Hi HISTARCHers!

I'm digging up a 1916-1917 National Guard camp in Nogales, Arizona associated with border protection during the Mexican revolution after Pancho Villa invaded the U.S. in March 1916. 3000 soldiers sat around for 8 months and got themselves ready for WWI. 

Besides the usual military stuff, we're finding living potatoes in the rock rubble under the tent platforms. 92 years in the Sonora Desert. Sort of blows the mind, doesn't it? 

I'm exploring the possibility that these things might be wild and  endemic to the area, but I'd like to know if they could have actually grown from eyes on peels and survived this long.

Has anyone else working at a military site found domestic potatoes growing in the rubbish piles and rock rubble from the tent platforms? It's a new one on me!


Cathy


Catherine Holder Spude, PhD
7 Avenida Vista Grande #145
Santa Fe, NM 87508
505-466-1476 home
505-913-1326 cell

"Life is not tried, it is merely survived if you are standing outside the fire," Jenny Yates and Garth Brooks.