The Lyin' Thing

[footnotefetish]

After a brief hiatus from Tucson and a nice reprieve from the Tucson summer, I drove home yesterday, arriving in the late afternoon, just in time for rush hour

Comments

[siyeh]

Well, I've always wondered what "The Thing" was. Now I know. At least your revelation may prevent the rest of us from paying further dollars to solve the mystery....

[footnotefetish]

Yeah, I decided to use the LJ cut, just in case anyone was bound and determined to discover for themselves what's behind the mystery. Before my stop there yesterday, I only knew one person who had seen The Thing, and he wouldn't say what it was. Perhaps the reason people are so good about keeping the mystery a secret is that it's really nothing as otherworldly or supernatural as the billboards make it out to be.

[poopsmoothie]

whoa, now i know. It figures it would be something fucked up.

[footnotefetish]

lilituc posted a link below that gives a lot more information on it. I guess it is fake, but there were real bone fragments around it (so it's still fucked up--just not to the degree I initially assumed).

[azadnama]

Rest assured, if it were really the remains of a Native American, legal battles would have engulfed it a long time ago. It's just not legal for remains to be kept like that; as far as I know, ownership doesn't apply in most of those cases. Supposedly, it's an art piece created by Homer Tate in the 1940's. It was part of the tradition of making fake side-show attractions. He also made shrunken heads and sold stuff in Phoenix. The museum was established in 1965, so the piece was actually pretty old when it was put on display.

[footnotefetish]

That's good to know that it wasn't real. One of lilituc's links says that there was some bone fragments that were real, though, but that certainly pales in comparison to an entire skeleton. (Of course, I wouldn't necessarily disagree with someone who countered that that's still wrong, regardless of degree.)

I didn't realize repatriation applied to privately owned remains as well. I just assumed that applied to remains being held at universities, research institutions, museums, etc. My knowledge of Indian law is pretty minimal.

[lilituc]

http://www.travelintelligence.net/wsd/articles/art_764.html

http://kjzz.org/news/arizona/archives/200605/thethingredux

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4529818

[footnotefetish]

Thanks for the links! The last one gives a lot of information. I think I'll listen to it a second time.

[mi_tigre]

sorry, dude just got excited cause I thought you said you were in Kansas.

[footnotefetish]

Excitement must result in really high cell phone bills for you.