Society for Historical Archaeology
"Life on the Edge"
Conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology
Sacramento, California, USA January 11 - 15, 2006

Eva Cecil
evacecil@aol.com

Institute for Canine Forensics
www.k9forensic.org

ABSTRACT
This presentation on
"A Noninvasive Method of Searching for Buried Human Remains"
will focus on the fact that locating unmarked, buried human skeletal remains is possible for a canine trained to detect them.

According to legend, Canadian fur trapper / mountain man Lawrence Rence, whose name was shortened by Native Americans to LoLo (also Lo Lo or Lou Lou). He was killed by a grizzly bear and buried by Nez Perce Indians near the LoLo Trail, in the Bitterroot Mountains, Montana, in the early 1850s. The headstone marking his grave was destroyed and lost in the 1930s due to logging.

With the cooperation of Dr. Kelly Dixon of the University of Montana, Lewis & Clark Trail Heritage Foundation’s Traveler’s Rest Chapter, and using the Institute for Canine Forensic dogs’ noses, we were able to map a possible burial site of LoLo.

KEY WORDS
Human remains detection, remote sensing, canine, Lewis & Clark Trail, Lolo Trail.

DISCUSSION
This presentation on "A Noninvasive Method of Searching for Buried Human Remains" will focus on the fact that locating unmarked, buried human skeletal remains is possible for a canine trained to detect them.

LOLO’S HISTORY
In the summer of 2004, the Traveler's Rest Chapter of the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation requested the University of Montana, Department of Anthropology's assistance in locating the grave of Lawrence Rence, the French Canadian fur trapper, so that they could place a commemorative marker at the actual site of his now lost grave. Lawrence Rence was a fur trapper and mountain man who lived on Grave Creek in western Montana around 1850 with his Nez Perce wife. He is believed sometime in the 1850s or 1860s.

His French name, divided in half by its gentle, but obligatory, uvular "r", was a nuisance for Anglo-Saxon and Native Americans to say, so it was shortened first to Lawrence, and eventually to Lou-Lou, Lo-Lo, and Lolo.

The Lolo Trail is the travel route from Lolo, Montana, to Weippe, Idaho. It was used by native people as a trade and hunting route long before Lewis and Clark and "Lolo" himself arrived on the scene. Between September 12 and September 21, 1805, Lewis and Clark actually followed the Lolo Trail while they made their treacherous trek across the Bitterroot Mountains; the 156 mile long Lolo Trail is now a National Historic Landmark.

SEARCH FOR LOLO USING NONINVASIVE METHODS
The challenge of finding Lolo’s grave was to carry out the search using noninvasive methods - that is, to investigate without digging, using only geophysical, aerial photography and other remote sensing methods as they apply to the identification, evaluation, conservation, and protection of archaeological resources across this Nation.

All that is known of Lolo's grave is written and oral history. The headstone that once existed, was destroyed by loggers sometime between the late 1930s and early 1940s. Ralph Space, the author of the book The Lolo Trail, remembers seeing the stone in 1939.

Once a probable grave area was established, the Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation’s Traveler’s Rest Chapter employed a local archaeologist, Dan Hall, to carry out a magnetometer survey of the area.

MAGNETOMETER MAPS
A magnetometer is a subsurface detection device that measures minor variations in the earth's magnetic field, often revealing archaeological features as magnetic anomalies; the magnetometer gives magnetic readings as it is run over the study area and these readings are converted into magnetic contour maps. (Sharer and Ashmore 2003:G-12).

Some cultural features create anomalies in the earth's magnetic field (e.g., iron tools, burned surfaces, walls made of volcanic stone), which can be located with magnetometers.

According to the history of Lolo's death, his gun was buried with him. Dan Hall and the Lewis and Clark Foundation assumed that the metallic components of Lolo's gun could be located using a magnetometer. Indeed, the magnetometer pinpointed a magnetic anomaly in the area, but there was no way to ground-truth that anomaly without digging, rendering the finding inconclusive.

As a result, the University of Montana's Department of Anthropology’s Dr. Kelly Dixon offered to provide a follow-up survey to use another form of remote sensing - a ground-penetrating radar (GPR) - to be used in conjunction with the magnetometer survey to identify a grave site associated with the anomaly. The Department of Anthropology worked cooperatively with the Department of Geology on this venture, but could not locate the grave site due to the density of the soils - the clay content prevented any subsurface readings.

