Tony’s Museum – Pacific Geo Lab

Tony’s Museum

Nonfiction. These events took place mid 1990s primarily at the PMG labs in the old Robbinsdale High School on 36^th Ave.

Sometimes when you need an elephant skull, you need an elephant skull – there’s no getting around it. No cow skull, no horse skull, no buffalo skull will do. Not even a giant moose cranium bedecked with gnarly big antlers, will cut it. It has to be an elephant skull.

Hal and I needed an elephant skull. And in case you didn’t know it, they’re in short supply these days. At least here in North America. But didn’t used to be: the whole continent was overrun by ‘em, back in the day – the Pleistocene day, that is. Up until the end of the Ice Age, elephants were wildly abundant on this continent. In fact, we had multiple types: Mastodons, Mammoths, Gomphotheres and Platybelodons all stomped around like they owned the place, which they did. But about 10,000 years ago the climate changed, the Ice Age abruptly ended, and things went all akimbo. Much of the megafauna on the continent died out, elephants included.

But not just elephants. Inexplicably, an incredible diversity of large animals in North America fell into the pit of extinction at the close of the Pleistocene: horses, tapirs, camels, rhinos, sloths, lions (yes, lions), sabre-toothed tigers, cave bears, dire wolves, giant beavers, and a whole lot more just up and disappeared from North America. Poof – gone!

Some researchers like to point out that the rapid decline of megafauna here suspiciously coincides with the appearance of humans on the stage. This, they claim, strongly suggests human malfeasance. As the theory goes, Paleo Indians obviously over-ran and over-hunted the whole shebang. I’m not buying it. While there’s ample evidence of people killing and eating mammoths, it’s a very, very, far stretch that a handful of stone-tool ragamuffins killed off an entire continent of elephants – along with all the other species that followed them into oblivion.

Seems more likely to me that a bunch of old white guys (read “academic researchers”), with a prejudiced cob up their collective butt, got together and decided the Indians were a problem – even before the white guy’s ancestors came along to fix things by slaughtering the Natives and the remaining megafauna too. Buffalo – which numbered perhaps 30,000,000 before whites came along – were not even hunted, really, they were just gleefully shot by the millions of European morons for sport. And sometimes not even for sport – just for “something to do” while riding a train across the plains. When the smoke settled on that travesty, whites had killed off 99.999994 percent of the population. There were only about 200 left alive and it’s a miracle the species did not go extinct.

By the mid 1990s, Hal and I were sick of the retail scene. Potomac Museum Group had four stores in the Twin Cities that ate up most of our time and all of our vitality. We decided to sell out the inventory, close the stores, and dump all our money into something more meaningful: traveling natural history exhibitions. The inconvenient fact that we had never planned, built, or promoted one of these complex events, did not deter us one iota from starting down that blissful path, completely unaware of how many millions of dollars we’d eventually sink into the venture. We jumped right in rebranding PMG as a producer of traveling natural history exhibitions.

If you’re going to do such a thing, why start small? Go big or go home! as they say, whomever “they” is. If we intended to get into this business of traveling exhibits, we were diving into the deep end. So, we started with a whopper: ELEPHANTS! 50 million years of Evolution was a 15,000 square foot behemoth that filled five tractor trailers and took a small army three weeks to install. Once completed, it had a price tag of $120,000 for a six month venue – a huge amount, at the very top of the market. How we ever thought we could pull it off defies any logic. Considering our circumstances at the time, it was absolutely the stupidest, most outlandish, and most costly, thing we could have ever done. If ignorance is bliss, we were smoking some serious pot and were so far out of our minds as to be floating somewhere past Pluto.

It was genius.

We started building ELEPHANTS! mid 1994 with a scheduled opening of fall 1996. It quickly became apparent we had no idea what we’d gotten ourselves into. Nonetheless, our vision originally crystalized around a full-size 14 foot tall fossil elephant skeleton: the Hebior Mammoth. But, really, wouldn’t it be nice to have a full-size fleshed-out model next to it, complete with woolly hair? How about a modern 11 foot tall elephant skeleton beside it for comparison? And if you’re going to have a full size modern elephant, you ought to have a baby skeleton as well. While you’re at it, why not a really cool 25 foot long gomphothere? And a 20 x 40 foot copy of an actual fossil excavation site would be good too. And also a bunch of “dwarf” elephants from some islands. What about those famous frozen mammoths from Russia? May as well throw in a real size Paleo Indian kill scene (30’ x 40’) with three or four humans. Don’t forget the elephant shrine!

