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Author Topic: Bones found in Fiji  (Read 75337 times)

Bruce Thomas

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Bones found in Fiji
« on: August 06, 2014, 09:46:52 PM »

A short article in today/tomorrow's Fiji Times reports about someone searching for the elusive bones found on Gardner Island.
LTM,

Bruce
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Greg Daspit

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Re: Bones search in Fiji
« Reply #1 on: August 06, 2014, 10:34:53 PM »

That is interesting Bruce.
Here is the link to the previous article "Whose Bones" which was in the related story column.
"The box containing a human skull, old stone adzes, wooden figures and an old army-type knife with US 1918 inscribed on the handle has raised the interest of a historical investigator"
The contents found in the box are a strange mix of different artifacts.
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« Last Edit: August 06, 2014, 10:58:55 PM by Greg Daspit »
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JNev

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Re: Bones search in Fiji
« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2014, 06:12:20 AM »

That is interesting Bruce.
Here is the link to the previous article "Whose Bones" which was in the related story column.
"The box containing a human skull, old stone adzes, wooden figures and an old army-type knife with US 1918 inscribed on the handle has raised the interest of a historical investigator"
The contents found in the box are a strange mix of different artifacts.

Seems those doing the perusing at the time enjoyed a bit of anthropological curiosity, not just that of the medic.

The mix of stuff in that box is interesting - I wonder if (and hopE it is) all related to a single find.  The eclectic mix does make me wonder about our chances of ever finding a well-filed box of 'as found' bones from Niku, or whether the empire tended to toss things around and rebox too casually for that. Maybe time and the bones chase will yet tell.
- Jeff Neville

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Ric Gillespie

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Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2014, 06:21:37 AM »

A TV documentary producer by the name of Joshua Gates is making an Earhart episode for a show called Expedition Unknown. Tom King and I have corresponded with and helped Josh but there is no contractual relationship.

The back-story is that according to a 1969 Fiji Times article, a kid named Grey in Suva found a skull under a house that had belonged to a medical doctor.  Mike Elliot-Jones of TIGHAR tracked this down and we've been looking into it.  When Josh Gates contacted us about the bones in Fiji we passed this on to him, and he pursued it with Grey, asking the obvious question whether Grey had looked for more bones.  Grey said no, so Gates got permission to do so and did.

A couple days ago I got this email from Josh:

"Josh Gates here. I've been filming in Fiji for the last week as part of our Earhart episode. We've been touching down with some of the leads regarding the lost bones theories. We interviewed John Grey, the man who (when he was 13) found a box containing a skull under his house in Suva. Though he maintains the skull was donated to the Fiji museum, they have no record of it in their archives. Obviously, you know all this. After all, nearly everywhere I've traveled to here, people say, "the TIGHAR group was here and they looked through everything!" So...very thorough work by you and your team.

When I was talking with John about the box and the skull, I asked him if he'd ever been back to his childhood house to search under the house for any additional remains. He confessed that he hadn't and that the police didn't do an overly thorough job in 1968 in looking under the house. So, tonight I went there with him, and with permission from the current owner, investigated in the crawl spaces under the house. About an hour into the search, I uncovered a variety of bones directly adjacent to where John Grey found the box and the skull. The crime scene unit from the Fiji police department is there now, and they'll have a forensics guy examining the bones tomorrow. They may well turn out to be animal bones...dead family dog...who knows. But, I wanted to let you know. At a bare minimum, it was an exciting find, and, while I'm not sure Amelia is under that house, someone else might be.

Hope this finds you well, Ric!

Cheers,

Josh
________________________
JOSH GATES | HOST, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
EXPEDITION UNKNOWN"

Yesterday there was a fairly garbled and wifty article in the Fiji Times about the discovery of bones so now we're getting inquiries about it. It's an interesting development and we're naturally eager to learn whether the bones Josh found are human - but we're still a loooong way from any connection with Earhart.
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Tim Collins

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2014, 06:53:32 AM »

It's an interesting development and we're naturally eager to learn whether the bones Josh found are human - but we're still a loooong way from any connection with Earhart.

Still, any kind of new lead is exciting. Can't wait to see how it turns out!
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Patrick Dickson

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #5 on: August 07, 2014, 06:59:44 AM »

cool news Ric.
 
I know there are times when it seems kinda slow in the R&D dept. around here....but persistent researchers just keep
steadily plugging along and un-screwing the inscrutable. Sometimes, you just can't make this stuff up
 
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JNev

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #6 on: August 07, 2014, 07:06:53 AM »

Very interesting development.  Would be something if those bones were human - and somehow managed to match the 13(?) bones that found their way to Suva from Gardner in 1940.

If they happen to match that odd set, the next steps might be very interesting indeed...
- Jeff Neville

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Monty Fowler

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #7 on: August 07, 2014, 07:57:45 AM »

Kar Burns would get a kick out of this if they turn out to be THE bones. Wish she was still around to watch this unfold.

LTM,
Monty Fowler, TIGHAR No. 2189 ECSP
Ex-TIGHAR member No. 2189 E C R SP, 1998-2016
 
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Bill Mangus

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #8 on: August 07, 2014, 08:05:26 AM »

Cool news!!

Couple of questions for the crew in Fiji:

What kind of box and what happened to it?  Presumably given to the museum with the skull in it.  Has museum been searched for a box?

Who was the doctor who owned the house in 1968, what kind of doctor was he and what happened to him?
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John Wallace

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Re: Bones found in Fiji: news articles in other thread
« Reply #9 on: August 07, 2014, 08:21:00 AM »

Same issue with news articles in another thread here, (for cross reference):
http://tighar.org/smf/index.php/topic,1534.0.html

(Should/can these be merged?)
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Jeff Victor Hayden

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #10 on: August 07, 2014, 08:21:16 AM »

His recollection was "According to Mr Grey the skull was given to the Fiji Museum, however, no record of the skull exists in the museum's archive."

So the skull was given to the Fiji museum but no mention of the box and its other contents. It would seem odd though, not to have given the museum the complete find IMHO.

This must be the place
 
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Paul March

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #11 on: August 07, 2014, 09:20:34 AM »

Very interesting development. Unfortunately, museums are often notorious for losing artifacts only to "discover" them some years or decades later. Example: The skeleton found in the closet (insert puns here) of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. The Fiji museum may have a closet somewhere with the skull in an old dusty box. Provides a ray of hope at least.
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Mark Samuels

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #12 on: August 07, 2014, 09:58:34 AM »


Who was the doctor who owned the house in 1968, what kind of doctor was he and what happened to him?

Since there appears to be a new investigation about these bones, the authorities in Suva, I would think will sort out who the Doctor was, where he worked and what happened to him.  Mr. Gates may already have that information.
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Bones found in Fiji
« Reply #13 on: August 07, 2014, 10:08:20 AM »

Since there appears to be a new investigation about these bones, the authorities in Suva, I would think will sort out who the Doctor was, where he worked and what happened to him.  Mr. Gates may already have that information.

In our experience it is (cough) hard to underestimate the investigative capabilities of the "authorities in Suva"
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matt john barth

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Re: Bones search in Fiji
« Reply #14 on: August 07, 2014, 10:11:49 AM »

I'll bet it only takes till noon before someone figures out if Dr. Hoodless ever lived at 12 Kimberly Street in Suva Fiji. I don't even know how to start trying to research that.
Matthew J. Barth
 
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