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Plain talk on the genetic issue
Plain Talk on the Genetic Issue
Explanatory notes for Proofpage
For some, a world outlook entails a vision of permanence and stability; that
like the day, time commenced at some point and will continue to another; that
the world is fixed, unchanging, and immutable - all that is necessary for human
comfort is written for the ages as preparation for a coming Winter.
Others see the universe in constant flux; that when the Lord made time, He
made it in plenty - perhaps to see that not everything would happen all at once
- that all things are ~ all life is ~ in motion ~ dynamic; that things work in cycles, the
earth swells in some places and subsides in others, making the very continents
impermanent; that even the heavens and the stars have their times. That
while we can see and fear death, destruction, and cataclysmic eruptions, it is
far more difficult and requires a different article of faith to envision that
somehow, somewhere there is a constructive force that perpetually re-generates
our world and universe. For those who seek, no matter how much is
known, there are always new lands, new voyages, new horizons ~ and an
approaching Springtime.
Time
Time is something we sometimes regret when we look in the mirror or observe
our childhood friends. And yet it has its values. Things change. We learn. We
are not the people we were a few years ago. Indeed, we are not really the same
as we were a few hours ago. For in that brief time the perpetual battle of microbes
has been waging within our bodies; our autosomic defenses in constant
re-organizations to new microbial and viral threats of which we are unaware.
Perhaps all those white blood corpuscles are marching now to a different
drum-beat; to a better dressed line; with more experienced drillmasters and
generals the more and longer they do their work. We can learn much from time.
One William H. McNeill does much with it, for in his publication
"Plagues and Peoples" he delves into spans of historical records
uncommon for historians. Examining public health records from extended eras of
ancient and modern history he is able to determine factors of plagues and
pestilences that have afflicted populations over eons. Consequently he is able
to sometimes establish particular diseases and their courses in eras and
severity. His statistical base then, is an enabler to understanding of diseases
and immunities uncommonly approached or observed for public scrutiny nor even
professional immunologists. Moreover, the statistics allow a differentiation of
effects on mainlands, islands, insular populations of lands the size of England
and Japan - and in different time spans.
Found is the fact that certain diseases recur in cycles and that within these
cycles specific diseases tend to follow paths of diminishing effects. That when
a disease first strikes a population, it does so with terribly grotesque and
"florid" symptoms, affecting individuals traumatically and populations
with measurable and immediate depletions in numbers. However, as a disease
cycles through long term epidemic/endemic patterns, its effects diminish - the
population and the attacking microbes tend to gradually reach an accommodation with each responding in typical patterns - each organism gains experience and
sometimes strength. At every epidemic recurrence of a disease symptoms become
systematically less and less severe. What starts at first strike as severe
disease with extremely traumatic effects, progresses to one with less trauma, to
a relatively minor affliction, to a sustainable childhood disease, and
ultimately to an apparent disappearance. The two formerly hostile organisms
reach an eventual accommodation to each other with no harmful effects observable.
A disease recognized by most is measles, which now, in Caucasians, is a mild
childhood disease but was formerly a quite severe one. Its severity can be seen
in the factors of mortality when contracted in hood by those unlucky in the
inheritance draw or in certain
non-Caucasian populations, particularly Native Americans.
The disease called tuberculosis has always been a subject of alarm and
consequent attention by public health officials. But McNeill remarks that
tuberculosis is a very old disease and may be so old that it pre-dates the
emergence of life from the sea. Accordingly, all humans would be expected to
have reached the accommodating stage of it and we can imagine that we are all
essentially immune to what we might call "human" tuberculosis. The
disease we know as tuberculosis is, in fact, a tranation form that has
crossed from cattle to humans. Consequently, the immunology cycle of diminishing
effects can be inferred to have commenced at about the time of cattle
domestication, and that this must be an "Old World" phenomenon, since
"New World" aborigines did not domesticate cattle. (They did
domesticate the ruminants llama and alpaca, also the rodent guinea pig).
Therefore we can establish a curious time differential in this case, based on
the fact that the indigenous populations of the New World descend from a rather
limited origin of Mongolian racial population(s) that transited the Bering
Straits at some time prior to cattle domestication; whose history after the
stricture of those straits to immigration remains separate and distinct from
"Old World" experience. So far as TB and many other diseases are
concerned, development of responses and varying symptomology were strictly
"Old World", stemming systematically from populations who had
domesticated cattle or who were in contact with those populations.
