>Date: 12 Dec 96 09:50:00 -0800
>From: ROTH_EMILE@tandem.com
>To: donfnelson@aol.com, mike@smtp-gw.div-cc.firn.edu, untulis@best.com,
>        dbenjamin@fcpa.fujitsu.com, jhalpern@boi.hp.com, krose@mailer.fsu.edu,
>        zi_zi@physik.uni-paderborn.de
>Subject: Backyard science
>
>------------   ORIGINAL ATTACHMENT   --------
>SENT 12-12-96 FROM SMTPGATE (craig@zso.dec.com)
>
>
>
> ----------
>
>Ok, the story behind this... There's this tripped out guy who digs things
>out his back yard and sends the stuff he finds to the Smithsonian Institute,
>labelling them with scientific names, insisting that they are actual
>archeological finds. The really weird thing about these letters is that this
>guy really exists and does this in his spare time!
>
>Anyway... here's a letter from the Smithsonian Instutate from when he sent
>them a Barbie doll head.
>
>
>Paleoanthropology Division
>
>Smithsonian Institute
>207 Pennsylvania Avenue
>Washington, DC 20078
>
>
>Dear Sir:
>
>Thank you for your latest submission to the Institute, labeled "211-D, layer
>seven, next to the clothesline post. Hominid skull." We have given this
>specimen a careful and detailed examination, and regret to inform you that
>we disagree with your theory that it represents "conclusive proof of the
>presence of Early Man in Charleston County two million years ago." Rather,
>it appears that what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the
>variety one of our staff, who has small children, believes to be the "Malibu
>Barbie". It is evident that you have given a great deal of thought to the
>analysis of this specimen, and you may be quite certain that those of us who
>are familiar with your prior work in the field were loathe to come to
>contradiction with your findings. However, we do feel that there are a
>number of physical attributes of the specimen which might have tipped you
>off to it's modern origin:
>
>     1. The material is molded plastic. Ancient hominid remains are
>typically fossilized bone.
>
>     2. The cranial capacity of the specimen is approximately 9 cubic
>centimeters, well below the threshold of even the earliest identified
>proto-hominids.
>
>     3. The dentition pattern evident on the "skull" is more consistent with
>the common domesticated dog than it is with the "ravenous man-eating
>Pliocene clams" you speculate roamed the wetlands during that time. This
>latter finding is certainly one of the most intriguing hypotheses you have
>submitted in your history with this institution, but the evidence seems to
>weigh rather heavily against it. Without going into too much detail, let us
>say that:
>
>          A. The specimen looks like the head of a Barbie doll that a dog
>has chewed on.
>
>          B. Clams don't have teeth.
>
>It is with feelings tinged with melancholy that we must deny your request to
>have the specimen carbon dated. This is partially due to the heavy load our
>lab must bear in it's normal operation, and partly due to carbon dating's
>notorious inaccuracy in fossils of recent geologic record. To the best of
>our knowledge, no Barbie dolls were produced prior to 1956 AD, and carbon
>dating is likely to produce wildly inaccurate results. Sadly, we must also
>deny your request that we approach the National Science Foundation's
>Phylogeny Department with the concept of assigning your specimen the
>scientific name "Australopithecus spiff-arino." Speaking personally, I, for
>one, fought tenaciously for the acceptance of your proposed taxonomy, but
>was ultimately voted down because the species name you selected was
>hyphenated, and didn't really sound like it might be Latin.
>
>However, we gladly accept your generous donation of this fascinating
>specimen to the museum. While it is undoubtedly not a hominid fossil, it is,
>nonetheless, yet another riveting example of the great body of work you seem
>to accumulate here so effortlessly. You should know that our Director has
>reserved a special shelf in his own office for the display of the specimens
>you have previously submitted to the Institution, and the entire staff
>speculates daily on what you will happen upon next in your digs at the site
>you have discovered in your back yard. We eagerly anticipate your trip to
>our nation's capital that you proposed in your last letter, and several of
>us are pressing the Director to pay for it. We are particularly interested
>in hearing you expand on your theories surrounding the "trans-positating
>fillifitation of ferrous ions in a structural matrix" that makes the
>excellent juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex femur you recently discovered take on
>the deceptive appearance of a rusty 9-mm Sears Craftsman automotive crescent
>wrench.
>
>
>                              Yours in Science,
>
>
>
>                              Harvey Rowe
>
>                              Curator, Antiquities
>
>
>