Seed of Knowledge, Stone of Plenty: Conclusion, Appendices, & Glossary

“Only one thing can be stated with certainty about such structures as Stonehenge: the people who built them were much more intelligent than many who have written books about them. It cannot be too firmly stressed that the ancient architects – our ancestors of only two hundred generations ago! – were men exactly like us. (…) There is no need to invoke any magical or mysterious powers, still less the intervention of any ‘superior’ beings, to explain their achievements.”

Simon Welfare & John Fairley 1982. Arthur C. Clarke’s Mysterious World. A & W Publishers Inc., New York, p. 99

It is our hope that this book may constitute one small step towards shedding some light on where we come from and where we are headed. We are sobered to know just how capable our ancestors really were, and we bask in a certain pride about that.

A few warring camps seem to exist today in discussions of early civilizations. One is that these were simple people with simple tools and they just were not capable of doing much besides eking out a bare subsistence lifestyle. They are assumed to have possessed less knowledge than we do, and a more primitive mindset. It does not occur to the members of this camp to wonder if ancient peoples knew something we do not and that there may have been some practical purpose to it all that is outside our contemporary knowledge base.

It seems odd that we should think this way when we blithely accept the existence of lost engineering knowledge. We know that in Peru the Inca were able to cut through enormous stones with such ease that they thought nothing of making towering walls out of a jigsaw of such stones, all custom cut and precisely fitted. We are unable to duplicate such stone masonry today and admit that the Inca knew something about stone work that we do not. And why should this knowledge be surprising from the best and brightest of the late Stone Age? Stone was their primary medium; it is not ours.

Consider the books and the documentaries still being issued every year, purporting to explain an exciting new theory on how the Egyptians built their colossal pyramids. We have been wondering for centuries and are still unsure. The same is true for the transportation of hundred-ton monoliths on both sides of the Atlantic. When it comes to the engineering, we are willing to grant that they knew practical things that we do not. Why then not grant the same benefit of the doubt as to the design and purpose of megalithic structures?

After all, theirs was a civilization of subsistence agriculture and ours is not. Those of us who live in the industrialized nations take it for granted that there will be enough food next year. If there is a massive drought striking our breadbasket regions, we will simply import the food we need next year.

We focus on industry. While we may have some impressive cathedrals for religious use, by far our biggest structures are enormous, utilitarian hydro-electric dams, designed to produce the lifeblood of an industrial civilization: electricity. As we have seen, it looks like the biggest creations of our forebears were giant, utilitarian, megalithic structures designed to produce the lifeblood of an agricultural civilization: fertility.

Clearly, there was a high degree of technical competence in the areas we have studied in this book. There was also great understanding of physical forces that we are only now re-discovering. This should not surprise us. After all, pyramid builders had brains similar to ours. They did have a different knowledge base. Many things that we know they did not, and some things that they knew we do not.

Does this mean they were far wiser than us? Not necessarily, just look at how they evolved into us after all, and how their societies often collapsed because of their own limitations. They were not superior to us, and neither were they dramatically inferior in intellect or ability.

These earth and stone fertility generators worked. You can test some of them yourself. Without fertilizer or crop rotation, the ancient engineers managed to not only feed a mushrooming population, but to produce such a surplus as to grow rich enough to import luxury goods.

When Pizarro reached Peru, he reported that the Inca were such successful food producers, even in their challenging terrain, that at any one time they had on hand enough stored grain to feed their population of millions for five years. In the year 1999, by contrast, when a late northern hemisphere harvest was finally reaped, the grain reserves of the modern world were down to a mere 18 days.

Pizarro’s firearms put an end to the Inca system. Many other ancient peoples, such as the Mayans, the Egyptians, and the Sumerians, were undone by decades-long droughts. So even with their successes, they lived with uncertainty. And it was to address that uncertainty that much of their ritual was directed.

Traditionally, the ancients would not separate the physical from the non-physical, the soul from the land. We have just seen how tremendous effort was repeatedly taken to create an edifice that seems to us today to be imbued with an aura of ritual, and yet our experiments show that it is tapping natural energy in a way that can increase food production.

Today’s attitudes among most people of European cultural descent are shaped by the assumption that the human soul is qualitatively distinct from the landscape in which it dwells. We do not ourselves need to believe in the gods of our ancestors to appreciate that they lived closer to the land and were more aware of it. And we can rediscover some of their technology and profit by it, whether or not it may have once been wrapped in ritual.

Let us briefly review what we have seen in our journey through time and geography.

The first high civilization of the Americas, the Olmec of Mexico, built earthen mounds and pyramids with well-engineered electrical characteristics. Villages with a mound enjoyed a better standard of living than otherwise identical villages nearby.
The last Pyramid of the Olmec was the first of the Maya, The Lost World Pyramid of Tikal, Guatemala. At this pyramid we measured tremendous surges of electrical ground current and airborne electric charge in the hours bracketing dawn. Local Mayan corn (maize) seed that we placed atop this pyramid during these electrical surges displayed tremendously increased germination and growth. The stronger the electrical activity on a given day, the greater the growth improvement. Seed was not improved when placed atop later pyramids, which are known to have been built as political monuments, and which had no electrical activity. Mayans today still place their seed atop certain pyramids at dawn, and teach that plant growth is improved above the same kinds of geological structures that generate such electrical forces.
Modern seed treatments using artificial versions of these natural forces are known to produce similar kinds of growth improvements, including higher yields. This has been confirmed dozens of times by universities and agricultural organizations. The degree of improvement is highest with the kinds of stressful growing conditions and relatively poor seed quality that typified the agriculture of the megalith builders.
These kinds of energies are generated naturally everywhere every day by well-known forces of the Earth, but they are magnified at some locations by certain geological structures called conductivity discontinuities.
Consistently, throughout history and all over the world, giant structures of earth and stone were built atop such conductivity discontinuities.
Humans are sensitive to these forces and some humans are capable of sensing them consistently. These forces have been used by pre-agricultural societies for vision quests. We have personally documented this use in a contemporary Native American setting.
Mushrooms across Europe are substantially more prolific atop such geology. Ancient shamans frequently hunted mushrooms for their own vision quests. This is therefore a likely connection that would have been observed between these locations and improved plant growth.
The Native American mound builders of North America were the cultural descendants of the Olmec and Maya. They located earthen mounds and pyramids atop magnetic anomalies and at conductivity discontinuities, where unusually strong electrical ground currents are generated – all confirmed in direct measurements by us. Seed left atop mounds during powerful energy surges have shown dramatic improvement in growth. These mounds can be visited today across most of the South and Midwest.
In the last of the mound-using societies of North America, farmers would not dream of planting their seed without first taking it to the top of a mound for ‘certain blessings’.
The chief role of much Native American religion was to help the crops grow better.
Rock chambers throughout the north-eastern United States were built atop magnetic anomalies at conductivity discontinuities, just like the mounds. We spent years measuring electric charge separation inside these chambers and improved growth from maize, wheat, and bean seeds left inside during days with electric charge, as compared to control seeds left outside. Results met scientific standards for high statistical significance. The biochemical changes inside this seed have been found to be the same kinds of biochemical changes found inside seed treated with today’s modern, laboratory version of these energies.
Nine samples of corn (maize) seed of a variety grown by Native Americans from 700 AD onward were placed inside three different rock chambers for varying amounts of time, then planted and grown out organically. When compared to nine plots of control corn kept outside the chamber or at home in the laboratory, the chamber-exposed seed produced on average double or triple the yields of the plots of control seed.
Centuries before the Inca, a mysterious civilization on the Peruvian-Bolivian border built rock chambers of the same type as those found in the north-eastern U.S., as well as sophisticated pyramids with electrical properties. Accounts by early Spanish colonizers relate that the farmers of this civilization somehow grew triple the amount of food that today’s farmers can grow at the same location, in the harsh Andean altiplano.
Many thousands of standing stones around Carnac, France were placed solely at the border of zones of differing magnetic strength and seismic activity. Numerous series of enormous stone chambers were placed one after another precisely above invisible fault lines. Measurements of the type we have taken at megalithic structures were carefully performed by a Belgian engineer over 30 years, with results strikingly similar to ours, showing magnetic and electric variations of similar magnitude. All these structures were erected only after a food crisis was on hand, starting 6,700 years ago – more than 2,000 years before the pyramids of Egypt.
In England we measured the effectiveness of henges at concentrating electrical ground currents by their placement, their design, and their construction. Sited on the same types of geology that we have seen elsewhere, we saw numerous archaeological finds where seed had been brought to these henges. Stonehenge was finally abandoned, after 2,000 years of use, only when fertilizer and crop rotation were introduced, thereby allowing farmers to multiply their yields without carrying seed to henges.
While the situation in Egypt was somewhat unique, we still saw all the same factors in place that we have seen elsewhere: famine, electrically active geological and atmospheric conditions, a harnessing of these energies in a manner that could have helped relieve the famine, and a chronology of building successive pyramids alongside and ‘upwind’ of the new farming regions as they opened up. We see how these energies could first have come to the attention of Imhotep, the first architect and chief engineer of the giant pyramids, in the temple at Heliopolis where he was also head priest. And we saw how those energies have manifested themselves at the same location in modern times before tens of thousands of witnesses in the form of glowing balls of light resulting from brush discharge. We began the chapter with the account of an early scientific pioneer of electricity experiencing powerful electric charge atop the great pyramid at Giza. And finally, we saw how every aspect of the design of the giant pyramids, from the building materials for each part, to the fitting of the casement stones, to the ‘airshafts’ and chambers, might well have functioned to efficiently collect, concentrate, and harness these energies to ionize air and produce airborne nitrogen fertilizer to the farms downwind at the same time of year and time in history when it was both possible and urgently needed.

