This outrageous email about the sex-botany of the Fairbanks "Ranch"
is being forwarded to the Taliban. Expect a visit down in Southern
California in the near future.

Next you will report "Satanic Verses"-rock art on the West Coast.

Talk about "agency" in the archaeological record!

I wonder what the "botany" of the William Jefferson Clinton Library
will look like? One tree for each . . .

By the way, this is a very iinteresting discussion on plant indicators
of archaeological sites. Remember Ralph Solecki's "flower child"
interpretation of Neanderthal burials in the Near East - it has
apparently (?) resurfaced as perhaps having some validity.
                                        Bob Schuyler
At 02:25 PM 3/12/2001 -0500, you wrote:
>About 22 years ago, in my role as Environmental Project Manager on the
>Fairbanks Ranch Specific Plan near Rancho Santa Fe, San Diego County,
>California, I field inspected the 2,000 acre ranch and found numerous small
>fenced-in areas. These were usually about 8-feet on a side and the fences
>were decomposing hogwire with an ornamental top. There were also some rotting
>picket fences too. Finally, some had dead fruit trees in the center. I
>puzzeled over these for quite some time and eventually required the developer
>to retain professional historians and conduct an archaeology survey. In
>addition to about 50 prehistoric sites, they mapped about 10 of these fenced
>features. Some also had geraniums, nasturtiums, whorehound, and bulb plants.
>The historian found the property had been owned by the late Douglas
>Fairbanks, Jr. (which we already knew) and that he owned when he was hot with
>Mary Pickford. At the time of the historic research, she was still alive and
>living in the area. Oral history with Pickford revealed she and Fairbanks had
>wild and passionate sexual trysts out on the ranch. Fairbanks memorialized
>the most memorable episodes with fruit trees and flowers, often surrounded by
>little fences. How about this for archaeobotany?
>
>Ron May
>Legacy 106, Inc.
>
>
Robert L. Schuyler
University of Pennsylvania Museum
33rd & Spruce Streets
Philadelphia, PA l9l04-6324

Tel: (215) 898-6965
Fax: (215) 898-0657
[log in to unmask]