Thus, epidemic/endemic cycles of TB have progressed for a considerable time -
perhaps 10,000 years - and there are "Old World" populations who have
developed partial immunities to this disease. In its simplest form it is a
contagion of the lungs which secondarily results in debilitation of the body
with death resulting in a relatively brief time. It is also known as
"consumption" because of this wasting away of physical resources. How
long before death occurs depends on the genetic history of the victim in a
population pool which has a history of exposure. So diverse are morphologies of
TB Old World responses that some medical practitioners go so far as to say that
tuberculosis is a difficult disease to contract, while others - and historical
records - aver that it is so contagious that it can be contracted from the air;
which happens to be true. In fact, both observations are accurate, depending
upon which population is being considered. This differential is explained by the
historical experience of the population of the victims - in the Old World, both
syndromes are in effect with some populations sensitive and others less so. It
is claimed by some specialists that (before anti-biotics) 95% of Caucasian
children had been exposed to TB by age ten but that the majority succeeded in
resisting the disease with little further risk of contagion. It was found that a
small percentage of children developed "spots" (scars detected by
X-Rays) on the lungs
from a less than successful resistance and that these individuals were at great
risk of later contraction or re-infection at a later period of life. They
were usually suspected to be "carriers" - people who did not
demonstrate overt symptoms but who transmitted the disease to others. Public
health authorities made every attempt to isolate these people by removal from
general school populations, etc.
In fact, there are Old World populations where the epidemic/endemic cycles
are so extended that many individuals can resist contraction of TB to defer
death to old age, to divert secondary symptoms to other parts of the body, and
to maintain energy enough to reproduce themselves and thereby contribute their
biological strength to their progeny. European history is replete with biology's
of persons who lived relatively normal lives with what was termed
"consumption" and certain other types, "humpbacks" (some),
another of which was called "scrofula" For these persons, defenses
were inherited by simple genetic transmission in addition to antibodies that
occur in colostrum - the first three days of mother’s milk. Offspring of these
persons thereby assist in the gain of resistance of the overall population.
Whatever a mother and father are, or acquire, they transmit to their progeny.
The defenses are present and remain in effect even if the offspring does not
contract the disease. And in the order of things, if one parent is weak in
resistance, it may happen that the strengths of the stronger parent may prevail
in the genetic order of three to one. Offspring failing to inherit the strengths
will therefore, being susceptible at some time in the epidemic/endemic cycle, be
more likely to contract the disease and either die or - enfeebled - lack
resources to reproduce. In this way a population will tend to gain resistances
to disease precisely as it does to any other inimical attack.
TB is characterized by the formation of small "tubercles" which
initially affect the lung, but which, if death is deferred, then migrate to
other parts of the body such as neck glands. If the victim survives long enough,
it may happen that these tubercles will attach themselves upon certain bones,
usually the ribs near the lungs and also the spine and then lower at the pelvis.
When this happens they often deform the bone and also leave characteristic
lesions, the presence of which are one of few post mortem symptoms apparent of
TB. When soft tissue decays after TB death, there is no other sign of the cause
except traces upon hard tissue - the bones - but also hair, another "hard
tissue". Therefore, it is apparent that when these lesions and particular
hair appear on skeletons, it is conclusive evidence that the individual had
suffered tuberculosis and also belonged
to some society that had had protracted experience with that disease. Some
of these societies might appear sickly, disease ridden and susceptible - yet,
they are alive. Bone deformation in Europe is well remarked but rare in Native
Americans from just these causes. Indeed, I am told that the factor is
sometimes used to trace migration routes of ancient populations.
Immunologists term this sort of circumstance as effects upon
"naive" populations - those who have not had contact with a disease,
or "sophisticated" populations - those who have had at least some
contact with a disease with some evidence of the epidemic/endemic cycles.
Europeans, in general, were "sophisticated" for TB since just about
all of them practiced cattle domestication and had done so for a long period of
their history.
Now this epidemic/endemic cycle of tuberculosis did not occur in the New
World. Populations in the Western hemisphere were effectively isolated by the sea
barriers from events in the Old World until some nautical contact occurred and
thereby transmit interchanges of disease that had not previously been present. This
event is universally understood at dating at 1492 with the discovery of Caribbean
Islands by
Christopher Columbus. Native Americans of Mongolian descent, wherever located,
simply did not have this experience, nor, indeed, experience many of the other
disease cycles that had occurred in Europe. They were "naive" to most
of the introduced diseases and to TB in particular. McNeill remarks that in the altiplano
of the Andes, populations were isolated by mountain ranges and could
not sustain the interpersonal contact necessary for widespread epidemic
conditions. Disease of European introduction was responsible for vastly
more death and destruction of Amerind societies than any other factor or
combination of factors.