Anyone can obtain instruments similar to those we used and can visit any of the many dozens of sites in the U.S., Canada, or England, or elsewhere around the world. Anyone can also repeat the seed experiments shown here. Whether or not you test our findings for yourself, we hope that you may come to share this new outlook on our ancestors and help resurrect precious knowledge that has been lost to us for thousands of years.

We do not ourselves need to believe in the gods of our forbearers to appreciate that they lived closer to the land and were more aware of it. By contrast, we find ourselves a bit embarrassed that today we can live, surrounded by some of the forces they tamed, and yet be completely oblivious to them. As we have seen, before there was agriculture, shamans tapped into these same forces to provide life-changing experiences for their people.

Certainly, anyone who had a base of such experience must have moved through the natural world with a different attitude than today’s casual picnicker in a park. Are such attitudes now obsolete in the modern world? Are they of no use to us any longer? Look around your own daily world and decide for yourself.

For our ancestors, the land was alive. It can be for us, too.

GLOSSARY

Aerosol – a cloud of fine droplets of minute size

Andesite – basaltic stone of a type found primarily in the Andes; moderately magnetic

Anomalous – literally ‘unusual’; differing from it surroundings or from the norm

Anomaly – a spot with anomalous readings, i.e. a spot with higher or lower readings than the surrounding area

Aquifer – a layer of rock or sand that holds water

Basalt – volcanic stone, often magnetic

Brush discharge – occurs when an object with substantial electric charge electrifies the air around it strongly enough to give off a weak glow

Carbonaceous – of the Carbonaceous geological era; generally refers to limestone and chalk

Causeway – an undisturbed piece of ground that causes a break in a long ditch

Causewayed enclosure – concentric circles of such ditches with occasional causeways

Collider – modern tool of physicists, which accelerates sub-atomic particles to high speed and smashes them into atoms

Conductivity discontinuity – zone where a region of ground that conducts electricity well meets an area of ground that conducts electric current less well. Strong surges of geomagnetism and ground current often occur here

Corona discharge – used interchangeably with brush discharge

Crypto-explosion crater – a rare geological formation, usually miles wide, that is a bowl caused by an enormous underground explosion of unexplained nature occurring eons ago

Diorite – a type of basaltic stone. The famous bluestones of Stonehenge are formed from it

Electrical conductivity – the ability of any substance to carry electric charge across it. Water and copper have good electrical conductivity, while plastic and glass have poor electrical conductivity

Electrical ground current – natural DC electricity that runs through the ground

Electromagnetic energies – can manifest as electric energy or magnetic; one of the four basic forces of Nature along with gravity, the strong atomic force, and the weak atomic force

Electrostatic voltmeter – a standard scientific instrument that measures the electric charge present on a surface. It can also be used to measure electric charge in the air, i.e. degree of ionization of the air

Emmer – primitive type of wheat, dominant in early European agricultural societies

Free radicals – usually oxygen molecules with a missing, or unpaired, electron. They are damaging to the biological system, plant or animal, because they tend to try to rip the missing electron from cell wall membranes or anything else with which they come into contact. Accumulating free radical damage is the primary cause of aging. We take anti-oxidants such as Vitamin E to try to combat these in our own bodies

Gamma – a unit of magnetic measurement. The earth’s magnetic field is approximately half a gamma. By comparison, a simple refrigerator magnet is many gammas

Geomagnetic field – the earth’s natural magnetic field, believed to be produced by the rotation of molten iron deep in the planet’s core as the Earth turns on its axis

Ground electrodes – specialized, spike-shaped sensors to be stuck in the ground at an interval and connected by wire, through a voltmeter, that will allow one to read the amount of electric current present in the ground

Henge – a ring-shaped ditch

Induction – principle of physics stating that an object moving through a zone of changing magnetic field strength acquires electric charge or current

Interfluve – a place on the ground’s surface where two differing aquifer levels emerge and border one another. Interfluves are usually powerful conductivity discontinuities and thus spots with abnormally large daily surges of electric current and geomagnetic field strength

Ionization – electrification of a molecule, in this book usually a molecule found in the air. This occurs when an air molecule such as oxygen obtains an unpaired electron and acquires negative charge, or when a molecule such as carbon dioxide loses an electron and thus acquires a net positive electric charge. The air is normally ionized in roughly balanced amounts of positively and negatively charged molecules. When the balance is tipped strongly in favor of either the negative or positive molecules, we say the air has become inoized

Ions – positively or negatively charged molecules, such as air molecules

Kelvin water dropper – method to measure electrical charge generated by water, separating into two streams at a Y junction. The breaking of the surface tension that holds the water together in drops or streams causes some of the electric surface tension to be released

Khamsin – electrified wind from the Sahara. It blows seasonally for about 50 days in the spring. The word means ‘fifty’ in Arabic. It blows during the same period that the Nile was at its lowest levels, prior to the building of the Aswan Dam

Kokopelli – a mythological figure common in Anasazi rock art of the American Southwest

Magnetite – magnetic form of iron. It is not only attracted to a magnet, it acts as a magnet. It was called lodestone by the ancients because compass needles were made from it

Magnetometer – a standard scientific instrument measuring the strength of the magnetic field at any given place

Mastaba – rectangular Egyptian tomb built of quarried, cut stone blocks – the first structures in history to have been built from such stone

Megalith (Ancient Greek for ‘large stone’) – structure made of large stones in pre-historic times

