The History Channel has a new series that is very interesting, ′America Unearthed′, hosted by forensic geologist, Scott Wolter. He is also the president of American Petrographic Services, the working end of a new branch of science Wolter has invented – Archeopetrography. A scientific process for dating and categorizing unusual and mysterious artifacts and locations. In the premier episode which aired last Friday on the so-called Mayan Doomsday, Wolter presented a good argument that the Mayans had established settlements in the United States, mainly in Florida and Georgia. He also may have solved the mystery of some alien-like skulls found in Mexico. Last night’s episode examined a ′rune stone′ from Arizona marked in Medieval English that may indicate a European visitor well before Columbus. Next week Friday, the H2 series investigates whether or not ancient Minoan miners sailed from the Mediterranean to the shores of Lake Superior in Michigan′s Upper Peninsula to mine for copper. Pretty wild stuff!

America Unearthed

The Internet was all a-buzzed earlier this past week with a story from Mexico about the discovery of alien-like skulls found in an ancient cemetery. Some 25 skulls were discovered and are estimated to be about 1,000 years old. But as we learned from the premier episode of ′America Unearthed′, the Mayans practiced a strange procedure to the infants of their aristocracy. The heads were temporarily fixed between two strong, flat stones such that the Mayan baby′s skull would grow in an elongated way with a flat top. Thus, the skulls discovered were not aliens but most likely Mayan royalty.

What I found most amusing was Wolter′s distaste for ′academics′ who spend most of their time refuting such weird episodes of history. For well over a century, there have been many clues pointing to such alternative theories, like the Mayans being in the southern U.S., but the ′experts′ rejected and scoffed at these notions. Another example is the infamous Kensington Rune Stone found in the mid-19th Century in Minnesota which appears to indicate that European travelers, possibly members of the Knights Templar, explored the region well before Columbus. While many experts will concede that Vikings had visited, and even established some settlements, on North America′s east coast, few consider the possibility that some may have went very far into the interior.

So if you enjoy history and are fascinated by the potential of ancients cultures, then you ought to check out ′America Unearthed′ on The History Channel. The new series hosted by Scott Wolter airs Friday nights on H2. From Mayans in Georgia to Medieval Europeans in Arizona to Minoans in Michigan, Wolter paints a new page in understanding our history. He leaves no rune stone unturned as he attempts to solve mysteries like the alien-like skulls found in an ancient cemetery in Mexico. By the way, if you think the skull thing is strange, keep in mind that even into the 18th Century in Europe, traveling circuses would buy infants from peasants and raise them in bizarrely shaped jars so that the child would grow up with a strange shape. That is how the freak show got started.