by Scott Wolter's blog and thrown his considerable weight behind Frank Joseph's Phoenician hypothesis:

"I had never heard of this artifact. I would tend to doubt that a solder just decided to carve it. It would be likely that the same soldier would have been a sculptor and there would have been other carvings made by him, perhaps some larger and others smaller."

Clearly, no amateur or even professional artist ever had only one of their works survive! But seriously, however tenuous Little's suggestion is, who's to say that there aren't other carvings by the same person? This one just happens to be the only one to have attracted attention due to its context.

"If there were not other similar artifacts found in the same general vicinity it would point to someone else."

Whatever the merits of this claim, doesn't it apply a fortiori to the Phoenician hypothesis? (Or something like the KRS, for that matter...)

"Native Americans generally didn't do such sculpture in stone. There were exceptions, such as the Etowan statues and various effigies, and, of course, some wooden effigies carved, but I don't know of anything else like it in the Native American world."

It's Etowah, not Etowan, right? Also, Greg Little lists more Native American candidates than he does European (0), yet somehow that leads him to *discount* the Native American option!

"I have seen some similar things in the British Museum--but I didn't really pay attention to them to the extent that I could say they were really all that similar."

Good job, genius! People have carved faces into stone at multiple points in human history. And this is relevant to anything how?

"I have long thought that the Phoenicians certainly visited the Americas."

Ever since you read something about it in one of the fringe mags, I bet.

"There wouldn't be (much of) a trace of them in mitochondrial DNA because the ships seldom carried women."

Here we have Greg Little, who has no idea who the Phoenician ships did and didn't tend to carry, making things up on the basis of his sexist assumptions about the past.

"But mtDNA haplogroup X remains a possibility."

It sure does! You know why? Because it is inherited by groups that diverged before the first human settlement of America, tens of thousands of years before there were any Phoenicians around! Also, if "the ships seldom carried women", then how did the mitochondrial DNA get transferred across the Atlantic? (Hint: Greg Little doesn't understand mitochondrial genetics.)

1/5/2015 12:01:32 pm

@jokerx44

I am confused, it has been my job to protect historic and archaeological sites for over 20 years. I have seen firsthand the destruction looters cause, and I have seen the uptick in activity since these shows have aired.

I guess I fail to find the humor here......the more correct information I have, the better I can educate the public, which helps promote advocates for preservation. Maybe I am being preachy, but it only takes one looter to destroy important info......I say this in response to your comment about these shows being transient.

You also commented about people writing instead of doing something. Was this a reference to Jason or to me? Either way you are wrong, Jason provides background that people in the field can use when asked about these theories (and yes I have been asked by the public at work). If that is doing nothing, I might as well give it up.

Please believe me, I don't take these shows seriously, sometimes I enjoy watching them occasionally. I don't completely dismiss pre-columbian occasional contact....I just wait for the evidence. I have no real feelings for SW or the AA cast at all.....but I can't ignore their influence.....does this make me part of your joke?

I am not really upset, I know that posting on a blog opens one up to potential ridicule. In fact I had to think long before re-posting. Know that I am not upset at you, just wanted some clarification.

1/5/2015 01:48:34 pm

Denise - I guess you should have devoted your life to something REALLY meaningful. Like ... copywriting. :)

1/5/2015 02:23:54 pm

@tm

hah:-) what a hideous idea......do you know how messed up copyright law is in the USA? I have spent much time trying to figure out what items in our collections that I was able to allow researchers to use due to copyright restrictions??? The ancient creeping horror from below!!!

1/5/2015 03:01:36 pm

First you copyright, then you copywrite. Then you copyright the copy you wrote. It's marketing 101, people! :)

1/5/2015 05:51:12 pm

@denise. I think he means spell checking.

@various ranting bloggers today, chill out it's just a TV show, for frak's sake.

Gonna go post on SW's blog too if this keeps up, but not gonna post on mine, as I don't wanna invite all this drama over there.

1/5/2015 07:27:52 pm

Oops! No! I dont criticize spelling, promise. :) I was poking at the absurdity of jokerx44, who seemed proud to be a copywriter but who basically suggested Denise's career and dedication are pointless. In my mind, someone like Denise is way ahead on karma points.

1/6/2015 12:03:35 am

SW:

"Some of these critics are so zealous in their beliefs that I doubt they see anything other than their own dogma. It's too bad."

I fail to understand why someone can't research a topic and form their own opinion. It's been my way my whole life. I can remember going to the library to look up information in middle school on topics I wasn't sure about before the days of computers and Internet.

Of course SW's response above is to someone who has went over there to feed a quote or piece of info about a post on this blog to SW to see what he would say. It's pretty apparent that anyone who can read is familiar with his responses to previous references to anything over here. Therefore it would seem that anyone who does that is seeking something else, like when one of my two children tell on the other but are not satisfied with my response so they immediately go to their mother for a better result. But I'm not sure what the motivation could be.