Menhir – French word for megalith

Meso-America – Mexico and Central America eastwards to Panama

Neolithic (Ancient Greek for ‘new stone’) – a period of the Stone Age, c. 7000-4000 BC

Passage grave – a long, large form of rock chamber, common in France and elsewhere

Plasma – the fourth state of matter (after liquid, solid, gas). In this book usually a special type of electrically charged air mass. Air is often electrically charged, but when the behavior of a volume of air begins to be determined primarily by its electric charge, rather than such physical factors as wind, then it is classified as plasma. Lightning is an extremely high-energy plasma. There are many low energy plasmas present in our atmosphere that do not glow

Pulsing – sudden, repeated changes of any type of reading

Pyramidion – stone of pyramid shape, placed atop Egyptian pyramids

Serpentine – basaltic stone, commonly of green color, moderately magnetic

Shaduf – old Egyptian method of lifting water up and into a raised field by means of a lever pole with a bucket on the end. This method had not yet been invented at the time the great pyramids were built

Telluric current – electric current running through the ground, near the surface

Tumulus – a round mound

Were-cat – fertility figure, half cat (the body), half human (the face)

Appendix 1

Electromagnetic energy locations in the United States, Canada, and England, open to the public

This appendix lists some North American and English mound and rock chamber locations, as well as some sites of high geomagnetic energies. All are open to the public.

Although the sites listed are usually in national parks or near roadways, use the same common sense when visiting the sites, as you would when visiting any outdoor location. See individual site listings for particular hazards.

UNITED STATES

General note

All the New England states, except Rhode Island, have fine examples of chambers, but these are on private land and not open to public access, with the fine and notable exception of Mystery Hill in North Salem, New Hampshire (see Chapter 6). New York has a few chambers that offer access to outsiders.

You can access some sites in New England through pre-scheduled trips with a number of organizations. For information on how to do this, we suggest logging on to the website of the New England Antiquities Research Association (neara.org), which conducts a number of outings each year, with several chambers visited on each outing.

ALABAMA

Moundville Archaeological Park

Here was a 300-acre, Mississippian Culture village on Black Warrior River, protected on three sides by a wooden palisade, inhabited c. 1000-1450 AD. There are 26 mounds, one with a restored ‘temple’ on top.

Location: 14 miles south of Tuscaloosa, on Hwy 69 South.

Website: moundville.museums.ua.edu

Oakville Indian Mounds Museum & Park

This site contains the largest Woodland Culture mound in Alabama, 27 feet high, base covering 1.8 acres, top one acre. It was built by Copena Indians about 2,000 years ago.

Location: 1219 County Rd. 187, Danville.

Website: oakvilleindianmounds.com

ARKANSAS

Parkin Archeological State Park

In this park is a 17-acre village, inhabited c. 1300-1550 AD. One large, flat-topped mound of the Mississippian Culture is preserved near St. Francis River.

Location: At junction of U.S. 64 and Arkansas 184 North, Parkin.

Website: arkansasstateparks.com/parks/parkin-archeological-state-park

Toltec Mounds Archeological State Park

A large and complex mound site, located on the bank of Mound Pond. It once had an 8- to 10-foot earthen embankment on three sides. Formerly, 16 mounds existed, up to 50 feet high, but several have disappeared.

Location: At #1 Toltec Mounds Road, Scott, 16 miles southeast of North Little Rock, and 9 miles northwest of England, off U.S. Hwy 165 on Arkansas Hwy 386. Easy access from I-140, take Exit 169 south on Arkansas Hwy 15 for 14 miles to Keo, then northeast on U.S. Hwy 165 for 4 miles; or take Exit 7 (England), going southeast on U.S. Hwy 165 for 10 miles.

Website: arkansasstateparks.com/parks/toltec-mounds-archeological-state-park

CALIFORNIA

Mount Shasta

This enormous, presently dormant ‘strato-volcano’ in northern California, 14,179 ft. high, is still a center for purification rituals and sweat lodge ceremonies at Panther Meadow, situated on the mountain.

Numerous private, local groups offer vision quests on and around the peak, often at the many caves, springs, and smaller volcanic cones in the area (including Black Butte). Erupting every 60 years or so, Shasta still has a couple of active small fumaroles on the peak, one with an acidic hot spring inside it.

While we have not taken measurements on this site, it is likely to be as littered with magnetic anomalies as Bear Butte (Chapter 3), due to its many past lava flows, etc.

Location: 60 miles north of Redding, south of the Oregon border, next to Interstate 5.

Website: mtshastaspiritualtours.com

Mount Tamalpais State Park

Paul Devereax reports the presence of a highly magnetic ‘seat’ on a rock ledge. The magnetic anomaly is so strong that it is probably the result of a lightning strike. Devereau says that wear patterns on the rocks suggest that many people have sat there over time, possibly in order to alter their consciousness.

Location: Just north of Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco.

Website: parks.ca.gov

Ojai Foundation

A spiritual retreat and educational center, located atop a small plateau, straddling the San Andreas Fault. If you are worried about earthquakes, you can rent a teepee for a night.

We measured some puzzling and dramatic energy changes here (Chapter 3). We have also seen photos by Ed Sherwood, showing light balls at night there.

Location: 9739 N Ojai Rd., Ojai.

Website: ojaifoundation.org

CONNECTICUT

Connecticut has rock chambers on private land. You can access them through tours run by the New England Antiquities Research Association (neara.org), see general note above.

Gungywamp Swamp

A 100-acre-site of stone rows and highly magnetic rocks, including the so-called Cliff of Tears. In this area, we had very high electrostatic readings (see Chapter 3).

Location: Near Groton.

Website: gungywamp.com

FLORIDA

Lake Jackson Mounds Archaeological State Park

This site contains 7 mounds, built c. 1000-1450 AD. The largest one measures 278 by 312 feet at base, height 36 feet.

Location: 3600 Indian Mounds Rd., Tallahassee.

Website: floridastateparks.org/parks-and-trails/lake-jackson-mounds-archaeological-state-park

GEORGIA

Etowah Indian Mounds State Historic Site

This 54-acre, Mississippian Culture site contains six mounds, a 63-foot high, flat-topped earthen platform, and a defensive ditch. Its population counted several thousand c. 1000-1550 AD.

Location: 813 Indian Mounds Rd. SE, Cartersville.

Website: gastateparks.org/EtowahIndianMounds

Kolomoki Mounds State Park

This site has 7 mounds, built 350-950 AD by Woodland Culture people.

Location: 205 Indian Mounds Road, Blakely.

Website: gastateparks.org/KolomokiMounds

Ocmulgee National Monument

This site contains mounds from two periods. Woodland Culture people (1000 BC-900 AD) built stone effigy mounds and earthen mounds, whereas Early Mississippian Culture people (900-1150 AD) made huge earthen mounds and earth lodges.

Location: 1207 Emery Hwy, Macon.

Website: nps.gov/ocmu

ILLINOIS

Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site

This site bears remains of the most sophisticated prehistoric civilization in the U.S., a Mississippian Culture city, inhabited c. 700-1400 AD, with a population of about 20,000. Originally, there were more than 120 mounds, of which 68 are preserved.

As discussed in Chapter 7, the principal mounds lie along axes of magnetic transition. The entire complex lies at the intersection between two large, homogeneous zones of differing geomagnetic field strength, just up and down the road from it. These zones give consistent readings for miles in either direction away from Cahokia, but transition abruptly at the site.

Don’t fail to visit the ‘Woodhenge’ – tree trunks stuck in the ground in a circle, so as to provide sightlines to determine solstices and equinoxes.

Location: 30 Ramey St., Collinsville.