The terrible and tragic human depletion is only now becoming understood.
Some estimate that it represented at least a 95 percent depletion and this
extended across the South Seas all through the "Age of
Exploration". As comparison, the Bubonic Plague, thought to be a
horror of the ages, only took something like 30 percent in the Old World.
To expand this to where the effect is more apparent, the following might aid
those to whom this is news:
The expedition of Lewis and Clark in 1804/06 followed the Missouri River
across the great plains. At this time they recorded numerous contacts and
visits of natives along the way, sometimes even going so far as to describe
"great numbers" and "numerous" individuals as well as the
occasional village. One has the feeling that they were never out of
contact with Indians for many miles until the Rocky Mountains were
reached. They also frequently remark on the unfortunate tribe of Mandans,
at that time a rather sizeable group. There were still many American Indians in
this area.
They do record some abandoned villages and attribute the abandonment to
infestations of fleas. The Columbia Natives at the Pacific coast also had
a number of abandoned villages and Lewis and Clark attribute it here, correctly,
to disease introduced by numerous trading vessels.
In 1876, some 70 years later, the US Army mounted three expeditions to
subjugate the last of the Indian holdouts in much the same area of the plains
but southward of the Missouri River, along the Yellowstone. Three prongs
of attack along rivers covered many thousands of square miles in a diligent
search for Natives, yet found none at all until a large encampment was
discovered at the Little Big Horn River in Montana. The population of this
encampment numbered about 7000 and were the remnants of at least five different
tribal groups. While this population was not the entire number of survivors, it
does indicate a considerably reduced population. The Mandans were entirely
eliminated, victims of European disease and inter-tribal (mainly Sioux) warfare.
Indians everywhere were victims of "first strike" epidemics which
reduced them sometimes from these initial onslaughts to small percentages of
former numbers. Ordinarily, if left alone, they might have recovered their
numbers with now newly introduced immunities. However, in most cases,
while so reduced, European settlers appeared bearing perpetual re-infections and
antagonistic attitudes with the result that few tribes have recovered or
prospered and many eliminated. New attitudes and new medical approaches
appeared in the early 20th century and now the Indian, while still more
susceptible to disease than whites has only a much more benevolent social
prejudice to contend with and his own internal differences to resolve. A
few tribes here in Arizona may well now exceed their numbers of 200 years ago.
How long the epidemic/endemic cycle to TB must be can be answered here in
what is known of timing - somewhat less than 20,000 years (inferred closure of
Bering Straits) and definitely more that 500 years (known introduction after
1492), since there is no evidence to date that American Aborigines have
developed much resistance, if any at all, to TB. Probably we might presume a
timeline in the order of 10,000 years which some historians estimate as the
commencement of cattle domestication. Today, Native Americans who survive TB are
beneficiaries of modern anti-biotics and not any genetic acquired resistance
that has been observed to date. They suffered tuberculosis acutely from 1492 to
the present day in a distinctly "naïve" manner as a pure lung
affliction resulting in death, usually in a brief time - in s in a year or
two and children often in
but a few months. Since the effect has been noted as in the earliest stages just
after contact with first explorers, it is possible that the "first
strike" of "florid" effects might kill some in a few days.
At this point of the discussion, the immunology question becomes both genetic
and empiric; the argument is advanced hereby into accepted norms of scientific
research. The factor, therefore, requires investigation of its
contributory information - whether the evidence is true or otherwise. So
far as disease immunities in particular, and TB specifically, are concerned we are dealing with populations,
Old World/New World, holding distinct, if invisible,
characteristics. TB lesions appearing on post mortem skeletons are unique in
themselves. While there are other causes of lesions, apparently those caused by
TB are unmistakable. They are common in the Old World and rare to non-existent
in the New. They constitute just as definite a human trait as any
visible one which, it would seem self evident, also are results of environment
and experience.
The appearance of these lesions among Narragansetts in the New world, proves positively that the individual
upon whom they occur is
descended from a genetic line of humanity that has developed partial immunity
over a long period of time. There simply is no other way for these to appear
except by the two factors of contraction of the disease and membership in a gene
pool that has developed the relative immunity. The thing is impossible - the lesions
cannot form by accident or chance - they are caused by a specific microbe
co-responding with an individual who has some measure of resistance which has
been inherited from forebears. It is a "natural" function of the same
order of science as a chemical reaction or radioactive decay where time is a
factor in the equation. Thus, the question transcends even genetics to a
"natural" and fundamental action; it is now empirical; perhaps the
only such factor in any Vinland study.
"Outsiders" (of a population) have the option of gaining this (or any other) trait by the simple
expedient of mating and producing progeny with and by those of the "stronger"
population. The individual, of course, gains nothing, but the progeny have good
prospects of gaining strengths in the genetic order of three to one if the trait
be what is termed a "dominant" one. This is the
event that is evident in the genetic (and anthropological) makeup of
Narragansett "Indians" of southern New England. Their proven variance
in these lesions show them as neither Viking/Caucasian nor Amerind/Mongol, but a
combination of both. Recorded is the presence of TB lesions upon bones in 17 of
59 individuals in one cemetery, and tubercular hair on one at another burial
ground. This is sufficient to demonstrate that the tribe was unique.
And the word "unique", when applied to anyone or any population is
another way of saying "genetics".
Of course, there is always a "first time" and in order to pursue
that line of thought it must be considered if both factors for development of
the immunity have been present. This thought is opened by the news of presence
of tuberculosis (but not the resistance) in a naturally preserved mummy in Peru. We would then suppose
that Narragansetts - and all other Native Americans - had been exposed to TB and
just by coincidence Narragansetts had been the first to respond with these
visible "sophisticated symptoms. The argument against is this: we know the origin date of
the tribe as approximately 1000 years ago when they signaled their arrival in
the Pettaquamscutt River Basin, a feature that became a central locus of their
territory. It would seem impossible for TB to have been endemic in the Americas,
for the impact, when it came, was so universal and so deadly that it signifies
an early "catastrophic" and "florid" stage of the disease. If it were endemic, there
is no factor imaginable that could restrain it from being periodically epidemic.
The great populations remarked by Cortez in central Mexico would be unable to
subsist in the presence of TB - as, in fact, they did not in the period shortly
after contact. And if TB were ineffective there, how much less so at 5000
miles remove in southern New England and across thinly populated deserts. The
presence of TB in Peru, therefore, might be a result of contact with llamas and
alpacas - not bovine but nearly so as, at least, ruminants. And as McNeill
remarked, the populations way up in the altiplano were isolated from each other
to the degree that epidemics did not occur except locally
And now we find that a number of skeletons of Narragansett Indians with
unmistakable lesions on bones resulting from TB. Additionally we have uncovered
another individual from another cemetery who had characteristic tubercular hair.
And this latter individual is known by name and history as the daughter of a
Narragansett nobleman.
There are several ways to view this situation and all are supportive of the
idea of descent from a people with a relative immunity. One is the concentration
of exhumations - 17 out of 59 burials. The next is the age of the youngest
victim who died at about age three. For a three year old American Aborigine to
live so long as to form lesions on bones defies comprehension of immunologists.
Another is the age of the oldest victim at 45 years at death. He was born
prior to the landings of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock. The evidence shows that TB was not only prevalent by the time of the burials
(~AD1660), it was common in the Narragansett population.
Endemic with certainty, and for some reason not epidemic among Narragansetts
alone - we see from
several well documented factors that Narragansett public health was much better
than their neighbors, and seemingly parallel to that of incoming colonial
populations who possessed long term contact with tuberculosis. These several
factors are: the census of 1670 which shows the population not only sizeable but
compact and dwelling in such close quarters as to seem specially susceptible to
epidemic diseases; that two knowledgeable observers remarked that "the
plague" "did not seem to be among them"; that the tribe was able
to mount a sizeable army in 1676 - a century or more after contact and at a
time when most other aborigines of the area were decimated and sometimes
annihilated. (The attack upon Providence during the 1676 war was perpetrated by
an army of at least 1500 and some researchers estimate nearer 2000. They
formed for battle almost at the same spot as where the present State House now
stands. This was not only the largest body of men formed as an army in New
England by either Indians or Colonists, it may have been the largest ever formed
into an entity by any Indians north of Mexico ever. And this at a time when all
other Amerinds in contact were dying and declining.) Narragansetts stand alone among all "New World"
residents, inclusive of South Sea Islanders, in "escape" from European
pestilences. This is just as sure a signal of varied genetic makeup as the
lesions themselves, for peoples of similar genetic structure variances in
immunology simply do not occur. If a microbe is toxic, it is toxic to each and
every individual of similar genetic structure.
