ELSAH - The public was invited to Principia College to watch the excavation of a mastodon.
Get The Latest News!
Don't miss our top stories and need-to-know news everyday in your inbox.
On Dec. 5, 2024, dozens of community members gathered at Principia College campus in Elsah to watch as Dr. Andrew Martin and his archeology students worked on excavating the skull of a 27,500-year-old mastodon. The students have so far uncovered the mastodon’s skull and a tusk.
“It’s 27,500 years old, it’s been lying in this acidic soil for that time, and it’s the first time it’s moved,” Martin explained. “We’re going to be working on getting the skull of the mastodon up. Now, that skull, there’s only about half of it, but it’s the half that’s kind of important with four teeth in it still intact. It’s a pretty dangerous job, because at this point you have to wrench it out of the ground.”
Martin, Chair of the Sociology/Anthropology Department at Principia, has been working on excavating the mastodon skeleton since it was discovered in July 2022. A facilities crew member named Mike Towel was digging in the area with a Bobcat to create a road. When he hit bone, he called Martin, who verified that it was a skeleton.
Nicknamed “Mike” in Towel’s honor, the mastodon is a relative of woolly mammoths and elephants. Students have been working for two years to unearth the mastodon.
Enyinnaya Ukairon, a freshman student majoring in computer science and music studies, said that “very little” of the skeleton is currently out of the ground. He explained that the class used a ground-penetrating radar scan to look for the remainder of the skeleton, but they have yet to find where it is located.
“We don’t actually know where the rest of it is quite yet, if it is under the ground,” Ukairon said. “Even through biological and geological processes, storms, winds, earthquakes, it would have stayed almost relatively intact. So we’re hoping, with future classes and a more thorough understanding of what is in the area, we can find more of the skeleton.”
Martin added that community members were likely standing on top of the body, several feet underground, as they watched the students excavate the skull.
Students expressed their eagerness to be involved in the excavation. Mayah Campagna, a freshman global studies and education major, noted that she recently attended a conference with Martin to present their findings. Many of the doctoral students in attendance were shocked that undergraduate students had such a major opportunity.
Sociology student Ernesto Botero hopes to go into archeology after taking Martin’s class. He noted that he never anticipated working on an excavation project like this, but he is thankful that he has been involved.
“I didn’t expect to work on something like this when I first came to Prin. It's an awesome experience,” Botero said. “Dr. Martin explains it really well to us. Almost all of us are new to archeology, so he kind of explained the process, what we need to be careful of, what we need to be looking out for, and now we have some sort of experience. We’ve made significant progress, and it’s been fun.”
More updates will be provided as Principia students uncover more of the skeleton.
More like this:
