Originally Posted: December 2017 issue
Dr. Sunday Eiselt—a field archaeologist, SMU professor, and former Marine—has a friendly disposition and long hair that falls to her waist. I went to meet her last summer on campus because she’d discovered something that I’d spent weeks searching for, something that had been missing for decades.
Inside Heroy Science Hall, I waited for her in the lobby and passed time by looking at various geologic displays and worn, oversize photographs of digs in Egypt. When she arrived, we made introductions and headed downstairs to the basement floor. As we began the descent, she turned and said, “We won’t be looking at any human remains today. I can show you artifacts, but no humans.”
She said this cordially but without leaving any doubt. It would take the next four hours to explain the restriction. Considering the enormity of the subject matter—13,000 years of indigenous occupation in North America and Dallas’ archaeological place in it—time passed quickly. There were more questions than available answers. She encouraged me to reach out to other people who work in local archaeology. But she did possess that one thing she’d invited me to see, an important piece of the puzzle I was trying to assemble.
Our meeting came about because of a single paragraph written by Edward McPherson, an assistant professor of English at Washington University in St. Louis. It appears in a book he published earlier this year, The History of the Future: American Essays, excerpts of which appeared in the Dallas Morning News in May. McPherson wrote: “Dallas came from nothing. Unlike surrounding areas, it was not a camp for Native Americans or prehistoric men. Dig and you find few artifacts.” I knew that assertion was wrong. The “Dallas came from nothing” trope has long been used by Dallasites to praise the grit and gumption of the Anglo businessmen who created the modern city. So in June, on D Magazine’s blog, I offered a counterargument to McPherson’s claim. READ MORE