ELEPHANTS! became something of a monster, growing bigger by the day. The money we had banked from selling our retail business evaporated in less than a year. To keep all the balls in the air, we cut deals with key suppliers, bartered for artwork, and, in perhaps our most ostentatious move, future-sold fossils we had not yet excavated. We mortgaged our houses and lives on this venture and were certifiably insane.

Time flew by. Before we knew it, it was summer 1996, with the ELEPHANTS! opening only a few months away. While not exactly 100% ready, we had most of the exhibits done and crated, ready for shipment. What we didn’t have was a real elephant skull and its toothy jaw for the all-important Touch the Past display. This was a huge gaping hole in our plan. We had promised this key exhibit to all the venues, many of whom had already plunked down serious deposit money. The cabinetry for it was finished, but the actual elephant skull specimen had not been secured. The display lay barren in the lab.

During that summer, through some connections in the zoological world, we became acquainted with an elephant sanctuary in Arkansas that had buried a female Asian elephant named Ellen about two years prior. If we dug it up, they told us, we could use the skeleton for our exhibit, skull included. So we packed up a team and drove to Riddles Elephant Sanctuary. Scott Riddle and his wife Heidi were very accommodating and happy to help our cause. After an all-inclusive tour and hearty lunch, Scott took us over to the place they had buried Ellen.

When an elephant dies in the wild – like the African bush – in very short order the bones become naturally cleaned. In as little as six weeks, carrion beetles and their brethren can reduce the body to its elemental inorganics, with nary a trace of odor left. So the fact that Ellen had been buried for two years was ample enough time for a good thorough cleaning by the sultans of the underworld. Or so we thought.

Right about here, Scott said, waiving his arm toward a small hillock on the edge of the property. I’ll let you guys have at it and I’ll check back in an hour.

We set about the task at hand. It was easy going at first – Hal, Clayton, and I dug quickly. But as we got down a few feet, the clay soils hung tough and we found ourselves chopping with our shovels as much as digging. At about four foot deep, we started to smell the foul odor of rotting flesh. In another foot we hit a thick grey plastic stretched tight over the bone pile. By this time the stench was powerful.

Why would they put a tarp over the body? Hal surmised that perhaps Scott and company wrapped the body in it when they buried her. But plastic? That wouldn’t help matters if you wanted the thing to decompose. We sat in the shade of nearby trees for a break from the heat and the smell. Undoubtedly the bone pile was just below the plastic and it wouldn’t be long before we had our bones, and a skull. We also knew, considering the stink, that we’d have to wash the bones thoroughly and dry them in the sun. It would be at least a couple days before we were finished, but there was satisfaction in knowing our labors would soon yield a real elephant skull.

Clayton was anxious. If we gotta do it, let’s get going! he said, grabbing his shovel and heading back to the dig like a little kid eager to get dirty. Just then Scott pulled up and I asked him about the plastic tarp. His response was elucidating. There’s no tarp, he said. I glanced over at Clayton. Down in the hole, he had his shovel poised, and was just getting ready to break through to the bone pile. Clayton! I shouted. He had no idea why I was yelling at him.

Let’s do this! He yelled while raising the shovel, ready to hack away the “plastic”. About then Hal realized the same thing I had. STOP! we screamed in unison. Stop right now, or you’re fired! He stopped in the nick of time. Scott started laughing. Hal and I did too.

Clayton came over, What’s the problem? he asked, a bit peeved. I filled him in – That’s not plastic! It took a moment, but he finally comprehended – the clay had very effectively retarded the natural reduction processes. What we had here was a thoroughly rotting mass of flesh and bone encased in tough grey skin balloon. If Clayton had broken the surface, there’s no telling what wretched, foul, explosion of goo might erupt from within.

We still had no skull.

