Adventures in the Bone Trade: The Race to Discover Our Ancestors in Ethiopia's Afar Depression FROM THE PUBLISHER
In the fall of 1971, Jon Kalb, a young geologist from Texas, was presented with the opportunity of a lifetime: the chance to explore Ethiopia's forbidding Afar Depression, long considered a kind of hell on earth. The Afar's searing heat, sub-sea-level elevation, unreliable water supply, and treacherous windstorms had for centuries repelled explorers. But Kalb -- young, impetuous, and probably confident beyond reason -- believed he could overcome these obstacles. He would map the Afar, sample its sediments, photograph the terrain, and open up the region to fellow geologists and -- crucially -- to archeologists and anthropologists.
Although it was geology that initially drew Kalb to the region, it was astounding archeological finds that became the reason to stay. The Afar yielded Lucy, the First Family, Bodo Man, the Aramis Skeleton, the Buri Skull, and some of the oldest and most extensive stone tool discoveries ever made. By the end of the decade, the area had become the source of the longest and most complete single record of hominid habitation in the world -- a span covering 4.5 million years.
But the Afar yielded more: It was the site of the "bone wars" that arose from one of the great archeological hunts of all time, with cutthroat competition among rival teams of archeologists driven by ego, money, and fame. And it was the site, tragically, of a very real war. In this remarkable memoir, Kalb recounts not just the turf battles of scientists but the armed conflict that overthrew Emperor Haile Sellassie in 1974, and the subsequent revolution that steered Ethiopia toward famine, tribal warfare, invasion, and chaos. All told, this gripping memoir shows how science is shaped not just by the search for truth, but by the demands of politics, the media, money -- and the needs of the human heart.
FROM THE CRITICS
Mark Rose - Archaeology
Beyond the dark side of paleoanthropology, and whatever the merits of Kalb's disputes with Johanson and the NSF, Adventures in the Bone Trade is well-written, often humorous, and definitely worth reading!
Quarterly Review of Biology
History is usually written by the winners. Occasionally, however, others
weigh in with an alternative perspective on well-known success stories. . .
. Although not as slick as many other popular books on early human
evolution, ADVENTURES IN THE BONE TRADE is nonetheless engaging reading as
the book portrays very clearly Kalb's own emotions throughout these
experiences -- from the thrill of seeing a new expanse of badlands to the
agony and frustration of a rejected grant proposal.
Antiquity Magazine
[Kalb's] long, learned but personable account covers both the technicalities of finds and the chances of finding them....Replete with dramatic landscapes and wildlife, Adventures is like those thrillers sold at airports, but worrying.
The Journal of Geoscience Education
Adventures in the Bone Trade is written in several styles to match several interwoven stories or topics. Amazing feats and accomplishments are interspersed with glimpses of macho behavior and colorful characters...Another reader may gloss over the heroics, use maps, and concentrate on the book relating to physical sciences. [The book] rattles off names of site locations and geological formations in almost poetic sounding recitations. Descriptions and definitions are included for novices...History of fossil discoveries, interpretation of morphological changes and creation of dating techniques are especially interesting...Experts and specialists in the sciences may examine Kalb's syntheses with a critical eye and enjoy debating some of his conclusions...This book can be touted as having something for almost every "taste".
Washington Post Book World
What distinguishes Adventures in the Bone Trade is its blend of the
>long-dead and the contemporary; alongside the story of the region's
>paleohistory and geography, Kalb sets a less pretty tale of the jealousies
>and rivalries among the bone hunters he knew and worked with. Moving from
>the geological to the geo-political, he also provides the reader with a
>field scientist's careful record of the events that deposed Haile Selassie
>in 1974 and later led the region into civil war and famine—calamities
>that touched Kalb and his work directly and indirectly in many ways.Read all 11 "From The Critics" >
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