Page:The World's Most Famous Court Trial - 1925.djvu/242

238 bent and that this man walked in a semierect position. Those people known as the Neanderthal race spread out over the western half of Europe and we now know and have excavated very large numbers of the stations in which they lived. They were men—they were human—but they were much more like the anthropoids in many respects than is modern man. They lived in Europe for a period of at least 25,000 years, probably much longer, when they were displaced by newcomers who pushed in from around the eastern end of the Mediterranian and from Asia. The newcomers known as Cromagnon, are a much finer physical type, but so closely related to modern man that it is not necessary to describe their physical type; but it is of interest that we can study his home life, his art and his life among certain animals now extinct, for a period beginning about 20,000 years ago and extending down to the coming of modern races.

Only a few points relating to man and his history have been reviewed, but enough has been said to indicate that the testimony of man's body, of his embryological life, of his fossil remains strongly points to the fact that he is closely related to the other members of the animal world, and that his development to his present form has taken place through immense periods of time.

From the above it seems conclusive that it is impossible to teach authropology or the prehistory of man without teaching evolution.

(Biography—Wilbur A. Nelson is state geologist of Tennessee, president of the American Association of State Geologists, past president of the Tennessee Academy of Science, chairman executive committee, Southern Appalachian Power conference, 1923, member of the executive committee of the division of states relations of the Natural Research council; member of the council of the American Engineering council, and president of the Monteagle Sunday School assembly, of Monteagle, Tenn., the leading interdenominational chautauga and summer resort in the south, founded forty-three years ago, and after Sept. 1st, Corcoran professor of geology and head of the department of geology, University of Virginia, and state geologist of Virginia. He received the degree bachelor of science at Vanderbilt university and the degree master of arts at Leland Stanford university. He has held responsible posiionspositions [sic] with commercial firms as well as in the service of the state. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a fellow of the Geological Society of America, member American Institute of Mining and MetalurgicalMetallurgical [sic] Engineers, American Association Petroleum Geologists, Seismological Society of America and other organizations. He has published a number of papers on geological and related subjects, both scientific and of a popular nature.)

The different layers of rock which form the surface of the earth unfold a remarkable story of evolution. These rock layers may be read as clearly as the leaves of a book, and they are the book which tells the true history of the earth; and the buried remains of animal and plant life which they contain likewise show the rise of life and its development on this earth. All forms of life have changed and developed to meet the conditions which have existed on the earth, as it has developed to meet the conditions which have been developing from the beginning of geological time.

Tennessee is an ideal place in which to study and learn the story of the rock layers which have been laid down, from the earliest tines in which any life existed up to the present. Life forms suitable for one period of the earth's history, proved unsuitable for another period, and so new forms, therefore, evolved through natural causes. This is not a new study in Tennessee, as geology and its study of