As the time approached for the exhibit opening, I despaired of ever finding a skull in time. We made backup plans to bring one from Africa, where I had documented hundreds in the Kenya Wildlife Service research stations. But that would be a protracted process, one that would take at least a year. As time ran out, it looked like we would have to negotiate a discount for the venues that were going to be without it. That was money effectively already spent, so how we would manage that was a disturbing question.

My brother Mike made a suggestion: How about checking that funky junk shop in Duluth? They’ve got all kinds of weird stuff.

For many years, Tony’s Museum was a local landmark abiding along a stretch of Superior Street in downtown Duluth. While not really thriving, the street wasn’t completely dead, either. Every other storefront was boarded up. But in between were businesses making the most of what little tourist traffic found its way there. Tony’s was famous – and not necessarily in ways you would want it to be, had you been the proprietor.

Tony himself was a rather nervous late middle-aged fellow of medium build and stringy grey hair. He had dark eyes and talked fast – literally. There was an air of urgency about him as if he worried about a tomorrow that might never come. One might compare Tony to a used-car salesman, although I’m not sure which of the two would win the integrity competition.

The collection Tony had amassed crammed his storefront chock-a-block full of strange items – a lot of which was way over-the-top and off-the-wall. An electric red neon light, in the shape of a lightening bolt, was mounted inside a cleaved tree trunk and had the label My Splitting Headache! A dancing – and singing – old miniature marionette on a little worn-out stage. An old red English phone booth, complete with phone which actually worked, or so I was told. Some might say it was all junk. But, as they say – one person’s junk, another one’s revenue stream. Seemed to me there was a lot of the former.

Tony was a modern-day P.T. Barnum – the Showman of Duluth, some would say; a complete and entertaining self-promoter; a bona fide purveyor of antiquated everything. Where one person might see a rusting pile of old iron, Tony would see a collection of historical artifacts ready for his shop/museum. He had all kinds of stuff: old pulleys, faded wedding dresses, rusty railroad signs, wooden wagon wheels, stuffed animals, Roman coins, shrunken skulls, arrowheads, pottery, TV show robots, human organs in glass jars … you get the picture.

Tony’s pride and joy was his mummy. Tony’s Mummy, the locals called it. It had made Tony quite a celebrity around town. As the story goes, an academic archeologist from back East stopped into the shop one day and was taken aback to find the artifact, apparently from Ancient Egypt, on display in a common thrift store. It was a small, ancient, human mummy, complete with ornate burial sarcophagus. Tony described how he had acquired it – through cunning, intrigue, and luck – from a peasant whose grandfather had worked in the excavations of royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings. Apparently, the British sahibs who had been digging up Egypt the prior century didn’t have enough cash on hand, so they paid the workers off in loot. Tony managed to parlay that into his most notable display piece.

The archeologist was thoroughly appalled that such a treasure was in private hands – denigrated, no less, to the smoky backrooms of a shady junk shop in Duluth, of all places! He knew that the government of Egypt claimed full title to all such artifacts, regardless of when or how they had been excavated – that is, “stolen” – from their soils. All the respectable museum repositories outside of Egypt had long since made amends with the government by repatriating most of their collections and arranging for licenses to legally borrow what the government allowed them to keep. Tony didn’t have such a license, nor did he give a damn – and told the archeologist as much when the fellow had the nerve to ask. This bravado did not favorably impress the patron. The archeologist called the Egyptian Embassy; the Embassy called the cops; the cops called the FBI; and the FBI raided Tony’s Museum. Thus began the calamity of the century.

For a sleepy little tourist town like Duluth, an FBI raid was a sensational front-page story. The opportunity was not lost on the local grandstanding politicians, who arm-wrestled each other for camera time. They issued righteous declarations condemning “pot hunters” who raided sacred ancient burials for personal gain. They pontificated about illegal trafficking in antiquities. They called into question how such a bold flaunting of international law could possibly have carried on for so long – right here in downtown Duluth! Where was justice? This was an *outrage! and a slap in the face of the fine citizenry of our fair city!

They came, they raided, they served Tony with search warrants. What could he do? He begrudgingly cooperated, all the while insistent that no law had been broken and that the whole thing was a despicable miscarriage of justice. A set-up! He was the poor victim of over-reaching politicians that had no respect for the rule of law. He’d get his lawyer and he’d have the last laugh! He damn-sure would!