Antiquities aficionado George Knapp, who instigated the search for Lolo’s grave and the other dedicated members of the Traveler’s Rest Chapter once again turned to Dr. Dixon for help. They wanted to know if there were other noninvasive methods they could use before they built a permanent memorial for Lolo. Dr. Dixon suggested using the Institute for Canine Forensics (ICF) dogs.

INSTITUTE FOR CANINE FORENSICS
DOGS SEARCH FOR LOLO
In the summer of 2004, the ICF dogs assisted Dr. Kelly Dixon and Dr. Julie Schablitsky on the Donner Project in the Sierra Mountains of California. Dr. Dixon knew the dogs and their work ethic, and she decided to invite them to help find Lolo.

APRIL 22, 2005
Early in the morning, about 20 people from the Traveler’s Rest Chapter and from the University of Montana and two dog handlers from the Institute for Canine Forensics with their dogs, met at Grave Creek, close to where Lolo and his wife had lived. The group hiked part of the Lolo trail to the clearing on top of the Bitterroot Mountain where George Knapp gave us a short case history. The two ICF dog handlers asked that Don Hall's magnetometer report and the oral history information about the possible grave location not be shown to them so that the canine search would not be influenced. The forest clearing measured roughly 60x60 meters, and sloped southward about eight degrees. The weather was bright and sunny, ambient temperature was F60, with a breeze coming up the slope from the southwest side. The soil was loose, sandy, and very moist from recent rain and snow runoff.

10:25 AM - the first search dog was deployed. A hasty search of the area allowed time for the dog to acclimatize. In about 15 minutes, after smelling up, down, and around a cluster of three young pines, the dog alerted just below the pines, in the lower center of the clearing. Reentering the same area, the dog gave two additional alerts in roughly the same place. The last alert was north of the pines, about 3 meters directly above the first three alerts.

10:40 AM - the second search dog was deployed. It confirmed the first dog’s alerts in the same general area below and above the pines.

11:00 AM - after a short rest, the first dog searched again; this time she approached the cluster of pine trees from the north side - against the wind. She checked the young pines with head up, and alerted on the north side of them.

SEARCH CONCLUSION
The dog handlers mapped out an area of approximately 10x10 ft where the dogs had alerted. When they finished, the handlers gave Dr. Dixon, George Knapp and the rest of the group their findings, showing the group the alert boundaries and explaining their working theory. Only then were they shown the magnetometer report and the map with the location of the proposed grave from the 1939 eye witness account. The dog alerts were only 5 to 6 meters downhill from the spot on the map. As was expected, the dogs confirmed the site measured by Dan Hall and his magnetometer. But why were the dogs’ alerts not right on the proposed location?

SCENT TRAVELS MUCH LIKE GASSES OR LIQUIDS
Our experience has shown us that the scent from a decomposed human body travels, flowing downhill with rain water and snow runoff. In this case, the surface slopes eight degrees southward from the proposed burial site shown on the magnetometer map, toward the cluster of young pines below. This was precisely where the dogs picked up the scent and alerted.

CONCLUSION
The eyewitness testimony of Ralph Space, Dan Hall’s magnetometer reading and now the Dogs’ trained noses, all confirmed the location of Lolo’s grave.
"On the 4th of July, 2005, a memorial service for Lawrence "Lolo" Rence was held on a ridge overlooking Grave Creek off U.S. Highway 12, about 16 miles west of the town of Lolo," writes Betsy Cohen from the Missoulian.

"When the ceremony concluded, Lolo’s grave was officially marked with a large white cross. Members of the Traveler’s Rest, dressed as explorers, shot off a volley from muzzleloader rifles. As ash fell from the sky and the gunshots echoed, the small gathering bowed their heads in respect. For a second, past and present came to a strange, mesmerizing standstill. The forgotten frontiersman is now remembered."

On November 6, 2005, the Traveler’s Rest Chapter of Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation erected a monument at Lolo’s grave location.

The engraving on the stone reads
"Lou Lou" Lawrence Rence

The Institute for Canine Forensics is very proud of their dogs Ness and Rhea, and are very proud to be playing a small part in documenting America’s History.

For further information, contact:

Eva Cecil
Institute for Canine Forensics
PO Box 81
Los Altos, CA 94022

evacecil@aol.com
www.k9forensic.org