Did Dinosaurs And Humans Live Together?: An Update
Clifford A. Wilson
*Clifford Wilson, Ph.D., speaks each week on ABR’s radio program “The Stones Cry Out”. He is president of Pacific College, Melbourne, Australia.
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[We include an article on this subject in an archaeological magazine for the simple reason that if men and dinosaurs truly did live at the same time, then a study of human history is involved. Archaeology as well as geology are combined. This is biblical archaeology because it deals with questions related to the early chapters of Genesis. From time to time we plan to have articles dealing with human history even though some would put them in the category of science. Ed.]
“Tracks Step on Evolution” – so ran the headlines of the Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, Star Telegram on Thursday evening, June 17, 1982. That newspaper article highlighted a series of activities centering around an excavation headed by Dr. Carl Baugh at Glen Rose, Texas, alongside the Paluxy River. The evidence seemed conclusive; indeed it was – and still is – even though there are criticisms of it.
It is not our intention to enter into protracted debate with anyone – evolutionists or creationists. We simply want to put forward some relevant facts, sort of a personal testimonial, with the conviction that they not only should be taken seriously, but also will be taken seriously because of the continuing finds at this site.
What Did Roland Bird Examine?
Criticisms against the genuineness of the human footprints are not new. Such tracks are known to have been reported as long ago as 1908. The eminent Dr. Roland Bird reported examining some humanlike tracks in the 1930’s, but he could not accept that they really were human. (See Natural History, May, 1939, pp. 225, 261, 302.) He accepted the traditional view of “establishment” scientists that dinosaurs had died out 70 million years ago. Thus, in his opinion, they could not have been contemporary with humans who had been around for only a couple million years.
This writer has interviewed the son and daughter-in-law of the late Charles Moss who was involved with Dr. Bird in his investigation of the tracks. Their tape-recorded statements agree with the reports Dr. Bird himself made as to his unpreparedness to accept the evidence before him.
As time went by, a very limited number of fake footprints were made and sold to gullible tourists. That does not rule out the fact that there were genuine tracks, any more than a fake $100 bill would mean that all $100 bills were counterfeit. Faking has been acknowledged by certain Glen Rose residents, but with the insistence (continued on p. 22 after sidebar)
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SIDEBAR:
Many people think tracks like those at Paluxy were formed in sedimentary mud which later hardened into rock. However, ordinary mud does not harden into rock under pressure. And apparently there has not been much pressure, anyway, since the tracks are near the surface. Even after hardening, sedimentary mud quickly turns back to mud and even disperses when submerged again in water. This, then, is not the explanation for the Paluxy tracks which are imbedded in rock so hard it is difficult eve to break it with a hammer.
Obviously, all the tracks were made in some kind of soft material like mud. However, whatever it was hardened into rock rapidly, before the tracks could be obliterated. Thus, to any unprejudiced observer, they must have been produced at nearly the same time. And they have remained hard ever since, even when submerged for long periods in water.
Now think of something in our modern experience which does this. How about cement, or concrete? But how could something with the properties of cement be scattered over a wide area, layer upon layer?
We suggest that it happened through volcanic action. To the west of the Glen Rose area and out through New Mexico is a vast area of now-extinct volcanic activity. In The Dinosaur Quarry (published by the National Park Service in 1958) we read, “When the whole region [all of western U.S.] emerged from the sea, the climate became more humid. Volcanoes were active far to the west; the winds carried clouds of ejected dust eastward and deposited them on the plains (p. 12).” Layer upon layer of ash was deposited, as a result, with quiescent periods between. During the quiet periods, the ash became moist and hardened into rock following which a layer of debris accumulated before the next eruption. This phenomenon occurs even now.
This process was probably the scenario at Paluxy. It could positively be determined by examining the rock. The same publication says, “Microscopic examination of clay fragments [now rock] reveals shards of volcanic glass and ash that speak of active volcanoes (p. 14).” (One of the Paluxy researchers reported to us that this is the situation there also.)
But how could volcanic ash and dust become rock? Not all volcanic ash hardens when it becomes wet. On the other hand, some does. Each volcano has its own “signature” written in the contents of its ash. The World Book tells us that the Romans made such good cement from the lava and ash of Mt. Vesuvius that it would harden under water! Science 82 (December) notes that “the Romans often used volcanic ash” in their cement. “Adding volcanic ash to cement… not only produced concrete but made it harden properly even under water[!]. This is because the ash provided silicates that combined with the lime to form compounds insoluble in water (p. 50).”
For an application of this to the question of how prints were preserved at Paluxy, we now look at an article from 1887. In the Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society (Vol. 124, No. 126) we read, “The surface of the Republic of Nicaragua presents in nearly all parts the signs of enormous volcanic activity (p. 437).” In this paper the author notes that human footprints were found in the lowest of seven beds of tuff (ash-rock), 21 feet below the present surface. “One of the footprints indicates the use of sandals or moccasins by the pedestrians of that day… there can be no doubt of these being genuine human footprints (p. 444).”
