BLACK MOUNTAIN COMPLEX PETROGLYPHS

needed to explain or justify his efforts. There was a nagging quality, “something isn’t right”, about the introduction; elements that did not fit; information that just did not seem relevant to the story itself, nor the data collecting effort…until NOW!

 

The following is a reprint of an unpublished analysis, extended hypothesis and commentary, conducted by this author, concerning that “introduction”:

 

In the following, I will attempt to demonstrate why Alfred L. Kroeber, prior to his retirement in 1947, was not a friend to the Native Americans of California and the Great Basin; but a cold, calculating agent for the railroads, banks, politicians and other members of the American corporate/industrial complex prior to the Land Claim Commission hearings of the 1950s. Additionally, I will attempt to demonstrate how many of the petroglyphs throughout the Southwest and Great Basin are related and do; in fact, document the histories of many Native American groups, as larger, corporate entities...prior to the catastrophic devastation reeked upon them by the Eurasian invasion. (Hunter 2006)

 

Data Collection:

 

Six and half years before I heard of Franz Boas, Alfred L. Kroeber and Julian Steward, I was crawling up and down the black basalt cliff faces of the sacred Black Mountains of Superior Valley, California re-inventorying petroglyphs previously recorded by Wilson G. Turner. The intent of the efforts was to compare the two inventories for losses and damages inflected upon the area by unscrupulous visitors. It was not until I hiked to the top of a mountain spur, within the complex, that I discovered that some of the petroglyphs I had been recording were similar in design to the terrain features of the mountain. Once I came to that realization; that many of the petroglyphs might represent terrain features atop and surrounding the mountain, I was able to begin retracing the exact steps taken by ancient warriors locked in mortal combat for nine consecutive days. ... perhaps the same story the Mojave informants attempted to tell Kroeber’s interpreter ... which Kroeber publicly stipulated was fantasy ... no doubt, at the direction of his benefactors with whom he maintained close communication while working in the field, visa vie Fredrick W. Putman, chairman of the new [1901] Anthropological Department, UC/Berkeley. (Who, actually lived in New York.)

 

California Indians vs. A Mohave Historical Epic: Kroeber himself provides evidence of his questionable data collection and assessment methods; contributing to the idea that the results of his investigation may have been strategically pre-determined.

 

In the very first line of his analysis, Kroeber sets up his finial assessment of the verbal testimony provided by the Mojave informants ... he refers to the evidence as a “tale”... a subliminal suggestion that the information conveyed by the informants is factious. Kroeber’s suggestion that the information is factious provides a legal challenge and a reasonable doubt that the information presented in the story is not suitable “as evidence” in any future legal proceedings, this tactic is beneficial to those funding his fieldwork and the newly authorized Department of Anthropology, UC/Berkeley.