It is truly astonishing to consider that the historical record that has
developed makes no consideration for the possibility that has now been amply
demonstrated. Historians aver that the Vinland Voyagers were driven away or
became discouraged by ill relations with the aborigines in residence. Yet, there
were over 200 Vinland Voyagers who were predominately male, and those males with little
opportunity and few prospects in a return to their homelands of European
Greenland and Iceland. For some, a much better option would entail remaining
where they stood - and in order for them to do this on a simple day-to-day basis,
they must seize, win, or purchase Native American females to tend hearths, cook,
dress furs and skins - and incidentally rear progeny. These progeny must be
those noted in
the anomalies of land use distinctions in the Pettaquamscutt River Valley which
commenced about a thousand years ago. They would necessarily possess the
language and adaptations to natural conditions as their mothers, but some of the
sociology, perhaps some of the language, and many of the genetic traits of their
adventurous fathers.
Incredible as it may seem, this is what the evidence indicates. And the
evidence is by no means weak - it is the initial and most plausible explanation
of a genetic factor to be drawn from the observation of lesions on bones and hair of 18 individuals.
But so far from historical doctrine does this seem to be, the scientists of note
(arch. site RI1000 ) could not approach closely the theme that this might be so. Instead, they
attempted to demonstrate that the development occurred within the microbes
themselves. This sort of thing also occurs - it occurs today in the increase in
mortality after a period of quiescence of an imagined conquest of TB by anti-biotics.
The cycle of recovery has occurred again - mycobacterium tuberculosis has also
recovered in the same way that humans had over eons - Mother Nature plays no
favorites.
From 1492 to 1660 is but 168 years. Even allowing for other visitors of
earlier times - even to that of the Vikings in AD1000 there is no way possible
for any human population of the New World to have internally developed such an
immunity by cyclic experience alone. The formula simply does not compute. Narragansetts must have
obtained their self evident immunity at an earlier stage of their history in
another place where TB had been endemic - the Old World!
There simply was not time enough - there were insufficient or absent
antagonistic microbes. We know this from observations after 1492 where after 500
years such
syndromes have yet to appear in Native American populations. The population must
certainly have a history of contact with European populations. Here is the crux
of the matter.
Very well, are there possibly other explanations of this phenomenon? We might
try to examine those we can imagine.
Supposing there were intermarriage among the Narragansett Indians and the
nearby colonists in the period between 1492 and 1660 and that this had resulted
in progeny carrying resistance.
First recorded contact was in 1524 where enough cultural characteristics were
noted to bear on the matter. Giovanni Verrazano at that time mentioned that the
Narragansett visitors sent their women to a small island rather than risk
boarding of the ship "Dauphine". In his two week stay he also remarked on the
modesty and chastity of the women. Moreover, the later chronicler Roger Williams
also mentioned the same. Their family ties were exceptionally strong.
Therefore, the presence of that large number of victims in the one cemetery
seems to rule out the idea - culturally they would seem to be an unusually
promiscuous group in a moral society. Yet, their style of burials indicates no
amount of cultural censure whatsoever. Moreover, the individual with tubercular
hair was known to have been of the noble class. Surely, she would not have been
the product of promiscuity - and at an age of some 35-40 at death would make her
conception in about 1620 when European contacts were very few.
Could these be European colonial individuals who had "gone Indian"
and died among them? This seems doubtful. They not only were buried among
Indians, they were buried in Indian manner (lain on right side, flexed position,
heads to southwest) and no sign of any Christian belief at all. Christianity was
as difficult to depart in those days as now. It would seem that some of those 17
would have some other indication of a different set of beliefs. With all this,
the Caucasian population of the area was very small and not of a tendency to mix
freely with natives. It would seem difficult to get 17 people together in one
spot, to say nothing of burying them together.
Until
quite recent times, disease and potential epidemics were widely observed and
discussed - a philosophy that now seems restricted to medical specialists.
There were many in every culture who were alert to the dangers of
distance of both travelers and visitors/invaders.
Differential immunities in geography,
while not fully understood, was readily accepted.
Shipwreck survivors and travelers were sometimes - in places often -
murdered from fear of being carriers of pestilences.
