View source for Melbourne Bone Bed

{{short description|Pleistocene fossil and archaeological site in Florida}}
{{Coord|28.1|N|80.6|W|display=title}}
[[File:Crane Creek (Melbourne, Florida) 002.jpg|thumb|260 px|Fossil deposits from the Melbourne Bone Bed were discovered in a tributary of Crane Creek, similar to the one shown here.]] 
'''Melbourne Bone Bed''' is a [[paleontology|paleontological]] site located at [[Crane Creek (Melbourne, Florida)|Crane Creek]] in [[Melbourne, Florida|Melbourne]], in the [[U.S. state]] of [[Florida]]. This site contains [[fossil]]s from the [[Late Pleistocene]] period 20,000 to 10,000 years before the present.<ref name=Historic_Brevard>{{Cite web|title=Historic Brevard: Your Guide to Historic Landmarks in Brevard County |date=2016 |url=https://brevardfl.gov/docs/default-source/historical-commission-docs/not-508-historical-landmarks/2016-brevard-county-landmark-guide.pdf?sfvrsn=8b794af4_6 |publisher=Brevard County Historical Commission |page=61 |access-date=January 23, 2025}}</ref> The fossils include [[Extinction|extinct]] animals such as varieties of [[camel]]s, [[Dire wolf|dire wolves]], [[Tremarctos floridanus|Florida cave bear]]s, [[Holmesina|giant armadillo]]s, [[Castoroides|giant beavers]], [[Bison latifrons|giant bison]], [[Eremotherium|giant ground sloth]]s, [[mammoth]]s, [[American mastodon|mastodon]]s, [[saber-toothed cat]]s, and [[tapir]]s.<ref name=Historic_Brevard/><ref name=flmnh/>

The excavations were conducted at three sites; the Golf Course site on the east bank of Crane Creek on the Melbourne Golf and Country Club (south of West New Haven Avenue), the Singleton Estate site about {{convert|1|mi}} southeast of the Golf Course site, and a minor site on the south bank of Crane Creek about {{convert|1|mi}} west of the Golf Course site.<ref name=flmnh>{{cite web|title=Melbourne: University of Florida Vertebrate Fossil Locality BR002|url=http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/vertpaleo/Melbourne.htm|publisher=Florida Museum of Natural History|access-date=28 September 2014}}</ref> C. P. Singleton discovered the bones of a [[mammoth]] (''[[Mammuthus columbi]]'') on his property along [[Crane Creek (Melbourne, Florida)|Crane Creek]], {{convert|1.5|mi}} from Melbourne, and brought in [[Amherst College]] [[paleontology|paleontologist]] Frederick B. Loomis to excavate the skeleton. Loomis found a second elephant with a "large rough flint instrument" <ref>Purdy:23</ref> among fragments of the elephant's ribs. Loomis found in the same [[stratum]] mammoth, [[mastodon]], [[horse]], [[ground sloth]], [[tapir]], [[peccary]], [[Camelid|camel]], and [[Smilodon|saber-tooth cat]] bones, all extinct in Florida since the end of the Pleistocene 10,000 years ago. At a nearby site a human rib and charcoal were found in association with ''[[Mylodon]]'', ''[[Megalonyx]]'', and ''[[Holmesina]]'' (formerly ''Chlamytherium'') teeth. A finely worked spear point found with these items may have been displaced from a later stratum. In 1925 attention shifted to the Melbourne golf course. A crushed human skull with finger, arm, and leg bones was found in association with a horse tooth. A piece of [[ivory]] that appeared to have been modified by humans was found at the bottom of the stratum containing bones. Other finds included a spear point near a mastodon bone and a turtle-back scraper and blade found with bear, camel, mastodon, horse, and tapir bones.<ref>Purdy:23-29</ref> James Gidley of the [[Smithsonian Institution]] joined Loomis in 1926, and continued to collect from the site until 1929. C. P. Singleton also continued to collect from the Golf Course site when Loomis and Gidley were absent, reportedly with the permission of the Smithsonian and some funding from [[Harvard University]]. The Melbourne site has been described as "one of the "Big Three" late Pleistocene sites discovered in Florida during the first half of the 20th Century".<ref name=flmnh/>

==Melbourne Man==
The [[human skull|skull]] found at the Melbourne Golf Course was exhibited at the [[Paleontological Society|Paleontological Society of America]] meeting in 1925.<ref name=Historic_Brevard/>  This discovery sparked a 30-year debate between geologists and [[Archaeology|archaeologists]] resulting in the skull becoming known as the Melbourne Man.<ref name=Historic_Brevard/>  Recent consensus dates the Melbourne Man as early as 10,000 BC confirming that [[Native Americans in the United States|Native Americans]] coexisted with Pleistocene [[mammal]]s in the area at the end of that period.<ref name=Historic_Brevard/>

Human remains, Pleistocene animals and Paleo-Indian artifacts similar to those from the Melbourne Bone Bed were found in [[Vero man|Vero Beach]], {{convert|30|mi}} south of Melbourne, and similar Paleo-Indian artifacts were found at the [[Helen Blazes archaeological site]], {{convert|10|mi}} southwest of Melbourne.

==See also==
*[[Vero man]]

==Notes==
{{reflist}}

==References==
*{{cite book|last1=Purdy|first1=Barbara A.|title=Florida's People During the Last Ice Age|date=2008|publisher=University Press of Florida|location=Gainesville, Florida|isbn=978-0-8130-3204-7}}

==Further reading==
*{{Cite journal |last=Cooke |first=C. Wythe |date=1928 |title=The stratigraphy and age of the Pleistocene deposits in Florida from which human bones have been reported |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/24523550?seq=4 |journal=Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences |volume=18 |issue=15 |pages=414–421 |issn=0043-0439}}

{{Indigenous peoples of Pre-Columbian Florida}}
{{Pre-Columbian North America}}

[[Category:Archaeological sites in Florida]]
[[Category:Geology of Florida]]
[[Category:Melbourne, Florida]]
[[Category:Natural history of Florida]]
[[Category:Paleontological sites of Florida]]
[[Category:Pleistocene paleontological sites of North America]]
[[Category:Geography of Brevard County, Florida]]
[[Category:1922 in paleontology]]


{{paleo-site-stub}}
{{BrevardCountyFL-geo-stub}}