Scientific American (September 1941) carries a caption “Human Footprints in the Hardened Rock in Central America Reveal a Dramatic Fight (p. 134.” (This is not the same situation mentioned above.) In the case mud flows were the base for the footprints. “Such flows harden very quickly – a somewhat similar deposit was laid down on the slopes of Lassen Peak in California in 1915 and within a few hours it was difficult to stamp an impression in it with the feet.”
These should be enough examples to suggest how human and dinosaur footprints could be intermingled and preserved in rock, all to a very short time and not necessarily long ago – truly a “capsule of history.”
END SIDEBAR
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VIEW OF THE PALUXY RIVER
STRATA BROKEN UP BY FLOODWATERS
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that they did not fake those which have so clearly shown human features in considerable detail.
Findings by Dr. Carl Baugh
Early in 1982, Dr. Carl Baugh led a team on an excavation at the well-known McFall site, upstream from the famous Dinosaur State Park where both dinosaur and human footprints have been reported. Almost immediately, they found a dinosaur and a human footprint literally together – the more shallow impression of the human footprint was protruding from the much deeper dinosaur footprint. Then the team found another human footprint only 18 inches from yet another dinosaur impression. It should be noted that the footprints were found in stone, not in the mud between the layers.
Dr. Baugh reported this widely to the media, and he was soon ridiculed on a well-known television channel. Someone came on the TV screen, impersonating Dr. Baugh – complete with faked footprints from the Paluxy River.
With that Dr. Baugh determined to conduct an excavation that could not be ridiculed. He would notify scientists as well as the press, and give them opportunity to see human and dinosaur footprints as they were being excavated. He was certainly sticking his neck out! But he would start where there were weathered tracks going under a limestone ledge, then remove that ledge with video-cameras recording the genuineness of the finds as they appeared for the first time.
Footprints Under Twelve Inches of Limestone
It worked! Video-cameras did indeed record the removal of twelve inches of limestone. Then underneath that previously un-penetrated sealing, both human and dinosaur footprints appeared. They could not have been faked! Hence the report in the Dallas-Fort Worth Star Telegram referred to above proved true – with many other favorable reports also.
Reporters had come in considerable numbers. Some either made no report, or it was edited out. But those whose reports were published were favorable toward the excavating team.
Where Were the Scientists?
The scientists themselves did not respond at that time. Some did come to inspect the site about a year later and were seething about “holes in the rock” being interpreted as human footprints. Of course, by that time there had been considerable weathering from the river’s currents, and the impressions were no longer clear. This writer participated in that June, 1982, dig and personally uncovered a human footprint 7 1/2 inches from a dinosaur impression. Two years later, the distance between the two was about 3 inches – such was the effect of weathering in two years. Also, by that time, the human print looked greatly different from the colored photographs taken two years earlier. That kind of weathering is true of many of the prints found over the years at various points along the Paluxy River.
On the other hand, at last count Dr. Baugh had obtained the counsel of 21 scholars with earned Ph.D.’s. He has been able to demonstrate that scientists with high academic qualifications have become convinced of the authenticity of the human footprint findings.
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SIDEBAR:
Human Remains: Latest Astonishing Find at Paluxy
Many have commented that footprints are one thing, but have any actual human remains or artifacts been found at Paluxy?
Yes, now there have! Without question, a human tooth was found in a layer of clay compressed between rock layers containing footprints. Therefore it has to be contemporaneous with the prints.
On June 16, 1987, the Creation Evidences Excavation team discovered the broken tooth in undisturbed Cretaceous context. James Addison, DDS (and Dallas County “Dentist of the Year”) as well as Kenneth Hogan, DDS (Washington University School of Dentistry) both positively identified it as an “upper maxillary right central deciduous juvenile human incisor.” Those are pretty positive statements. Furthermore, subsequent examinations by prestigious institutions and scientists have all positively identified it as human – even though some of them obviously with it was not.
Actual enlarged color photos of this tooth, as well as the history of the Paluxy excavations with many fore good color photos, are found in Dr. Carl Baugh’s brand new book Dinosaur: Scientific Evidence that Dinosaurs and Men Walked Together. The book can be obtained from ABR Books for $10.95 + .75 postage. Our address: P.O. Box 31, Willow Grove, PA 19090.
END SIDEBAR
Unique Discovery of Dinosaur Bones
That is not all. Dr. Baugh has led in the finding of bones of three dinosaurs – the first time dinosaur bones have been found on the North American continent in the same ledges where their footprints have been found. That itself is sensational, and this find has certainly deserved much wider attention than it has received. One wonders ff Dr. Baugh’s clear stand as a creationist militates against such acknowledgment.