Website: cahokiamounds.org

Rockwell Mound

This mound covers nearly two acres and is 14 feet high. It was built about 200 AD by a Middle Woodland Culture people.

Location: 500 North Orange Street, Havana (in a city park).

Website: havanaparkdistrict.org/facilities/rockwell-mound-park

INDIANA

Angel Mounds State Historic Site

Around 1100-1450 AD, a town, enclosed by a stockade, was inhabited by 2,000-3,000 people of the Middle Mississippian Culture. Several mounds are preserved.

Location: 8215 Pollack Avenue, Evansville.

Website: indianamuseum.org/historic-sites/angel-mounds

Mounds State Park

Ten earthworks from the Adena Culture, including the Great Mound, built around 160 BC.

Location: 4306 Mounds Road, Anderson.

Website: in.gov/dnr/parklake/2977.htm

IOWA

Effigy Mounds National Monument

This site covers 2,526 acres and contains 195 mounds, of which 31 are effigies of animals. The largest is Great Bear Mound, which measures 137 feet long and 70 feet across the shoulders and forelegs. The mounds are about 1,000 years old. They are placed on limestone.

Apostol (see Chapter 3) reported a biolocation reaction over the Baby Bear Mound (the oldest), and a few hundred feet southeast, strong airflow from small holes in the limestone suggests a cave.

Location: 151 Hwy 76, Harpers Ferry.

Website: nps.gov/efmo

Toolesboro Indian Mounds National Historic Landmark

Seven Hopewell Culture mounds, built between 100 BC and 200 AD, situated on a bluff overlooking the Iowa River.

Location: Highway 99, Toolesboro.

Website: iowaculture.gov/history/sites/toolesboro-mounds-national-historic-landmark

LOUISIANA

Poverty Point World Heritage Site

These are among the oldest mounds in the U.S., erected several hundred years BC. They sit atop a large gravitational and magnetic anomaly. Apostol’s sensitive (Chapter 3) showed involuntary muscle twitches while being driven blindfolded across this anomaly.

Traditional interpretation says that these mounds were built before full-time agriculture had entered North America. However, discoveries of the past few years have pushed the date of non-maize farming in North America well past Poverty Point’s date of 1,200 BC (similar to the Olmec’s San Lorenzo, see Chapter 1).

A spectacular bird-shaped effigy mound rises 70 feet high, measuring 700 by 640 feet. It is estimated to have taken five million man-hours to build!

Location: 6859 La. Hwy. 577, Pioneer. From I-20, take the Delhi exit and travel north on LA 17, east on LA 134, and north on LA 577.

Website: povertypoint.us

MAINE

Maine has rock chambers on private land. You can access them through tours run by the New England Antiquities Research Association (neara.org), see general note above.

MASSACHUSETTS

Massachusetts has rock chambers on private land. You can access them through tours run by the New England Antiquities Research Association (neara.org), see general note above.

MICHIGAN

Norton Mounds Group

A complex of 17 mounds, the largest 100 feet in diameter and 15 feet high, created during the Hopewell Middle Woodland Period (100 BC-500 AD). Many mounds have been destroyed by the expansion of Grand Rapids.

Location: In a city park in Grand Rapids, between Indian Mounds Dr. and Interstate 196.

Website: michigan.gov/som

MINNESOTA

Indian Mounds Regional Park

People of the Hopewell Culture built the first mounds here before 500 AD. Only six out of 37 remain.

Location: Atop Dayton’s Bluff, along Mounds Blvd., off Hwy 94 east of St. Paul.

Website: stpaul.gov/facilities/indian-mounds-regional-park

MISSISSIPPI

Grand Village of the Natchez Indians

This was the capital of the Natchez Indians in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The site is discussed in Chapter 7. There are three platform mounds, a plaza and habitation.

Location: In Natchez, turn off U.S. Highway 61 (known as Seargeant S. Prentiss Drive within the city limits), at Jefferson Davis Boulevard just south of the Merit Health Natchez Hospital. Proceed on Jefferson Davis Blvd. to the entrance gate.

Website: mdah.ms.gov/explore-mississippi/grand-village-natchez-indians

Nanih Waiya Mound and Village

A large rectangular mound, measuring 218 feet long, 140 feet wide, and 25 feet high. It was probably constructed during the Mississippian Culture period (1000-1600 AD). The site is discussed in Chapter 7.

Location: 15 miles northeast of Philadelphia, on State Hwy 21.

Website: nps.gov/nr/travel/mounds/nan.htm

Owl Creek Mounds

This site holds five Mississippian Culture platform mounds, built 1100-1200 AD.

Location: In Tombigbee National Forest, 2.5 miles west of Natchez Trace Parkway on Davis Lake Rd., milepost 243.1 on Natchez Trace Parkway, about 18 miles southwest of Tupelo.

Website: nps.gov/nr/travel/mounds/owl.htm

Pharr Mounds

This site covers about 85 acres, containing eight mounds from the Middle Woodland period (100-200 AD). The largest mound is 18 feet high.

Location: On the Natchez Trace Parkway (milepost 286.7), 23 miles northeast of Tupelo.

Website: nps.gov/nr/travel/mounds/pha.htm

Winterville Mounds

Spread over 40 acres, this impressive group of mounds includes one of the tallest in America at 53 feet. Our fluxgate magnetometer survey of this site fits the normal pattern seen elsewhere. Large individual mounds were placed on detectable anomalies, and the site is at the intersection of zones of differing geomagnetic strength.

Location: On Mississippi Hwy 1.6 miles north of the intersection of Highways 82 and 1 in Greenville.

Website: nps.gov/nr/travel/mounds/win.htm

MONTANA

Chief Mountain

This solitary and dramatic tower of rock on the U.S.-Canadian border has long been used for vision quests by the Blackfeet.

Made of 1.5 billion-year-old sedimentary rock, this knob sits on the border of two tectonic plates. It thus qualifies as a conductivity discontinuity, sharing this property with Silbury Hill and Avebury in England (Chapter 9), which are both located on solitary knobs of one aquifer where it borders on another.

Location: On the eastern margin of the upper plate of the Lewis Overthrust, at one of the entrances at the eastern border of Waterton-Glacier National Park.

Website: visitmt.com/listings/general/mountain-mountain-range/chief-mountain.html

NEW HAMPSHIRE

New Hampshire has rock chambers on private land. You can access them through tours run by the New England Antiquities Research Association (neara.org), see general note above.

America’s Stonehenge

A 4,000-year old megalithic site, covering about 30 acres on Mystery Hill. Many stone walls contain large, shaped standing stones. We surveyed this site with a fluxgate magnetometer and found that, as elsewhere, the rock chambers were placed with a magnetic anomaly right outside the door.

Location: Take I-93 to exit 3. Follow Rt. 111 east for 4.5 miles. Watch for the sign just past the North Salem Village Shops. Turn right at the intersection with the traffic light (Mobil Gas will be on your left). Follow this road for one mile. Entrance is on the right.

Website: stonehengeusa.com

NEW MEXICO

Petroglyph National Monument

Occupying 11 square miles on three distinct sites, just outside Albuquerque, this is the largest assemblage of rock art in North America. 15,000 prehistoric images are carved into the edge of a 17-mile basalt escarpment at the biggest conductivity discontinuity in North America. These images were usually carved while the artists were in trances.

We measured dramatic electric ground current activity, as well as electric charge in the air, during a single day’s visit.

Location: 6001 Unser Blvd. NW, Albuquerque.

Website: nps.gov/petr

NEW YORK

Balanced Rock

A 90-ton boulder balances on several small slabs of granular quartz (Fig. 30, Chapter 6).

We measured a strong magnetic anomaly directly under the rock. The site lies at the intersection of two L-shaped zones of differing magnetic field strength.