The differential in immunology between Europeans and Amerinds is a
sharp and distinct factor, no less a difference between Europe and Africa,
western Atlantic and eastern Pacific lands.
Here in the Narragansett Amerind occurs a "blip" in the
equation - something that can be explained only through migration and
intermarriage. I repeat here
notice by Richard Henry Dana in "Two Years Before the Mast" (1820)
that the population of Kanakas (Polynesians) was declining by 2% a year.
While this does not seem a high percentage, it does signal the
beginning of the end, for 50
years only would result in only a few scattered survivors.
It also defines my remark on general interests for, while Dana did not
record this until years later, he did become aware of it when he was but an 18
or 19 year old ordinary seaman.
In
these many long years of study - bearing on thirty now -
this writer has found it extraordinarily difficult to approach the
Amerind point of view concerning this issue.
This is primarily because there was not universal nor written
communication throughout the Americas and the cultural climate enforced each
population to suffer their tribulations alone.
Apparently early on they understood that the white man brought disease
that would ultimately destroy them, but their efforts at resistance and
cooperation among themselves came too late and likely would have been futile
no matter what they did. It is
difficult to conceive the terrible conditions in their villages when once the
pestilences struck - many of them wiped out completely.
Mandans, a large plains tribe, were annihilated with no warfare at all,
from disease alone. Indeed, the
true history of the Euro American/Indian relationship is not so much of
warfare, but actually the movement of European pioneers into lands essentially
depopulated of natives and whose survivors were demoralized and ineffective.
A
fine Amerind insight to the effect of disease comes to us in
"Madonna Swan - a Lakota Woman's Story" as told to Mark St.
Pierre, pub. 1991 University of Oklahoma Press.
For those overseas unfamiliar with tribal locales, Lakota are a plains
tribe dwelling essentially in the area of the Dakotas, North and South,
Wyoming and Montana. Some
segments of the tribe are also called Sioux and they are famed as heroic
warriors and fiercely independent people largely responsible for the
overcoming of General G.A. Custer at the battle of the Little Big Horn which
took place in Montana.
While
Mrs. Swan's story is of modern times, it does span a period to the past.
Her Uncle (or Great Uncle) was present at the Little Big Horn where he
occupied himself in aiding women and children to escape what was initially feared as an approaching massacre. She
was born in 1928 on the Cheyenne reservation in South Dakota.
It was her misfortune to contract tuberculosis at age 15, was
hospitalized for some ten years and was saved by draconian treatments of
removal of all her left ribs and left lung.
She became a teacher and respected person among her people and, so far
as I know, still lives.
What
she has to say concerning TB and her experiences is of interest to us. First is the important element that the Indians called TB
"the white man's disease".
This is what they believed and which this paper stresses and is
generally accepted by immunologists - and is the basis of our scientific
argument. Mrs. Swan describes
several types affecting her friends of which we had been unaware.
Primarily it infected the lungs as it did Mrs. Swan but she described
several other sympomologies such as TB of the skin
(frequent eruptions resulting in death), and a peculiar one, TB of the
tonsils (removal of which effected a cure).
While I have been informed that TB mycobacterium is a slow growing
organism, it is apparent through the book that speed of contagion was more
rapid than would be expected in a Caucasian environment, often resulting in
death at two years from onset and in children even quicker.
She describes several episodes where death occurred a mere two days
after onset of symptoms.
Her
ordeal was long and painful. It
is likely that she would have died - certainly if she had not been
hospitalized. But some five years
after her admission she was transferred to a regular (Anglo) sanitarium where
more advanced treatments and drugs were available as well as the extreme
operation of removal of ribs and lung.
For
a short period of her lengthy stay at the sanitarium, she was joined by her
younger brother, also a victim. I
cannot determine how long his pathology extended, but from the way she describes it,
he seems to have shown first symptoms and died within a year.
She
and a friend both kept diaries. When
they compared these some years later they noted that in the years 1944 and '45
no one was discharged from the hospital at all - death was the only exit.
In 1950 the two found that they could record five hundred deaths and
this was a count only of those they were aware of
- "(not including) those we had not heard of and did not include
those who died at the San that we didn't hear of, or those that went home and
later died, or those who ran away and died".
This is a span of some five years in a hospital that served a total
population of perhaps
50,000 people. This death rate is
very high and alone could explain a severe reduction in overall population
from TB.