1/6/2015 12:59:33 am

I agree Tim, I really do not see the need to try to bait Wolter, his response can be predicted pretty well.

1/6/2015 02:36:27 am

Just because it can be predicted doesn't mean it can't be amusing.

1/6/2015 03:38:59 am

I cannot argue with that.

I must admit I find Scotts comments funny.

I love how he says allows everyone to post yet does not.

and Only Me's example below is excellent, I guess his advice applies to everyone else but himself.

1/6/2015 03:27:54 am

What's even better, Scott actually told a commenter:

"so you won't see anything except that which supports your view. That's hardly scientific, but it is your choice."

How does this man function?!

1/6/2015 04:04:00 am

Realtalk: Scott Wolter gets through life on good looks and charismatic personality.

1/6/2015 06:28:38 am

@tm

I have to admit that I am still scratching my head over joker4xx's comment about writing vs doing since I've learned that he is a writer. Odd......

tm thanks for your kind words. This is my last post on this particular subject, sorry if I came off kind of preachy guys, believe it or not I really do have a sense of humour and enjoy reading the banter here. Now to move on to Jason's latest entry.

Vince Donatello

1/6/2015 03:33:38 pm

Next week on American Unearthed, Scott discovers that Jay Cutler's $54M contract was a mistake!

HarleyQuinn

1/10/2015 01:15:35 pm

First.... oh, my giddy aunt, Jason, THANK YOU FOR RUNNING THIS SITE. My family is thoroughly tired of hearing me scream at the TV every time this show is on, and now I can scream silently on the internet with you! =D

Usually, I can make it through the episode, but tonight I just had to turn it off and walk away. I can't handle his bad science anymore. I can't. I just can't even. I mean, can we just take a moment to acknowledge the fact that - after being told the stone had once been used as a DRINKING FOUNTAIN - the man jumps straight to HERP-DUH-DURR, MAYBE IT WAS USED FOR SACRIFICE.... and I just wanted to take him by the shoulders and shake him and say, "Oh, I don't know, MAYBE IT WAS THE BOWL OF THE DRINKING FOUNTAIN???" If he would just use his "forensic geologist" skills, and test the surfaces of the bowl with something a little more impressive than a flashlight and his eyes, then maybe he could find out if the bowl was carved for the fountain or as part of the original work. But we'll never know, will we?
Also, Tutankhamun's funerary mask was just that, a funerary mask, not a "death mask." It was stylized Egyptian art and was never molded from his face, never even intended to look exactly like him as a death mask would have. His father Akhenaton's reign was characterized by realism in artwork, but during Tutankhamun's own reign, an attempt was made to return to pre-Amarna culture, and that style was abandoned for less realistic portraiture. If it was a death mask, it would have shown his skeletal irregularities, as the young Pharaoh had an inherited skeletal disease. NOT A DEATH MASK, SCOTT.
And do we have to jump DIRECTLY from "Oh, here are four possibilities" to "HEY LET'S SPEND THE REST OF THE EPISODE TALKING ABOUT THE MOST IDIOTIC OF THE FOUR!"? Geez. I....I just can't. I'm just glad to discover there are so many people who Just Can't along with me.

MES

1/13/2015 04:37:45 am

I just watched the episode last night and I'm left scratching my head more so than usual. I should state for the record that the only thing that caused me to watch the episode is that I am a Chicagoan. I gave up on the show long ago.

While watching the show I was instantly struck by how slanted the eyes on the face were and how much it resembled many of the faces we see painted in early Chinese artwork. Quite a growing number of people believe the Chinese as well as many other cultures had a presence here. Why couldn't the stone have been an ancient Chinese property marker, somewhat akin to the Mason Dixon line markers? I'd believe that over an ancient Phoenician sacrificial alter/anchorage stone. Even my wife, who rarely watches shows like these with me (which may very well prove that she's smarter than I am) walked by and said "hey, that's a chubby Chinese guy. Is that Buddha?" Lol...

OldGoat

6/14/2015 05:02:06 pm

As an interested innocent, it seemed obvious to me that the hole through the lips is an integrated part of the carving. Clearly not added when they decided to convert it to a fountain. What other statuary has a similar look?

The attempt to relate the Waubansee stone to the Sea Market altar stone doesn't ring true to me -- they may have both had a depression on the top, but the lips on the Sea Market altar stone were clearly closed, not open. But finding art of similar design seems to be the right approach. Does anyone have some insights into that? (And no, the "chubby Chinese guy" is not Buddha.)

None

6/27/2019 06:34:42 pm

I know this is an old thread, but i just now saw the episode and ran over to Jason's blog to read his critique. An extremely quick search for early nineteenth century folk art styles found this image of an "Carved Granite Stone-Face" found here:

https://www.aaawt.com/html/arch_gallery_carnival_figures.html (scroll down)

This granite face eerily resembles that of the stone face in question.

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