Big find in little Chesterfield
For the small fee of $1, Coy Hatch will tell you about the mammoth bone found on his family's property.
Coy Hatch had a big surprise for those who ventured past his home during Chesterfield’s opening Memorial Day weekend. Behind a tent at a “Pop-Up Sale” conducted by his family, Coy had a number of artifacts which had been found on the property, including the main showpiece, a mammoth bone which had been discovered near the creek when Coy was “about five or six.” When the bone was brought up from the creek, according to Coy, they first thought it was a dinosaur bone. At first, people were skeptical, but once they saw the artifact, they are reported to have said, “Oh man! That is a big bone!”
Eventually, David Byers, Associate Professor and Graduate Program Director of the Anthropology program at Utah State University was contacted about the find, and submitted samples of the bone for scientific analysis. According to Byers, lab results on the mammoth bone revealed that “it is about 14,300 years old—that’s super cool!”
Coy also has a collection of ancient bison bones and teeth, as well as obsidian arrow heads and other artifacts. Coy says that bone shows that the animal was somewhat young. Although the University was excited about the discovery, they were not able to secure funding to further investigate the site at the moment. Coy and his family intend to hold onto the find for now, as “it is pretty cool!”
