24 
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 
[BULL. 66 
Florida. The feature of especial interest at this locality is the presence of 
fossil human remains in association with the Pleistocene vertebrates. Human 
remains have been found at this locality in two separate strata which differ in 
age, the one being superimposed upon the other. The contemporaneity of man 
and the Pleistocene fossils is based not upon a single discovery, but upon suc 
cessive discoveries, including bones from two human skeletons and in addition 
flints and implements made by man. The geologic conditions at this locality 
fortunately are favorable for a correct placing of the fossils, as the older 
human remains are here found in a fresh-water stratum which rests upon 
marine shell marl and is overlaid by a laminated fluviatile deposit. Although 
lying near the surface, the possibility of the human bones representing a recent 
burial is excluded by the fact that the overlying laminated stratum is undis 
turbed. The condition of preservation as well as the abundance of the asso 
ciated Pleistocene fossils is such as to show that they could not have washed 
FIG. 1. Vero, the drainage canal, and vicinity. The arrow points to the location of the 
finds. (From survey map furnished the Smithsonian Institution by William II. Kim- 
ball, chief engineer in charge of the construction of the canal.) 
into this deposit from an older formation. There is thus conclusive evidence 
that the human remains and the associated fossils are contemporaneous. These 
associated fossils, including mammals, birds, batrachians, reptiles, and fishes, 
afford incontestable evidence of the Pleistocene age of the deposits. 
The occurrence of fossils at Vero was brought to Dr. Sellards s 
attention toward the end of 1913 by Mr. I. M. Weills, a local col 
lector. Their presence 
[P. 124] first became known as a result of the construction of a drainage 
canal made by the . Indian River Farms Company. Throughout the greater 
part of its course this canal, which extends from the coast several miles inland, 
cuts through the surface materials, including sand, marl, and muck beds, and 
into marine shell marl. In the marine marl, invertebrates are found in abun 
dance and in an excellent state of preservation, while in the sands, fresh-water 
marls, and muck beds, vertebrates and fresh-water invertebrates are not infre- 