Location: At Rte. 116, North Salem.

Fahnestock State Park

This park is the site of an old magnetite mine and is littered with strong anomalies.

Location: In Carmel, take Taconic State Parkway to Rte. 301, then west on 301.

Website: parks.ny.gov/parks/fahnestock

Kent Cliffs

Two rock chambers are found here. Chamber A is the one with the glowing arch, shown in Fig. 25, Chapter 6.

Location chamber A: Take the exit for Fahnestock State Park on Taconic State Parkway, but drive east on Rte. 301, away from the park. A few miles later, after passing a Buddhist monastery, this chamber is located on a curve on the immediate left shoulder of the road. Park across the road and be quiet and respectful, as this site is on private land, belonging to the owner of the house behind the chamber. Exercise extreme care, because when you step out of the door of this chamber, you are two feet from the lane of a busy highway with fast-moving cars on a curve.

Location chamber B: Past the above chamber, further east on Rte. 301, where the road makes a sharp curve to the right, across from Farmer’s Mill Road, on the right-hand side of the curve, a few feet below road level and hidden (except for the door) in the foliage. (If the road runs along a reservoir and you see a deli on the right, you have gone too far.)

This is another of the chambers we used in our seed experiments, which has a magnetic anomaly right outside the front door. It is also private property, owned by a person across the road, so show proper respect and restraint. There is safe parking for one car just past the chamber on the right shoulder.

Ninham Mountain State Park

Rock chamber, located at the intersection of a large, homogeneous zone of lower geomagnetic readings downhill and a zone of higher magnetic readings, with many magnetic anomalies, immediately uphill from the chamber. This is the chamber with the glowing ball, shown in Fig. 26, Chapter 6. It had powerful effect on seeds.

Location: From the above chambers, continue east on Rte. 301 about 6 miles to a reservoir, make a 270-degree left turn onto Rte. 41 North (Gypsy Trail Rd.). After a few miles turn left onto Mt. Ninham Rd., at the sign for Ninham Mt. State Park. When you enter the park, drive up the mountain, until a barrier across the road blocks further progress. Park in the parking area and walk past the barrier up the dirt road to the right. About 50-100 yards up on the right lies the chamber, well hidden in foliage, about 20 feet off the road. You will see a cement frame doorway, which was a later addition by the occupants of the house, whose foundation can still be seen just uphill from the chamber.

NORTH CAROLINA

Town Creek Indian Mound

Well-restored mounds are surrounded by a stockade.

Location: 509 Town Creek Mound Rd., Mt. Gilead.

Website: historicsites.nc.gov/all-sites/town-creek-indian-mound

OHIO

Enon Adena Mound (Knob Prairie Mound)

This Adena mound is 40 feet high, with a 574 feet circumference at the base.

Location: Indian Mound Circle, Indian Drive, Enon, off Dayton Bypass on Rt. 675.

Website: ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Enon_Mound

Fort Hill State Memorial

Here, the Hopewell Indians (100 B.C.-A.D. 500) constructed a 1.5 mile long earthwork hilltop enclosure as well as at least two ceremonial buildings.

Location: Just down the road from Serpent Mound (below), on Rte. 41 between Elmville and Cynthiana.

Website: stateparks.com/fort_hill_state_memorial_in_ohio.html

Great Circle Earthworks

This 66-acre site, formerly called Moundbuilders State Memorial, preserves a once vast system of ditch and bank earthworks. It contains a circular earthwork 1,200 feet in diameter with grass-covered earthen walls ranging from 8 to 14 feet high. In the center are three lower, connected mounds. It also contains a large octagonal earthwork.

Location: 1 mile SW of SR 16 on SR 79 in Newark.

Website: ohiohistory.org/visit/museum-and-site-locator/newark-earthworks

Hopewell Culture National Historical Park

This site contains earthworks that date from the Hopewell Culture, c. 200 BC-500 AD. Every mound over six feet high that we measured was placed directly atop a magnetic anomaly. The one linear mound has numerous anomalies along its ridge. The group of mounds is surrounded by a henge-like ditch.

Location: 16062 State Rte. 104, Chillicothe, next to the sprawling state prison complex.

Website: nps.gov/hocu

Indian Mound Reserve (Williamson Mound)

This 28 ft. high, 156 ft. circumference Adena mound is located in the Massies Creek limestone gorge. The only springs that can be observed in the one mile long gorge are three, located about 500 ft. south of the mound. These were found by Apostol through a biolocation reaction from his sensitive (see Chapter 3).

Location: On State Rte. 42, 1 mile SW of Cedarville.

Website: touringohio.com/history/williamson-mound.html

Miamisburg Mound

The largest conical mound in Ohio and possibly in eastern U.S. was con-structed during the Adena Culture (800 Bc-100 AD). It measures 877 feet in circumference and was originally more than 70 feet high. This mound was measured by us with a magnetometer. It sits directly atop a magnetic anomaly and is located at the intersection of two nested, L-shaped regions of differing magnetic strength.

Location: 900 Mound Rd., Miamisburg, turn west on exit 42 on I-75.

Website: ohiohistory.org/visit/museum-and-site-locator/miamisburg-mound

Paint Creek area

The entire area south of Chillicothe on U.S. Rte. 53, which runs along Paint Creek, is replete with numerous mounds, some of which are marked with signs and historical markers. This area was once home to large towns. Among the chief mounds are Fort Hill State Memorial (above) and Seip Mound State Memorial (below).

Seip Mound State Memorial

Seip Mound is the central mound in a group of geometric earthworks, most of which, however, have been destroyed by farming and erosion. This mound is 240 feet long, 130 feet wide, and 30 feet high. It displays magnetic variations across its top.

Location: On Rte. 50 between Bainbridge and Bourneville, SW of Chillicote.

Website: stateparks.com/seip_mound_state_memorial_in_ohio.html

Serpent Mound

This quarter-mile long mound is the largest and finest serpent effigy in the U.S. Built atop a 100-foot-high bluff, it was constructed during the Fort Ancient Culture, around 1070 AD. The site is discussed in Chapter 7. There is a modest museum with a good exhibit of the unusual geology of the entire Serpent Mound region.

Location: 3850 State Rte. 73, Peebles.

Website: ohiohistory.org/visit/museum-and-site-locator/serpent-mound

Williamson Mound

See Indian Mound Reserve (above).

OKLAHOMA

Spiro Mounds Archaeological Center

This site, covering 150 acres, contains 12 mounds, erected along the Arkansas River. It was inhabited c. 850-1450 AD.

Location: 2.5 miles east and 3.5 miles north of Spiro on W.D. Mayo Lock & Dam Road, off State Hwy. 9.

Website: okhistory.org/sites/spiromounds

SOUTH DAKOTA

Bear Butte State Park

We visited this volcanic mountain and found it littered with magnetic anomalies. It is also a very important site for religious ceremonies and vision quests of Native American tribes. Particular spots are marked with brightly colored ‘flags’ of cloth (Chapter 3, Fig. 7). Please observe that leaving the marked trails is prohibited.

Location: 6 miles northeast of Sturgis, off Hwy. 79.

Website: gfp.sd.gov/parks/detail/bear-butte-state-park

Black Elk Peak

This peak, previously known as Harney Peak, is the highest mountain in the Black Hills and long sacred to the Sioux and prior tribes. It was the only location where the authors themselves felt mind-altering influences (see Chapter 3). The source was electric ground current in a quartz vein in a cliff measured with our instruments. A well-maintained hiking trail of several miles leads to a lookout tower on the top.

