36 SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 



the top of the hill. 1 here secured for the National Museum's histori- 

 cal collection three of the old cast iron hub-thimbles. 



Our party this year included Mr. C. P. Singleton, chief field assis- 

 tant ; Mr. S. P. Welles, graduate student of the University of Cali- 

 fornia; Mr. Frank Gamier, cook and camp assistant; and as occasion 

 permitted Mr. Elmer Cook, the discoverer of the fossil bone deposit. 

 After a week's service Mr. Gamier was replaced by Mr. J. Young 

 Rogers as camp man. 



Camp established, the work of the summer began where we left off 

 the previous season in the development of the fossil bone deposit. 

 This deposit is situated at the southern extremity of a short hill or 

 spur that juts out from the border of the plain, about a quarter of a 

 mile from our camp and about 45 to 60 feet below the top of the 

 hill. (See fig. 28.) It is evidently the remnant of a stream channel 

 deposit made up of cross-bedded layers of coarse and fine sand with 

 occasional pebbles and here and there patches and lenses of almost pure 

 clay, forming a part of the horizontally laminated beds of the Idaho 

 formation. These beds reached a thickness of several hundred feet and 

 at one time extended many miles in every direction, completely occupy- 

 ing the area now excavated by erosion to form the Snake River Valley 

 of this region, and the present day rough terrain to the west and 

 south of Hagerman. The bone deposit was evidently at the time of 

 its formation a boggy, springy terrain, perhaps a drinking place for 

 wild animals in a semi-arid country where water holes were not abun- 

 dant. This assumption is based on the general character of the de- 

 posits as stated, and the fact that it contains the bones of literally 

 hundreds of animals, mostly belonging to an extinct species of horse. 

 For the most part the bones are disarticulated, intermingled, and 

 scattered in a way to suggest that they represent the slow accumula- 

 tion of many years rather than the sudden overwhelming of a large 

 herd in one grand catastrophe. Springs and swampy conditions are 

 indicated from the fact that there are in the deposits the remains of 

 frogs, fish, swamp turtles, beavers, and other water living animals, 

 and abundant evidence of vegetation as shown by remnants of coarse 

 grass stems, leaves, and even small pieces of wood. The best evidence 

 of the former presence of springs is the fact that numerous pebbles 

 are found scattered throughout many of the layers of both coarse and 

 fine sand, although there are no distinct layers of gravel. In the lower 

 stratum of this deposit the sand is heavily stained and many of the 

 fossil bones are encrusted and stained with light accumulations of bog 

 iron. 