Despite their rough SWAT-team tactics, the FBI was exceptionally careful of the mummy itself. Due to its antiquity and obvious lack of proper curation, the specimen was crumbling into powder, as ancient mummies are wont to do. They very gingerly packed it up and, in a caravan not dissimilar to a funeral procession, hauled it up the hill to the University of Minnesota where, coincidentally, one Dr. Arthur Aufderheide (Dr A.), a paleopathologist and expert on mummies

– aka the “Mummy Doctor” – had been studying such things for decades. (see “The Mummy Doctor”, New Yorker magazine, May 16, 2005)

The authorities all agreed the proper thing to do was return the artifact to Egypt. Or at least offer it up to the Egyptian authorities, if, in fact, it had come from there. The state Attorney General took over the case. Before bringing charges, the first order of business was to establish the provenance of the specimen: Where was it from? Exactly which tomb had it been stolen from, by whom, and when?

They subpoenaed Tony’s records. Not surprisingly, he had none. Further, he claimed – rather conveniently it seemed – that he couldn’t quite remember where he’d gotten the mummy. Was it the antique show in Madison? Or maybe it was from that farmer in Iowa. He just wasn’t sure… it had been so long ago. When quizzed about the yarn he told the archeologist, Tony allowed as how that was Just a little fun showmanship for the public…

Dr A. said the best place to start was to establish the actual age and sex of the mummified human remains. At the same time, it would be a good idea to do a radio-carbon date on the cloth to establish how old it was. The popular theory was betting the mummy was from Egypt – inscriptions on the funeral casket sure looked that way. But Dr A. wasn’t jumping to any conclusions. A thorough investigation was needed. The Attorney General gave him the go-ahead. Let’s move this along, he said, waiving his file about like a diploma, We want answers as soon as possible! Once we have them, I’ll call the Embassy myself. Heads were gonna roll…

They snipped out a little of the gauze and sent it back East for testing. Dr A. studied the wooden casket, photographed the inscriptions, and mailed a package off to Egyptologist friends at Harvard and the British Museum. Eventually he took the mummy into the medical center for scanning. The greatest detail would come from an MRI, and that’s where he started. But during the initial scan, the machine went berserk and lit up the display with all sorts of warnings. Something was not right. So, he took it over for a simple X-ray. Although a much less sensitive machine, the results were very clear and very compelling. No need for an MRI – he had it nailed and he knew it. He wasn’t called the “Mummy Doctor” for nothing.

Dr A. wrote his report and delivered his findings the very same day. This was much quicker than the Attorney General was anticipating. Who was this “Mummy Doctor” and how could he be so fast, and so sure, when so much was at stake? He nonetheless took the sealed envelope and pulled it open. The contents told the tale – the proof was there, and it was obvious. He understood immediately. It was, to be sure, an amazing discovery.

The AG hastily called a meeting, bringing together all the cops, lawyers, scientists, and staff on the case. He requested Dr A. make an appearance to underscore the results of his findings and field any questions. They also summoned Tony. It was time for him to face the music.

Word leaked out and the press appeared, en masse. There was breaking news in the mummy case! They descended on the city offices like a swarm of locusts, cameras rolling. They caught Dr. A. as he walked across the parking lot. No comment, no comment. You’ll have to ask the Attorney General, he exclaimed. Tony arrived and the media went into overdrive. Far from being humble and subdued, here he came strutting in like a peacock, bombastically declaring how he had been framed: the cops were the real crooks and he was going to sue the bastards! He paraded around and gave the cameras plenty of primetime footage. By the time he got into the conference room he was smirking contemptuously, like some deranged hyena.

The mummy was on display at the front table. Once the room quieted down, the AG took the podium: We’re here today to reveal the results of our investigation. In short – the mummy is a fake! And because of that we owe an apology to Tony…

The supposed mummy was nothing more than paper mache over chicken wire, wrapped in gauzy cloth, painted with old wood pitch, doused in smelly turpentine, and with a couple handfuls of dirt rubbed in for good measure. It fooled everyone – everyone, that is, except Dr. A. and, of course, Tony. He knew all along. Some believe he actually created it. But Tony wouldn’t say. Barnum would be proud….

