GIANT GROUND SLOTHS — GAZIN 343 



The attention of Dr. Alexander Wetmore, at that time Secretary of 

 the Smithsonian Institution, was directed to the Ocu discovery by 

 several of our friends in the Canal Zone, apparently first by Kenneth 

 W. Vinton, a science teacher at the Junior College. A preliminary 

 investigation of the occurrence was made for the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution by Assistant Secretary John E. Graf, and arrangements were 

 made with the Panamanian Government, through the kind offices of 

 Dr. Alejandro Mendez, Director of the National Museum of Panama, 

 and Prof. Max Arosemena, then Minister of Education for the 

 Republic of Panama, for a Smithsonian party to carry on excavation 

 work at this site. We are particularly indebted to Dr. Mendez for 

 his very helpful cooperation and kindly personal interest, as well as 

 the never-failing enthusiasm which he showed for the progress and 

 results of our work during the two field seasons. 



Dr. T. E. White of the Smithsonian's River Basin Surveys accom- 

 panied me on the first expedition to Panama, and we arrived there 

 early in January 1950. We were given a most royal welcome at the 

 Posada in Ocu and every effort was made by the townspeople to 

 facilitate our work and make our stay as pleasant as possible. The 

 actual digging began at La Coca on January 19, but as the occurrence 

 was not of great extent, by February 3 we had it completely worked 

 out (pi. 3). During this time, we were assisted by the discoverer, 

 Manuel Valdivieso, or from time to time by his brother Viviano, 

 and by Juan Franco, a campesino who learned the work quickly and 

 proved particularly helpful to us. Altogether we removed 36 blocks 

 of material from La Coca, each securely encased in a jacket of plaster 

 of paris reinforced with burlap. Through the kindness of "Chin" 

 Carrizo, we were permitted to store our collection, as it accumulated, 

 in a storeroom at the Posada in Ocii. Following the La Coca work 

 we turned our attention for a couple of weeks to various reports of 

 other places where fossil bones were supposed to have been seen, but 

 most of these proved to be rumors without foundation in fact. Never- 

 theless, one promising lead remained, and about the middle of Febru- 

 ary, by arrangements made sometime earlier during one of the fiestas 

 in Ocu, we were accompanied to the El Hatillo locality about a mile 

 west of Pese, as mentioned above, by the Governor of the province, 

 Sr. Guillermo Arjona. 



Some difficulty was encountered at first in locating fossil remains; 

 however, after extensive probing with picks and shovels (pi. 4, fig. 1) 

 the source of the material was located at the periphery of a mud deposit 

 in the vicinity of a large and swampy spring. The bones were found 

 to occur at the bottom of the mud near contact with the underlying 

 bedrock, close to the surface at the periphery but increasing in depth 

 toward the spring. Excavation was carried on at El Hatillo with the 



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