Dinosaur Tracks on the Top Stone Stratum
Another relevant point is that on the last day of the dig in June, 1982, Charles Hiltibidal removed topsoil to a depth of between six and eleven feet. Following that, I personally had the privilege of working with my trowel through the thin layer of mud down to the solid limestone. While doing so, I uncovered five dinosaur footprints in the usual left-right-left pattern, each stride being just over three feet. There is no doubt whatever as to the authenticity of these impressions: not only were they photographed in color, but also very good plaster impressions were made.
However, these are on the very top stone stratum of the earth’s surface. They should not be there, according to some paleontologists. A recent article claimed that they were fakes, cut into the limestone by Indians.
Such total rejection of legitimate evidence is indeed hard to understand. I personally uncovered that trail. The find was significant, and is totally authentic. What is necessary to convince the skeptics?
Other Finds Include a Trilobite
There are evidences of other creatures found nearby, including woolly mammoths and – 12 miles away in Panther Cave – “prehistoric” giant humans. An article in Bible Science Newsletter (August, 1982) reported on and has photographs of a 7 foot female skeleton, excavated in 1949, with accompanying baby skeleton – evidently the
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woman died in child-birth. She has been dated to the “third interglacial period” by anthropologists. Based on this find, oversized human footprints should not seem surprising. I have physically handled some of these remains, but I do not argue for their relationship to the same catastrophe in which human and dinosaur footprints were laid down together, simply because the evidence is inconclusive.
The finding of a trilobite in the Paluxy limestone is probably more relevant. In a taped interview with the present curator of the Gillespie County Museum (at Montrose) she told how she watched her mother dig that trilobite out of the Cretaceous rock (that is, relatively recent rock “only” 100,000,000 years old whereas trilobites are supposed to be over 500,000,000 years old). They then put it in a bag, and took it home. At present
SIDEBAR:
The Carboniferous Mystery
… is the title of an article in Scientific American back in January 1940. It was an attempt 50 years ago by evolutionist Albert Ingalls to explain away human footprints found in rock as early as the Carboniferous Period (“250,000,000 years ago”). He lists many places where footprints have been found. In geological time, the Carboniferous Period is much earlier than dinosaurs. But, for all practical purposes, human tracks found with dinosaur tracks is just as big a problem for evolutionary philosophers.
Ingalls suggests that the tracks were carved by American Indians since the are “always found near water.” [On the contrary, they are not always found there.] However, the Paluxy diggers have completely overruled his supposition in that they continually find new tracks under many feet of rock and soil overburden. This, of course, makes it impossible that Indians carved the prints.
Roland Bird was not the only one who could look at human footprints and deny that they were human. Ingalls put it this way, “They look like human footprints and it has often been said, though not by scientists, that they really are human footprints made in the soft mud before it became rock.” With this evidence before him, he gives his “unbiased” opinion of it. “You want man in the Carboniferous? Entirely and absolutely – totally and completely – impossible. We admit we don’t know exactly what made the prints, but we do know one agency that didn’t, and that is man in the Carboniferous.” (his emphasis)
The impossibility of an evolutinoist accepting “concrete” proof that dinosaurs and man lived together is summed up later in the article. “Asking a scientist for man in the Carboniferous is like asking the historian for Diesel engines in ancient Sumeria. The comparison is no exaggeration, but an understatement. If man, or even his ape ancestor, or even that ape ancestor’s early mammalian ancestor, existed as far back as in the Carboniferous Period in any shape, the whole science of geology is so completely wrong that all the geologists will resign their jobs and take up truck driving.”
This emphatic statement will help our readers to better understand the importance of this issue. Human footprints found alongside dinosaur footprints at Paluxy (as well as other places) is not just problem for evolutionists. It completely negates their most fundamental principles.
Ingalls makes one concession, however, near the close of his article. He says, “Science has no proof that these tracks were not made by one or more …animals – one with which it is not familiar – for it does not know everything.”
Maybe if Ingalls had been ruled by that last phrase, he would not even have written the article.
END SIDEBAR
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it is stored in a safe-deposit vault. Once again, I have personally handled it and, having talked to that museum curator, I have no doubt the story is true.
The story continues, for this is an ongoing wore Even as this article is being written there is a report of yet another footprint found under a covering seal of limestone. Once again, a scientist with an earned Ph.D. participated in the recovery and expressed himself as quite convinced that it is a human footprint. This particular find is not on the McFall site, and so the evidence is not limited to that site.
What Do the Locals Say?
Even the disparaging evidence against the tracks on the Taylor Trail at Glen Rose is by no means “water-tight” (to use an appropriate term). Glen Rose locals have told this writer that tracks mainly had a “slipper” (or sandal) effect without the toes always being convincing. Others have said that the *staining” effects recently discov-
SIDEBAR:
Creation Evidences Museum
Headquarters for the excavations by Dr. Baugh’s team at the Paluxy River is the Creation Evidences Museum. Many astonishing artifacts found already are displayed here.