Location: Near Mt. Rushmore, south of State Rte. 244 and east of State Rte. 87.

Website: summitpost.org/black-elk-peak-harney-peak/150511

Harney Peak, see Black Elk Peak.

TENNESSEE

Pinson Mounds State Archaeological Park

This 1,200 acre area contains 15 mounds and other earthworks from the Middle Woodland period (200 BC-500 AD).

Location: 460 Ozier Rd., Pinson. From Jackson, follow Hwy 45 South to Pinson. Turn left at the park sign, State Rt. 197, and then follow the signs 2.5 miles to the park entrance.

Website: tnstateparks.com/parks/pinson-mounds

TEXAS

Caddoan Mounds State Historic Site

These mounds were built by the Caddoans, who lived here c. 800-1300 AD.

Location: On State Hwy 21, 6 miles SW of Alto.

Website: thc.texas.gov/historic-sites/caddo-mounds-state-historic-site

VERMONT

Vermont has rock chambers on private land. You can access them through tours run by the New England Antiquities Research Association (neara.org), see general note above.

WEST VIRGINIA

Grave Creek Mound Archaeology Complex

This Adena mound, constructed about 250-150 BC, is the largest conical mound in the U.S., 69 feet high and with a circumference of 295 feet at the base. It is located on a powerful magnetic anomaly, and we measured extremely strong earth currents here shortly after a thunderstorm had passed (Chapter 7).

Like so many mounds, it was originally connected to a river by ditch and mound avenues, similar to the ones found at England’s henges (Chapter 9).

A large museum is focusing on the lives of the pre-Columbian Native Americans who inhabited the area, and there is an extensive exhibit on the building of the mound. The mound itself is surrounded by a tall fence and can only be accessed during museum hours (Tuesday through Saturday, 9 a.m. – 5 p.m., access to the mound closes at 4:30 p.m.)

The entire original complex was so striking that Lewis and Clark paused here for more than a day to explore it on their way to Missouri.

Location: 801 Jefferson Avenue, Moundsville, across the street from the state prison.

Website: wvculture.org/museum/GraveCreekmod.html

WISCONSIN

Wisconsin is simply loaded with mounds, particularly in Madison, in and around the university campus. Most are effigy mounds, low structures made in the shape of an animal. They are also usually located at the edge of a lake.

We have never measured an effigy mound and we do not know if these follow the magnetic siting pattern of the conical mounds we have measured in the Midwest. However, many of the parks cited below have modest conical mounds as well.

Avoca Mound Group

This group contains six linear and four conical mounds.

Location: In Lake Side Park, East Lake Shore Dr., Avoca, on the shore of Avoca Lake, a backwater slough of the Wisconsin River.

Website: wisconsinmounds.com/AvocaMounds.html

Aztalan State Park

Between 1000 and 1200 AD, this area was home to Mississippian immigrants from Cahokia. Here, as at Cahokia, they built large earthen mounds and fortified the site with a huge timber and clay wall.

Extensively excavated in the 1920s, two platform mounds and parts of the wall have been reconstructed. To the northeast of Aztalan is a line of large conical mounds.

Location: 6200 County Road Q, Jefferson, on the shore of the Crawfish River, one mile east of Lake Mills.

Website: mpm.edu/research-collections/anthropology/online-collections-research/aztalan-collection/site-history

Baum Mound Group

This group holds three linear mounds and one conical.

Location: In Goodland County Park, Goodland Park Rd., Dunn.

Calumet County Park

Six effigy mounds sit atop an escarpment over Lake Winnebago.

Location: N6150 County Trunk Highway EE, Hilbert, off State Hwy. 55 in Stockbridge.

Website: calumetcounty.org/650/Calumet-County-Park

Cave of the Mounds

The ‘mounds’ referred to here are natural limestone formations, in which a cave was discovered after blasting in 1939. It is listed here because Andrei Apostol’s sensitive recorded a biolocation reaction while walking blind-folded over the cave (Chapter 3).

Location: 2975 Cave of the Mounds Rd, Blue Mounds, 20 miles west of Madison, just off U.S. Hwys 18 and 151, between Mount Horeb and Blue Mounds.

Website: caveofthemounds.com

Devils’ Lake State Park

Low effigy mounds surround the lake, particularly on the north shore. The Bear Mound is located just above the pocket aquifer that maintains the lake at a constant level.

Location: S5975 Park Rd., Baraboo, situated along the National Ice Age Trail.

Website: devilslakewisconsin.com

Edgewood College Mounds

12 mounds are preserved on the campus of Edgewood College. One linear and six conical mounds are visible along Edgewood Drive. Two linear mounds are near the library, and on the other side of the library is a large bird effigy. Two conical mounds are near the playground.

Location: Edgewood College, Woodrow St. (off Monroe Ave.), Madison.

Website: wisconsinmounds.com/EdgewoodCollegeMounds.html

Edna Taylor Conservation Park

Here are six linear mounds, two of which are very long, following the crest of the hill. The four other mounds are on the north-eastern slope of the drumlin.

Location: 802 Femrite Dr., Madison.

Website: cityofmadison.com/parks/find-a-park/park.cfm?id=1159

Elmside Park Mounds

This park has two effigy mounds, depicting unknown animals, which have been interpreted as a bear and a lynx.

Location: At Lakeland and Hudson Avenues, Madison.

Website: wisconsinmounds.com/ElmsideParkMounds.html

Farwell’s Point Mound Group

This mound group has a number of large conical mounds, part of a linear mound, and a bird effigy — built over a 1,000 year span!

Location: On the shore of Lake Mendota, Troy Drive, Madison.

Governor Nelson State Park

Covering 422 acres on the northern shore of Lake Mendota, this park has five conical mounds along the Woodland Trail. They were probably built during the Middle Woodland Period, whereas a large puma or water spirit effigy was a later addition. Also remnants of a stockaded Late Woodland Culture village.

Location: 5140 County Road M, Waunakee.

Website: travelwisconsin.com/state-parks-forests/governor-nelson-state-park-204103

Lake Koshkonong Effigy Mound Groups

This area once had 23 effigy mound groups, composed of about 500 individual mounds, of which about 270 have been preserved. Some lie atop the highest yielding parts of the aquifer that feeds the lake, others lie atop the lowest yielding sections.

Location: In Jefferson Co., on Koshkonong Mounds Road, a mile west of its intersection with Old Wisconsin Hwy 26 and near its intersection with Vinnie Haha Road, Fort Atkinson.

Website: wisconsinhistoricalmarkers.com/2013/08/marker-322-lake-koshkonong-effigy-mounds.html

Lizard Mound County Park

This park is named for its most outstanding effigy mound, shaped like a gigantic lizard, and it contains 30 other effigy mounds, built 500-1000 AD.

Location: 2121 County Highway A, West Bend, east of State Hwy 144. On Hwy 45, take exit STH 33.

Website: wisconsinhistory.org/Records/Article/CS9955

Mendota State Hospital Group

This group has some of the finest effigy mounds anywhere, and several conical mounds. One bird mound has a wingspan of 624 feet! To see mounds check with the staff in the administration building, which is the first building on the right after you enter the hospital grounds.

Location: On the shore of Lake Mendota, Troy Drive, Madison.

Outlet Mound

This is a large conical mound, probably 2,000 years old, overlooking the outlet of Lake Monona. It is the largest of 19 conical, oval and linear mounds, once located in the vicinity.

Location: 6271-6299 Ridgewood Avenue, Monona.

Website: wisconsinhistoricalmarkers.com/2013/04/marker-384-outlet-mound.html

Picnic Point Mound Group

On the south shore of Picnic Point, halfway to the tip of the peninsula, are two linear and three conical mounds. Near the tip is a conical mound.