With the Mummy Ruse as a backdrop, I entered the storied catacombs of Tony’s Museum in search of an elephant skull. After a brief tour of duty through the dingy crypt, I happened upon Tony as he was fidgeting with a bizarre floor lamp made of bird houses stacked atop each other. Whether the artist who made it just liked bird houses or actually intended to lure the more stupid avians into them, was a question I thought to ask, but didn’t. I was, after all, in Tony’s Museum and in the presence of the great man himself. So I asked the more pressing question about an elephant skull.

Why in the hell would you think I had such a thing!? Tony growled, peering over his glasses, agitated that I would insult him with such a stupid question. I was about to apologize for the impertinence and push the reset button when he let out a laughing roar and said, Of course I do! Old Tony has EXACTLY what you’re looking for! Follow me. I was dumbfounded – could it really be true? Tony led me zig-zagging through the narrow aisles, into a nook in the back wall. And there it was! There on a table was a very large, very beautiful, African elephant skull in perfect condition, complete with a jaw full of gnarly old teeth. It was breath-taking.

There ya go! Tony said proudly. I got that from a gal whose husband was a Great White Hunter. He liked to go around the world killing things. I’ll bet that’s been here for 10 years. People like to touch it, but nobody needs an elephant skull on their fireplace mantel.

I asked the price. $3,000. Now, there’s no question that it was well worth $3,000. And it was perfect for what we needed. The only problem was we didn’t have $3,000 and, truth-be-told, we couldn’t even afford half that. Even so, I bartered with him. I told him about our project, and he seemed intrigued.

I’ll go down to $2,600 for ya, he declared, but that’s the best I can do. As I handed him my business card, I told him we were definitely interested but I’d have to consult Hal and see how we could arrange to pay for it. I was on my way back to the Twin Cities and would call him up the next day. I’ll be here, he said, as I left.

I drove south, puzzling about how we’d ever be able to buy Tony’s elephant skull. I figured if I showed up later with cash, he could probably be talked down – maybe even to $2,200. But we didn’t have even a thousand. Yet, we still had a couple months to go before we shipped out the exhibit so now that we knew where to get it, we had some time to figure it out.

When I saw Hal later that day and told him about it, he agreed that was the way to go. With my Dad (another showman altogether!), as our sales manager consistently pre-selling the show schedule, we’d likely get some deposit money on venues in the next month or two. In the meantime, just in case, I’d drive back to Duluth the next weekend, negotiate with Tony, and maybe put some cash down on it. We were relieved – finally we had a plan to finish up the exhibit!

And then…

You know that old saying about the best-laid plans? Well, whoever came up with it must have been trying to acquire an elephant skull.

The next day, before I got a chance to call him, the Showman of Duluth called me. Jon! Jon! I gotta talk to you! Tony said breathlessly, There’s a guy here who wants to buy that elephant skull! But I told him you had first dibs…

At first, I was stunned. Really? But then I realized this for what it was – the old charlatan was trying to put one over on us so he could: a) get his full price, and b) get it fast. What a bunch of salesman crap! Did Tony think I was born yesterday?! That skull had an inch of dust on it and, by his own admission, had been sitting there for 10 years! And now, all of a sudden!, some guy walks in the very next day after I expressed interest and is in a rush to buy it? I was not about to fall for this obvious bullshit!

Tony! Do you take me for a fool? I asked, incredulously. You can’t pull this crap on ME – I’ve been around, my friend, and know all the angles. There’s no way I’m falling for this scam!

No, no, Jon! Tony exclaimed excitedly, I’m not bullshitting! Really, it’s true! Honest to God, I’ve had this thing here for a decade and nobody has given a gnat’s ass about it. Now, in less than 24 hours, I get TWO guys who want to buy it! I’m NOT kidding, this is for real!

Hal was nearby, so I put Tony on hold. We both agreed this was used-car sales tactics. I returned to the call ready to do battle:

Tony, I said firmly, we’re not going to let you get away with scamming us like this. Now, let’s just hang up, forget you tried to pull this crap on us, and I’ll see you next week.

But Jon! he was actually yelling now, I’m telling the Goddamned truth! There won’t be any skull next week! If you don’t care, just say so and I’ll sell it to this guy right now. I’m just trying to give you a chance…if you come back here with some cash, I’ll sell it to you. Otherwise it’s gone!

