The Earth's Shifting Crust by Charles Hapgood - wire of information

268
EARTH'S SHIFTING CRUST
natural deaths; that is, that the remains that we find in the Pleistocene
strata over the continent represent the normal death that ends the
ordinary life cycle. However, where we can study these animals in
some detail, such as in the great bone pits of Nebraska, we find liter-
ally thousands of these remains together. The young lie with the old,
foal with dam and calf with cow. Whole herds of animals were appar-
ently killed together, overcome by some common power.
We have already seen that the muck pits of Alaska are filled with
the evidences of universal death. Mingled in these frozen masses are
the remains of many thousands of animals killed in their prime. The
best evidence we could have that this Pleistocene death was not sim-
ply a case of the bison and the mammoth dying
after their normal
span of years is found in the Alaskan muck. In this dark gray frozen
stuff is preserved, quite commonly, fragments of ligaments, skin, hair,
and even flesh. We have gained from the muck pits of the Yukon
Valley a picture of quick extinction. The evidences of violence there
are as obvious as in the horror camps of Germany. Such piles of
bodies of animals or men simply do not occur by any ordinary natural
means. . . . (212:168-70).
So far, Professor Hibben's description of the evidence in
Alaska may be consistent with the solution I have suggested
for the evidence in Siberia, and for the area of the former
Wisconsin icecap. No doubt Alaska also had a temporary
icecap, since it was, in effect, merely an extension of Siberia,
and apparently had the same kinds of animals at about the
same time. However, it is evident that the animals that were
killed far to the south, in Florida, Texas, Mexico, and
South America, cannot have been contained in any icecap,
whether thin or thick. Professor Hibben suggests that other
factors were at work.
One of the most interesting of the theories of the Pleistocene end
is that which explains this ancient tragedy by world-wide, earth-
shaking volcanic eruptions of catastrophic violence. This bizarre idea,
queerly enough, has considerable support, especially in the Alaskan
and Siberian regions. Interspersed in the muck depths and sometimes
through the very piles of bones .and tusks themselves are layers of
volcanic ash. There is no doubt that coincidental with the end of the
Pleistocene animals, at least in Alaska, there were volcanic eruptions
of tremendous proportions. It stands to reason that animals whose
flesh is still preserved must have been killed and buried quickly to