Of course, there are a number of human and dino footprints in stone. (Others can still be seen in situ down in the river bottom.) Actual dino bones uncovered on the site are on display. A giant cat print found among the human and dino prints as well as a human hand print in stone is being shown. The Nebraska Man tooth Clarence Darrow used to “prove” evolution in the famous Scopes Trial is here too. (It turned out later to be nothing more than a peccary, or pig’s tooth.) Possibly the most astounding feature of all is a steel hammer, with its wooden handle intact, still imbedded in Ordovician stone (supposedly over 400,000,000 years old)!
Newest and most exciting is the recently excavated child’s tooth being exhibited. It came from the same layer in which dino and human prints are being found.
Nearing completion is a hyperbaric biosphere chamber. This is a sealed chamber which, at slightly over 2 atmospheres of pressure and control of ultra-violet rays, will simulate pre-Flood conditions on the earth’s surface. It is believed that this healthier climate will promote longevity and physical growth in size. Experiments will be very interesting.
Future plans include the construction of a 25 foot model of Noah’s Ark. This will become part of a traveling display which will be used to promote creation evidences.
The Creation Evidences Museum is located about 60 miles southwest of Fort Worth. It is just outside and north of Glen Rose, Texas, and is located across the Paluxy River from the Dinosaur State Park. The museum and the area nearby are well worth including in a family vacation, especially in this day when children are “crazy” about dinosaurs (and are getting all kinds of wrong information about their age).
You may write and obtain brochures and a list of their publications at: Creation Evidences Museum, P.O. Box 309, Glen Rose, TX 76043. They will also send a map. Hours are 10 AM to 5 PM, but only on Saturday. Other days are by appointment. They will arrange and welcome tours. Telephone: (817) 897–3200. A small fee is charged. All income is used for upkeep, development and further research. We hope Christians will encourage and support this important effort. (Information on future excavations can also be obtained at the above address.)
END SIDEBAR
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ered could have been made by the application of hydrochloric acid – and one experiment actually demonstrated this possibility. Then, again, it has been pointed out that it is strange that tracks first found 60 years ago and others much more recently all are being found with this “staining” effect at the same time.
A Russian Paluxy and The Geological Column
Much more could be added – for example, findings in Turkmenia, Russia, clearly indicate that dinosaurs and humans lived and walked together in that part of the world. As a result of finding what clearly appear to be dinosaur and human footprints together, the Russians have suggested that the history of man should be pushed back 150 million years. (Moscow News, No. 24, p. 10, 1983. Cr. V. Rubstov.)
The significant implication is that the long periods in the geological time scale (the geological column) have been shown to be unacceptable. If man and dinosaurs lived together, the chronology of that column falls apart. (They supposedly were separated by about 70 million years.) And, of course, the finding of a trilobite in Cretaceous rock, rather than in the Cambrian strata where “it should be,” puts yet another nail in the coffin of fossil-indexing.
A Modern Pleslosaurus
The widely-publicized report of a Plesiosaurus being caught by Japanese fishermen off New Zealand also indicates the contemporary existence of dinosaurs and men. Job (chapter 40) described a dinosaur (called “Behemoth”) with its strong loins and belly, and a tail “like a cedar” (hardly that of an elephant or a hippopotamus!).
In the June, 1988 National Geographic there is a fascinating article with pictures of coelocanths. “The Fish That Time Forgot” is a “living fossil”. It was supposed to be extinct for 300,000,000 years, But it never did die out. Fossils supposedly that old are exactly the same as living coelocanths. Is this a problem for evolutionists? It certainly is. If the coelocanth has been around for “300,000,000 years”, those fossils could be any age; even less than 10, 000 years! Thus they cannot “index” the age of geological strata. What other specimens from the “dinosaur age” are still with us?
The evidence could be multiplied, and it will be. The Baugh team have purchased 10 acres of land at Glen Rose across the river from Dinosaur State Park. Reports have been made of earlier findings of both dinosaur and human tracks on both sides of this property and the future is exciting. As funds are available, it is proposed to remove overlying limestone on this property and it is confidently anticipated that many footprints will be found.
Creationists Should Stand Tall
In the meantime, we who are Creationists should stand tall, recognizing that Genesis 1 clearly indicates that animals and other land creatures were created at the same time as man.
A wise man named Gamaliel once warned his religious colleagues that if they rejected the resurrection they might be found to be fighting against God (Acts 5:38, 39). It seems probable that the evidence of the contemporary relationship of men and dinosaurs will be a strong 20th century pointer to the accuracy of the creation record in God’s written word.
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