The
deaths are one thing, the effects on survivors are another.
While Mrs. Swan's siblings numbered nine, five died young, only one from
an accident so the rest must have been from disease of some sort.
I have difficulty in numbering the next generation but believe it
numbers only 5, so a reduction is apparent in this family, which is likely
typical/average.
It is hoped that this discussion will yield an insight to the claim of
resolution of the Vinland Sagas.
Frederick N.
Brown
all rights reserved July,
2000
Home
Proofpage
Follows a change of pace perhaps not for everyone. It rhythm is intended to speak to those who know the sea
and its human travelers. If you do happen to find that it "speaks" to you, you will have a better understanding of Vinland, the Sagas, and seamen through the ages..
THE VOYAGE OF WAVE CLEAVER
A Sea-Pilot's plea for a crew
Yon high horizon, void appearing, mere nether barricade of mystery beyond!
Ours - if striving keeps us found.
Steadfast Leifur's Chaffing Courser waits at voyage end.
She - illustrious vessel that transited Europe and wracked on a spit in America;
She - that made Vinland thrice or more times;
We who trace her mystic wake need traverse but once!
Gentle surging morning tide - swirl and suck of wash among the rock indeed can become boom and crash of devastation, but our ship of senses ne'er founders nor becalms.
Our literary vessel - grand endeavor - may prove enduring and ranging as another.
So come aboard!
Find your place, fore or aft; test your gear and oar.
Resolve your mind to the trial at hand - the ship is bare afloat.
Her bow sways and bobs; keel stroking binding sands those fractions connoting
a last, light thrust will set us on our way!
Feel the shuddering, thrumming, streaming heartbeat of adventure, sea,
of earth, history - life !- beneath your feet --- Look!
Multifarious shore-watchers tally reflective few -
cognitive ones who fathom our industry; portend our cargo and our manifest - come aboard !
Stout hands await to row offshore;
supplied, sufficient, secure ; Pilot confident, guided, charted.
Sparbound sail's tenacious sinews test titanic, strident gale
--heaving, striving flaxen dray onward straining Sea Steed and Striding Bison ----
---- o'er white horses of the tumbling, running, rumbling sea.
Minds and souls fly and soar 'mong nebulous seabird throng; with dolphins and whales
that sweep through our flood.
Slack'ning ne'ermore for fog nor storm nor breaking wave,
our crafted sloop tight oaken haven.
Come aboard!
That spray from windward will not afflict - the cold of it invigorates.
The strike of it - e'en ice - but pleasurable sting; the white of it a brightness in the night time;
the flight of it the beat of angel wing.
Who can say but it is spindrift flung from shaken locks of gods ----- of Neptune !
There! Look there!
Rising land? Strands 'neath towering clouds?
through languid mists glazing slow, slick swell?
Low forested shore - pleasing refuge? - or island yielding rest, sweet water, new bearings?
Is that footing - the land we seek? There!
There !! just o'er the bows; that lesser glint, horizon breaching, hovering billows!
Our lookout cries it; our Pilot holds it so; our people yearn it!
Can it be - our goal at last?
Vinland? --- the good?
( copyright 1989 Frederick N. Brown, Phoenix, AZ Revised 2002 Yarnell, AZ
"Sea Steed" and "Striding Bison" may well be names of ships that traversed to Vinland. So also might be "Chafing Courser".
The contexts of the Vinland Sagas mention these in such a way as to infer a generalized reference but might just as well be specific.
The Voyage of Wave Cleaver, Inc is a wholly independent research enterprise of some 25 years duration.
The website < vinlandsite.com > summarizes the program and < vinlandsite.com/Proofpage > contains our formal offering
of proof that Leif Ericksson's Vinland has at last been found. This is supplemented by
< vinlandsite.com/Plain Talk on the Genetic Issue > which has proven to be our most popular page.
Proofpage is what is termed an "Argument in Science" - that is, similar to a mathematical argument, it consists of accepted truisms
and published facts which, in combination, constitute proof positive. What the argument requires are attempts at rebuttal - disavowals
of the truisms or presentation of information which might detract from what is now evident truth.
The "argument", now five years in the public weal, no responsible rebuttal has been offered - no "Scientific disavowel" has been brought.
Until such disavowel is presented, it is the position of this organization that the issue is decided - Leif Ericksson's landing site and
Thorfinn Karlsefni's "Hop" are located at Pettaquamscutt in the State of Rhode Island.
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