Evening Star Newspaper, June 6, 1937, Page 87

June 6, 1937 THIS WEEK Magazine Section ,9 T[RY lfl n I] by Roy CHAPMAN ANDREWS In the heart of the Grand Canyon rises a plateau on which man has never stood. Scientists of the Natural History Museum this year will attack its perilous barriers and hunt its hidden secrets. Here is the first authentic story of what science knows about this land — and what it hopes to learn smaller. As an example we think of the fossil pigmy elephant of the Island of Malta. The closest physical connection of Shiva’s Temple is with the north rim of the canyon. The mammals there differ from those of the south rim. All must have descended from a small group of ancestors. What characters will we find in the isolated forms? It is a fine problem in genetics. There are dozens of other interesting biological problems whlch would be made clearer by a study of this fauna which has been isolated for so many centuries. I ean think of no more fascinating world to enter. It would be rolling back the curtain of time to GRAND CANYON: )i ce life as it was in those dim dark ages when our primitive o:’:-:rmg ancestors first appeared upon the American continent. “{SLANDS"" Wotan’s Throne, another mesa, lies more than a mile from Cape Royal, separated from the tip of the north rim of Grand ":;;E:_ii" Canyon. It is about a mile long and half a mile wide and thus does EROM THE not have as great a summit area as Shiva’s Tu'npl.e. Both were AR INLAND? formed in the same way. A harder cap qf cry‘stallme limestone FoR EONE has protected the top of the mesas from rain while the winds have carved the main shafts into fantastic forms. If it is possible, we will climb both Shiva’s Temple and Wotan's i it Throne, but we hope particularly to ascend Shiva’s Temrle be- e cause of its larger summit. Trails must first be cut to the foot i of the great mounds on which the plateaus lie, for both mesas are in parts of the Canyon where no man has ever walked. The National Park Service, appreciating the enormous scien- tific value of these areas, constituted them as research reserves. Special permission for us to enter the area was given only upon the assurance that the work would be of the highest quality and that the results would be made available to the National Park educational program and general science. Director Amo B. Cam- merer has promised the cooperation of the National Park Service. Conenrol If the aerial photographs show a feasible route up the sides, Newark Museom either of Shiva’s Temple or Wotan’s Throne, the work will be undertaken this summer. Until that information is available no detailed plans for the expedition can be formed. The personnel will be selected only from the staff of the American Museum of Natural History and the exploration will be carried on under the direction of the institution. Of course all our work may come to naught. Shiva’s Temple may still defy the attempts of man to invade its sanctuary and stand for generations to come in the brooding silence of its eternal isolation. Eclock giving us something of the rate of evolution in these | forms. We would know approximately how many years it had taken to bring about the structural changes which almost ‘ certamly exist. We would learrt what had been the effects of inbreeding and whether the animals were fertile. We would knowMvhether the fauna of this isolated plateau has the char- acter of other island faunas. The animals of small areas l surrounded by water sometimes have a tendency to become : . { v 2 R 4 wuu t‘u nmuvtnpu: h luomu '/ 'J" SHO-SNONE POINT IOMT ANGEL POINT CLEAR CREEX ”MMAM WFDINT NO PLACE TO LAND: AN AIRPLANE VIEW OF THIS STRANGE AREA ON WHICH NO HUMAN HAS TROD e AMAZING GRAND CANYON: A MODEL IN THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM sroNe 308 F