Oh, for God’s sake! Now he’s issued an ultimatum? The odds were about a million to one that Tony, the bombastic King of the Bullshitters, was telling the truth. But what if he was? We’d lose what likely would be our only chance to get a skull before the show opened. I hung up with Tony and called my brother. Hey Mike – guess what?! You know that shop in Duluth you told us to check out? Well, it just so happens…

I drove back up to Duluth and entered the shop not 24 hours after my last visit. Tony was all apologetic but I had cooled down on the long drive and was pretty much over it by the time I got there. I put the sale on Mike’s credit card and we packed the skull in the passenger seat beside me. As I shook hands with Tony I had to ask the obvious question:

Tony, now that the deal is done, we’re happy to have it. But just tell me honestly, was there really another buyer?

Absolutely! he said. Then he really embellished his story: It was some guy from a museum back East. No kidding. Said he wanted it for display – just like what you guys are doing. In fact, I thought he had been sent by you. But when I realized he wasn’t, that’s when I called you.

Sure, sure…I thought to myself as Tony blathered on.

I took off back to Minneapolis, thinking how ridiculous that story was. And how unoriginal! Tony hadn’t spent much time or effort concocting it. I provided him the plot the day before and all he did was repackage and send it back to me with the “other buyer” thrown in. I had to admit, however, that it was a clever ruse – and it worked. Tony got his money – all $2,600. And he got it in less than 24 hours. The man had sales gumption, that’s for sure. But we finally had an elephant skull!

Two days later I got one of the strangest phone calls of my life.

Hello, Mr. Kramer?… The guy on the other end spoke in a thick Boston accent, This is Tom DeSilva. I’m from the American Museum of Dentistry in Baltimore. I was in Duluth a couple days ago, visiting a place called Tony’s Museum….

I was flabbergasted – turns out the whole thing was for real. DeSilva offered to buy the skull from us for $5,000 – nearly double the price we’d paid for it only a few days earlier. Sometimes fact IS stranger than fiction. I called up Tony and apologized for questioning his integrity.

He laughed, Now, would you like to buy and Egyptian Mummy?

—————————-

AFTER WORDS

In the strange criss-cross weavings of life’s crazy quilt, we became good friends with Dr. Aufderheidi – the Mummy Doctor – during the mid 1990s when he took an interest in the Hebior Mammoth during the building of our ELEPHANTS! exhibit. The Hebior is an astounding discovery, excavated from a farm field in Wisconsin. The creature had been killed and butchered by Paleoindians about 12,500 years ago. There are chop marks and cut marks on many bones – produced by stone tools, some of which were found at the site.

The Hebior Mammoth was an old animal – possibly 65 years in age – and had been suffering many ailments, as evidenced in its skeleton. Among many other problems, it had badly injured its foot, resulting in a terrible chronic infection that misshaped the bones and was no doubt very painful. There were also several areas of spinal degradation, indicating a systemic infection in his skeleton. The poor guy even had a badly abscessed tooth. He was definitely hurting and that’s likely the key to how the Paleo Indians were able to take him down.

Once he heard we had the Hebior Mammoth in our labs, Dr A. became keenly interested in it. He traveled to our labs many times over the next few years to examine the bones and take photos and samples. He was thrilled to be able to work freely on such a unique specimen without the usual constraints of a museum setting. During the course of his investigations, he found some strange, unexplained nodules of bone that had been unearthed with the rest of the specimen.

His research led him toward an unusual theory: it appeared, he said, that the Hebior Mammoth may have contracted a form of tuberculosis – something Dr A. had documented in ancient mummies and animals. Although he was not completely certain, in his treatise on paleopathology he mentioned the mysterious boney nodules as possibly ossified tubercles from the lungs of the ancient elephant. This added another page of notoriety to the Hebior Mammoth story, which has become the most incredible mammoth discovery ever on the North American continent.

I am happy to report Dr A. was able to attend the ELEPHANTS! exhibit when it was hosted by the Science Museum of Minnesota in 1997-98. It was a grand event and he was a key part of the opening party. Hal and I remained good friends with him ever after. Sadly, Dr. Arthur Aufderheidi – the Mummy Doctor – died August 9, 2013 at the age of 90.