Year One: Radiocarbon Dating and American Archaeology, 1947-1948

Abstract

This paper both expands and reconceptualizes our knowledge about the early (January 1947 to January 1948) and formative responses of American archaeologists and anthropologists to word and rumor about W. F Libby's 14C dating system. Drawing principally from primary sources for the first time, integrated with literature from the history and sociology of science, new and interpretative information is offered relative to several topics. They include: (1) the profession's inefficient communication networks and their influence on the year-long course of truncated dialogue about purported radioactive dating investigations afoot; (2) the divergent ways in which competing factions of elite specialists labored to formulate strategies to address the perceived implications of Libby's novel technique; (3) the particularly important roles in this period assumed by Chicago's Robert Redfield and Fred Eggan, the R. S. Peabody Foundation's Frederick Johnson, and the Viking Fund's Paul Fejos, among others; (4) the degree and manner in which the effort to grapple with the 14C dating proposal was integrally connected to an ongoing campaign to enhance the professional standing of American archaeology; and (5) clear indications that some archaeologists exhibited ambivalence, if not resistance, to the prospect of "physics" intruding into their domain.