Editing Carleton S. Coon (section)

== Other work ==

=== Archaeology ===

After taking up his position at Pennsylvania in 1948, Coon embarked on a series of archaeological expeditions to Iran, Afghanistan and Syria.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|title=Coon, Carleton Stevens|url=https://iranicaonline.org/articles/coon-carleton-stevens-b|access-date=2020-10-05|website=Encyclopaedia Iranica}}</ref> His 1949 excavations at four cave sites in Iran ([[Bisitun Cave|Bisitun]], [[Tamtama Cave|Tamtama]], [[Khunik Cave|Khunik]] and [[Belt Cave|Belt]]) were the first systematic investigations of [[Paleolithic|Palaeolithic]] archaeology in Iran.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":3">{{Cite journal|last=Mortensen|first=Peder|date=1987|title=Philip E.L. Smith, 1986. – ''Palaeolithic Archaeology in Iran''. (Review)|url=https://www.persee.fr/doc/paleo_0153-9345_1987_num_13_1_4929_t1_0137_0000_1|journal=Paléorient|volume=13|issue=1|pages=137–138}}</ref> The most significant of these was Bisitun, which Coon called "Hunter's Cave", where he discovered evidence of the [[Mousterian industry]]<ref name=":2" /> and several human fossils that were later confirmed to belong to [[Neanderthal]]s.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Trinkaus|first1=Erik|last2=Biglari|first2=F.|date=2006|title=Middle Paleolithic Human Remains from Bisitun Cave, Iran|url=https://www.persee.fr/doc/paleo_0153-9345_2006_num_32_2_5192|journal=Paléorient|volume=32|issue=2|pages=105–111|doi=10.3406/paleo.2006.5192}}</ref> Coon published the results of these excavations in a 1951 monograph, ''Cave Explorations in Iran, 1949'',<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Garrod|first=Dorothy A. E.|date=1952|title=Cave Explorations in Iran, 1949. By Carleton S. Coon. 10 3/4 by 8 1/4 pp. 124. 33 plates, map, plans, sections . University Museum, Pennsylvania. $1.50.|url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0003598X00024261/type/journal_article|journal=Antiquity|language=en|volume=26|issue=104|pages=228–230|doi=10.1017/S0003598X00024261|issn=0003-598X}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Adams|first=Robert M.|date=1954-01-01|title=Cave Explorations in Iran 1949. Carleton S. Coon|url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/371182|journal=Journal of Near Eastern Studies|volume=13|issue=1|pages=65–66|doi=10.1086/371182|issn=0022-2968}}</ref> and subsequently wrote a popular book about the expeditions, ''The Seven Caves: Archaeological Explorations in the Middle East'' (1957).<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Howells|first=W. W.|date=1957|title=The Seven Caves. Archaeological Explorations in the Middle East. Carleton S. Coon.|journal=American Anthropologist|language=en|volume=59|issue=5|pages=930–931|doi=10.1525/aa.1957.59.5.02a00500|issn=1548-1433|doi-access=free}}</ref> Bisitun remained the only fully-published Palaeolithic site from Iran for several decades.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":3" />

Coon followed up his 1949 expedition with excavations at [[Hotu cave|Hotu Cave]] in 1951.<ref name=":4">{{Cite journal|last=Howe|first=Bruce|date=1954|title=Ethnology and Ethnography: Excavations in Hotu Cave, Iran, 1951: A Preliminary Report. Carleton S. Coon. The Pleistocene Artifacts of Hotu Cave, Iran. Louis B. Dupree. The Human Skeletal Remains from Hotu Cave, Iran. J. Lawrence Angel|url=https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1525/aa.1954.56.5.02a00480|journal=American Anthropologist|language=en|volume=56|issue=5|pages=922–923|doi=10.1525/aa.1954.56.5.02a00480|issn=1548-1433}}</ref> He interpreted the site, together with Belt Cave, as the first traces of a "[[Mesolithic]]" in Iran and claimed that they showed evidence of early [[agriculture]].<ref>C. S. Coon, "Excavations in Huto Cave, Iran, 1951: A Preliminary Report", ''Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society''; 96, 1952, pp. 231–269.</ref><ref name=":4" /><ref name=":5">{{Cite journal|last=Braidwood|first=Robert J.|date=1952|title=Review of Cave Explorations in Iran 1949|journal=American Anthropologist|volume=54|issue=4|pages=551–553|doi=10.1525/aa.1952.54.4.02a00240|jstor=664896|issn=0002-7294|doi-access=free}}</ref> Other archaeologists questioned the basis for these claims<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":5" /> and subsequent excavations at sites such as [[Ganj Dareh]] clarified that Coon had probably conflated separate [[Epipalaeolithic Near East|Epipalaeolithic]] hunter-gatherer and [[Neolithic]] farmer occupations at the sites.<ref name=":2" />

===Cryptozoology===

Coon was, up to his death, a proponent of the existence of bipedal [[cryptids]], including [[Sasquatch]] and [[Yeti]]. His 1954 book ''The Story of Man'' included a chapter on "Giant Apes and Snowmen" and a figure showing the purported footprints of an "Abominable Snowman" alongside those of extinct hominids,<ref>{{Cite book|last=Coon|first=Carleton S.|title=The Story of Man: From the First Human to Primitive Culture and Beyond|publisher=Knopf|year=1962|edition=2nd rev.|location=New York|language=en|oclc=489646}}</ref> and near the end of his life he wrote a paper on "Why There Has to Be a Sasquatch".<ref>{{cite web|last1=Coon|first1=Carleton|title=Why There Has to Be a Sasquatch|url=http://www.bigfootencounters.com/articles/coon.htm|access-date=2020-10-05|website=Bigfoot Encounters}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last=Liechty|first=Mark|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zNYZDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA58|title=Far Out: Countercultural Seekers and the Tourist Encounter in Nepal|publisher=University of Chicago Press|year=2017|isbn=978-0-226-42913-7|location=Chicago|pages=55–59|language=en}}</ref> In the late 1950s, he was approached by [[Life (magazine)|''Life'' magazine]] about either joining [[Tom Slick]] and Peter Byrne's expedition to the [[Himalayas]] to search for evidence of Yeti, or organising his own expedition.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|last=Dickey|first=Colin|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Zri-DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA102|title=The Unidentified: Mythical Monsters, Alien Encounters, and Our Obsession with the Unexplained|publisher=Viking|year=2020|isbn=978-0-525-55757-9|location=New York|pages=102–105|language=en}}</ref> Although Coon spent some time planning the logistics, in the end neither materialised.<ref name=":1" /> Coon believed that cryptid "Wild Men" were [[Relict (biology)|relict]] populations of Pleistocene apes and that, if their existence could be proved scientifically, they would lend support to his theory of the separate origins of human races.<ref name=":1" />

Cultural historian [[Colin Dickey]] has argued that the search for Sasquatch and Yeti are inextricably linked to racism: "For an anthropologist like Coon, invested in finding some sort of scientific basis to justify his racism, Wild Men lore offered a compelling narrative, a chance to prove a scientific basis for his white supremacy."<ref name="Dickey" /> It has also been speculated that the Yeti expeditions that Coon was involved with were [[Official cover|cover]] for American espionage in Nepal and Tibet, since both he and Slick had links to US intelligence agencies,<ref name=":1" /> and Byrne was allegedly involved in the extraction of the [[14th Dalai Lama]] from Tibet by the CIA in 1959.<ref name=":0" />

Coon's views on cryptids were a major influence on [[Grover Krantz]], and the two were close friends in his later life.{{Sfn|Regal|2011}}