Location: Lake Shore Nature Preserve, Willow Dr., University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Website: lakeshorepreserve.wisc.edu/visit/places/picnic-point-mound-group

University of Wisconsin Arboretum

A bird and a puma effigy mounds, plus linear and conical mounds, located on both sides of McCaffrey Road at the University Arboretum, Madison. One group is situated right above several prominent springs. A map is available at the McKay Center at the arboretum.

Location: The Arboretum’s 1,260 acres border the southern half of Lake Wingra. Vehicles can enter in 2 places: from the north at the intersection of McCaffrey Drive, North Wingra Drive and South Mills Street, or from the south at the intersection of McCaffrey Drive and Seminole Hwy, just north of the Belt line (Hwy 12).

Website: uwarboretum.org

Upper Wakanda Park Mound Group

Three large oval mounds on a ridge, overlooking Lake Menomin, a widening of the Great Cedar River.

Location: Pine St., Menominee.

Website: wisconsinfirstnations.org/upper-wakanda-park-mound-group

Wyalusing State Park

This 2,628 acre park contains 21 mound sites, once totaling more than 130 mounds, from the Middle and Late Woodland Periods. 69 have been pre-served, including the ‘Procession of the Mounds’ – a row of conical and linear mounds and one effigy that follows the crest of a bluff.

Location: 13081 State Park Lane, Bagley.

Website: travelwisconsin.com/state-parks-forests/wyalusing-state-park-204186

WYOMING

Devils Tower National Monument

This geological twin of Bear Butte, called Bear Lodge by surrounding tribes, is again today the center for religious ceremonies of numerous Native American peoples, some of whom mark particular spots with brightly colored ‘flags’ of cloth, as at the vision quest site of Bear Butte.

Physical evidence shows that the ‘tower’ was used for vision quests through the 1930s. After a decades-long ban on the ritual use of Devils Tower, the National Park Service is now allowing Native American groups to obtain permits for group activities on land, located away from the tower itself. But the brightly colored cloths and medicine bundles found at Bear Butte, are now also appearing at the base of the tower itself.

Location: Visitors traveling east on I-90, exit at Moorcroft. Traveling west on I-90, exit at Sundance. Take 14 North to 24, follow 24 North to Devils Tower.

Website: nps.gov/deto

Inyan Kara

The Sioux rank this mountain with Bear Butte and Devil’s Tower. It is likewise an igneous intrusion, but is much larger than the other two, sprawling across 12 square miles. The Indian slayer George Armstrong Custer climbed it in 1874 and carved his name on the top, which is still visible.

Location: In the western part of Black Hills, Crook County, 14 miles S of Sundance, on private land near Newcastle. Access is only obtained via the landowner’s permission.

Website: fs.usda.gov/detail/blackhills/specialplaces/?cid=stelprdb5063000

Sundance Mountain

Annual vision quest rites have been held here since time immemorial, hence its name. The area was also the home of the criminal Harry Longabough, who became known as The Sundance Kid after spending 18 months in Sundance Jail for horse theft. He later joined up with Butch Cassidy, and together they formed the infamous Wild Bunch Gang.

Location: In the Bear Lodge District of the Black Hills National Forest.

Website: blackhillsbadlands.com/cities-towns/sundance-wyoming

CANADA

Chief Mountain

See Montana (above).

Dreamer’s Rock

This vision quest site on Manitoulin Island, located in northern Lake Huron, Ontario, is still used by First Nations people. It is the largest freshwater island in the world and is a geological wonderland.

Here the pre-Cambrian shield outcrops at the shorelines, forming a huge conductivity discontinuity at the edge of the electrically conductive water. Dreamer’s Rock is a 300-foot outcrop of white rock, perched above the lake with spectacular views. Heavily vandalized in 1974, the site was rehabilitated by First Nations young people. Please respect the privacy of anyone you see here using the site.

Tours are available in nearby Whitefish River and other towns. Tribal permission must be obtained to visit Dreamer’s Rock alone or with a tour. One place to obtain permission is at the Great Spirit Circle Trail organization, which is owned and operated by tribe members.

Location: Off Hwy 6 (west of Sudbury) on Birch Island where Hwy 6 connects Manitoulin to the northern mainland. From SW Ontario, connection can be made up Route 6 north to Tobermory and Cape Herd, where a ferry connects to Route 6 on southern Manitoulin.

Website: circletrail.com (Great Spirit Circle Trail)

Majorville Medicine Wheel

A major medicine wheel site that stayed in use for 5,000 years! It was first marked out about the time the builders of Silbury Hill in England cut their first chalk (Chapter 9).

Unfortunately it is extremely far off the nearest road and on private property, as are most of Alberta’s medicine wheels. With an estimated two-thirds of all the medicine wheels in existence, Alberta is the center of this cultural phenomenon.

Those wishing to visit these sites need to do a great deal of advance research, including obtaining permission from landowners. The Alberta Wilderness Association periodically hosts guided tours to the Majorville Medicine Wheel.

Location: In the Valley of the Ten Peaks in the Canadian Rockies near Calgary, Alberta, on the highest hill in the area.

Website: albertawilderness.ca (Alberta Wilderness Association)

Petroglyph Provincial Park, Vancouver Island

Two hectares hold hundreds of Native American rock carvings. The visible sandstone layers may provide a natural conductivity discontinuity.

Location: On the eastern central coast of Vancouver Island, just across from the city of Vancouver. Take the main highway south out of Nanaimo. The park will be on the left (seaward) side, just before the mouth of the Nanaimo River empties into the channel.

Website: bcparks.ca/explore/parkpgs/petroglyph

Petroglyphs Provincial Park, Peterborough

This site contains an impressive set of rock carvings, which have been covered over by a well-designed building to preserve them, and to allow viewing in all weather. It contains 900 petroglyphs, depicting turtles, snakes, birds, humans, and geometric shapes, cut into white marble rock over 1,200 years ago. Such images are usually associated with vision quest activity. Much of the best art has been enclosed in a building with skylights.

Location: 2249 Northey’s Bay Rd., Woodview, 11 km from Hwy. 28, 55 km NE of Peterborough, Ontario.

Website: ontarioparks.com/park/petroglyphs

St. Victor Petroglyphs Provincial Historic Park

Located on a rocky outcrop on an isolated hill with panoramic views of surrounding plains in Saskatchewan. Much of the rock art can be viewed from a wood walkway leading to another park on top of the hill. The site is a possible conductivity discontinuity and/or vision quest site.

Location: On Hwy 1, 40 miles west of Regina, take Route 2 south through Assinoboia. A little way past Route 719, watch for sign for left turn (east). Road bends 90 degrees south before park and another 90 degrees east just past park. Watch for signs.

Website: tourismsaskatchewan.com/listings/313/st-victor-petroglyphs-provincial-historic-park

Stein Valley Nlaka’pamux Heritage Park

Stein Valley is a traditional vision quest site where hikers can see faded rock paintings, presumably created by shamans to illustrate their trance visions. Preserved ‘forever wild’ as a Native American cultural site. A 40 mile long roadless valley of true wilderness, for the experienced backpacker only (pack in all supplies but water and include a topo map, compass, and first aid kit). Recommended hiking time to traverse is one week, but the eastern end of the trail, which follows the Stein River near Lytton, is far easier than the strenuous west end near Stein Lake.

Location: NE of Vancouver, British Columbia. Take Hwy. 1 to the village of Lytton. Trail-head at Lytton is at Van Winkle Flats sandy beachhead. Alternate route: From N. Vancouver take Hwy. 99 (the Sea to Sky Highway) to Pemberton Valley/Mt. Currie area.

Website : bcparks.ca/explore/parkpgs/stein_val

Vision Quest Stone Rings

The many stone ‘rings’ in varying shapes and designs, laid out on bedrock, remind us of those stone rings that lay atop magnetic anomalies on Bear Butte (Chapter 4) and seem to serve as vision quest sites there. They are still occasionally used as sites for visions quests and rituals. Please respect the privacy of any Native Americans you see using the rings.

Location: At Bannock Point, Whiteshell Provincial Park, Manitoba. From Winnipeg, take Hwy 1 for 126 km east to Falcon Lake and West Hawk Lake. Other entry points to the park include PR 307 at Seven Sisters Falls and PTH 44 at Rennie.

Website: explorethewhiteshell.com

Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park

This park contains spectacular stone outcroppings in a genuine prairie ecosystem of 4,400 acres. It is home to the largest collection of rock art in the Great Plains with over 50 sites holding thousands of figures. From the rock outcroppings viewed, we suspect this may be a substantial conductivity discontinuity, and thereby qualitatively similar to Petroglyphs National Monument in New Mexico, where we have measured powerful electric ground currents. Bear in mind that most rock art was carved by shamans in trance.

Location: From Milk River, Alberta, drive east 32 km on Secondary Road 501, south 10 km on Secondary Road 500.

Website: albertaparks.ca/parks/south/writing-on-stone-pp

ENGLAND

The sites mentioned below are discussed at length in Chapter 9.

Adam’s Grave Long Barrow

This burial mound, measuring 200 feet long by 20 feet high, has stones at one end and is surrounded by a ditch. It dates from c. 3000 BC. Open to the public. Our electrostatic voltmeter was ‘fried’ here one afternoon by a mysterious mass of electric charge, circling the hill, as described in Chapter 9.

Location: On Walker’s Hill, about 4 miles NE of Pewsey, 1 mile NE of Alton Barnes.

Website: historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1013032

Avebury Henge

This is one of the largest megalithic structures in Europe. It has a 1,400 ft. diameter bank and ditch with four causeways. The ditch is 15 feet deep and 40 feet wide. 98 standing stones remain in a circle and linear avenue. We took approximately one thousand magnetometer measurements here. Open to the public during daylight hours.

Location: 6 miles west of Marlborough. Just off the A4, the A4361 runs right through the stone circle.

Website: english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/avebury/history

Overton Hill (The Sanctuary)

This was originally the beginning of Avebury’s West Kennet Stone Avenue. Modern stone markers depict the double stone ring that was erected here c. 3000 BC. On a hill overlooking the River Avon, we measured a magnetic anomaly at the centre of the circles. If you bring a magnetometer to take measurements, beware of the buried water main that runs along this side of the road. It gives powerful readings and can easily confuse you.

Location: On the A4, half a mile east of Avebury, 6 miles west of Marlborough. Watch for marker at road’s edge.

Website: historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1014563

Silbury Hill

This hill is flat on top with spectacular views of surrounding countryside and the surrounding ditch and causeways. Several years ago, a pit opened on the top when the ground collapsed on a spot that had been originally excavated during the 20th Century, whereas the 5,000-year-old sections are still holding up well.

Officially, there is no public access to the hill, and a fence blocks off access to the mound with a sign No Visitors Allowed. However, you are welcome to walk around the base. We conducted a multi-instrument one-week monitoring of this site.

Location: Half a mile from Avebury on the A4, 6 miles west of Marlborough.

Website: english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/silbury-hill/history

Stonehenge

One of the wonders of the world. Erected between c. 3000 BC and 1600 BC. A circular structure, aligned with the rising of the sun at the midsummer solstice.

Note: During the Summer Solstice, the site may be closed to the general public as thousands show up dressed in white robes for rituals.

Location: 90 miles west of London on Salisbury Plain, at the junction of A303 and A344/A360, 2 miles west of Amesbury.

Website: english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stonehenge

West Kennet Long Barrow

A restored long barrow, reminiscent in structure of the stone chambers of America and Europe, as well as the passage graves of France. We recorded a moderate geomagnetic transition here.

Location: Visible just off the A4, a few hundred meters east of Silbury Hill, about 1 km SW of West Kennet, along footpath off A4.

Website: english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/west-kennet-long-barrow/history

Windmill Hill

This ancient causewayed enclosure sits uphill from and behind Avebury, just off the Ridgeway public walking path. The site itself is nondescript and easily missed. Ask directions at the Avebury museum or the Red Lion Pub in the village located within Avebury stone circle.

Location: About 1 km NW of Avebury.

Website: english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/windmill-hill/history

Appendix 2. Do it yourself! (with your own instruments)

For those of you who wish to visit ancient sites and take measurements of your own, a wide variety of instrumentation exists. We have seen great changes in this field since we began our investigations. Some of the models we have ourselves used have either been discontinued or superseded. Some are still available.

Overall, they fall into three categories:

Ground electrodes

These also include a long length of wire and a voltmeter, which is capable of registering millivolts of DC charge. The entire assemblage is quite reasonable in cost, probably under $200.

Fluxgate magnetometer

Our model measures the z-axis of the geomagnetic field only – the most pertinent of the x, y, and z axes. Such models are available for around $4,000 or less. At the time when we began our work, a model that measured all three axes cost about $30,000. Today, however, such models are available or a small fraction of that price.

One advantage of the more costly 3-axes units is their ease of operation. You basically just push a button when you want a reading. The z-axis units require some patience, dexterity, and practice. For an accurate reading, you must hold the probe parallel to the geomagnetic field line, while facing north. This is how you will obtain the highest reading. If you fail to hold the probe parallel to the field line, you will get lower readings. Thus, it is easy to mistakenly get a lower-than-accurate reading, but virtually impossible to get a higher-than-accurate reading. It requires standing still and rotating the probe in your hand while you watch the readout. With practice and a steady hand, you can get readings accurate to within about 50 gammas (or 0.5 milligauss) during a few minutes of manipulating the probe.

Increases of more than a few hundred gammas are likely to be non-natural sources, such as buried or nearby iron or steel objects. Don’t worry about coins or a pen in your pocket. I hold the probe at about chest height with bent elbow, simply because it is the most comfortable. Choose a comfortable position, because you will be holding it for a long time. If you need to work in the rain, you can put the unit’s base, with readout, inside a clear plastic bag and just let the probe get wet.

Some z-axis units now on the market are accurate to as little as one gamma, but it is impossible to hold the probe steady enough to accurately measure to such fine resolution. If you wish to do so, you need to employ a clamp or base similar to a camera or telescope tripod. However, as we have seen, the coarser resolutions still can produce very useful information at most sites.

Electrostatic voltmeter

This is the unit that measures electric charge in the air or on objects. It can be used while walking around a site. You can also stand still and sometimes watch the readings change, as gusts of wind deliver air that is more ionized.

Today, a variety of types are available for under $1,000. One important aspect of use is to not wear clothing made of synthetic fibers, silk, or wool as the cloth rubbing against itself will produce electrostatic charge that can register on the meter. All-cotton clothing is best, though leather is also fine. Rubber- or leather-soled shoes are best.

Normally, interference from overhead electric lines is not a problem. It will be a problem getting accurate readings in rain. You cannot put the unit in a plastic bag or under a nylon umbrella and get accurate readings, because both generate electrostatic charge. Always store the unit in a cloth bag or leather case, never in a plastic or nylon bag, unless it is shielded by a cotton or leather covering.

If you need to check if it is working, a good test target is your own hair after rubbing it with silk or rubber. That can produce a charge of several thousand volts.