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4A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL October 12, 2016 O PINION Offbeat Oregon History Oregon has been home since at least 12,400 B.C. BY FINN J.D. JOHN For the Sentinel O regon is a very young state. Its oldest buildings – those whose dates are known, at any rate – went up in the 1850s; many a visitor from the East Coast, where there are still buildings constructed in the 1600s, has gotten a chuckle out of the fuss Oregonians make over architecture and artifacts barely over a century old. But appearances are deceiving. As far as is known today, Oregon takes a back seat to nobody in a contest of antiquity. The earliest evidence of human habitation in North America is here – in the form of DNA that’s lit- erally 143 centuries old. And it’s far from the only evidence that humans have lived in the land we know as Or- egon for a long, long time. The DNA was recovered in 2008 by a team of archaeologists from the University of Oregon, led by Dennis Jenkins, during an expedition to the Paisley Caves, near the town of Pais- ley. Paisley is in north Lake County, by the bed of what was, 13,000 years ago, a massive freshwater lake called Lake Chewaucan. (Over the millen- nia, Lake Chewaucan slowly evapo- rated and shrank, year after year, until today all that is left are the shallow alkali waters of Summer Lake and Abert Lake). Dramatic and important as the dis- covery of this DNA was, though, it’s not likely anyone is going to want to see it on display in a museum. The DNA was extracted not from a mum- mifi ed skeleton like Otzi the Iceman, nor a freshly fed mosquito encased in amber like in Jurassic Park – but rath- er from an artifact that goes by the neat, clean, clinical term “coprolite.” Coprolites are – simply and bluntly put – feces. They’re ancient excre- tions that have either fossilized or been dried to the point that decompo- sition stopped. These particular ones, of course, were dried; and when they were tested in the university’s labo- ratory, they turned out to be 14,300 years old. This was a big deal, because prior to this discovery the oldest known inhabitants of the Americas were a primitive culture known as the Clovis People, who lived 13,000 years ago. It’s also a big deal because the last ice-age glacial period ended roughly 10,000 years ago; so, whoever left these “artifacts” behind lived (and pooped) in the years of full ice-age glaciation – 30 centuries before the retreating glaciers loosed the Mis- soula Floods tearing through the Columbia River Gorge to form the Willamette Valley, and 10 centuries before the Clovis people. Scientists were not slow to analyze their fi nd. The DNA indicated that the party who answered nature’s call 143 centuries before was of Siberian and East Asian origin, lending support to the “land-bridge theory,” which sug- gests that North America was popu- lated by people migrating over the ex- posed seafl oor from Siberia to Alaska during a time of low sea levels. Since the coprolites were found, their authenticity has been somewhat hotly debated in the archaeological community. One study analyzed the old stools for diet content and con- cluded that they were the feces of her- bivores, and the human DNA there- fore had to be the result of accidental contamination by the sloppy Univer- sity of Oregon researchers; those re- searchers, naturally, found this claim unconvincing. The debate continues, although Jenkins and his team have since returned to the site and found more specimens along with artifacts such as arrowheads. Even if the evidence for the 14,300- year claim were thrown out, though – maybe the coprolites could turn out to have been from the extinct Or- egon Cave Elk, or perhaps the Great Western Jackalope? – Oregon’s title as prehistoric capital of the West will still be safe, thanks to a pile of san- dals found in a cave near Fort Rock in 1938 by Luther Cressman, a Uni- versity of Oregon professor remem- bered today as the “father of Oregon archaeology.” Dr. Cressman – who’s also famous for having once been married to Dr. Margaret Mead – found the sandals with the help of legendary Oregon rancher-raconteur Reub Long, on whose Fort Rock property the cave stands. They’re made of sagebrush bark and look not much different from that type of modern beach san- dal that’s woven out of ropes. These were radiocarbon dated to an age of 9,000 years. Actually, they almost weren’t ra- diocarbon dated at all. After bringing them back to the university for study, Dr. Cressman carefully treated every square millimeter of the ancient foot- wear with a chemical preservative. A few years later, when the radiocarbon- dating technique was developed, Dr. Cressman was doubtless vigorously kicking himself for this. Once doped, the sandals could not be dated. Luck- ily, he had not found and “ruined” all the sandals; a return visit yielded a few more that he’d overlooked, and the dating was done on those. Some of these sandals can be viewed in the Fort Rock Museum in the nearby town of that name, or – for Please see OFFBEAT, Page 7A It’s open enrollment time: Five tips for selecting the right health benefi ts ARTICLE SUBMITTED BY UNITEDHEALTHCARE F all signals the start of many an- nual traditions – a new school year, football season, and holidays such as Halloween and Thanksgiving. 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A little extra time spent today can pay off next year in hav- ing a plan that works for you. The best foods for healthy eyes BY JOEL FUHRMAN, MD For the Sentinel A s This may be because carrots (and other orange and yellow vegetables and fruits) are abun- dant in beta-carotene, which is a provitamin A carotenoid, mean- ing it is converted to vitamin A in the body. Vitamin A is impor- tant for eye health, especially for night vision as it helps to produce a pigment called rho- dopsin in the retina, which helps a child, you probably heard that carrots are good for your eyes. $ PUUBHF ( SPWF 4 FOUJOFM 116 N. Sixth Street · P.O. Box 35 · Cottage Grove, OR 97424 ADMINISTRATION: JOHN BARTLETT, Regional Publisher.............................. 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In foreign countries, postage extra. No subscription for less than Ten Weeks. Subscription rates are subject to change upon 30 days’ notice. All subscritptions must be paid prior to beginning the subscription and are non-refundable. Periodicals postage paid at Cottage Grove, Oregon. Postmaster: Send address changes to P.O. Box 35, Cottage Grove, OR 97424. Local Mail Service: If you don’t receive your Cottage Grove Sentinel on the Wednesday of publication, please let us know. Call 942-3325 between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. Advertising ownership: All advertising copy and illustrations prepared by the Cottage Grove Sentinel become the property of the Cottage Grove Sentinel and may not be reproduced for any other use without explicit written prior approval. Copyright Notice: Entire contents ©2015 Cottage Grove Sentinel. the eye detect low levels of light and allows us to see at night. Vi- tamin A defi ciency is known to cause night blindness. However, beta-carotene is not the only carotenoid that contributes to healthy vision. Out of about 600 known carot- enoids, twenty have been found circulating in human blood and only two are found in the eye. They are lutein and zeaxanthin, which cannot be synthesized by the body and are primar- ily found in green leafy veg- etables. Once consumed, these two carotenoids accumulate in the macula, the inner portion of the retina, which has a high con- centration of photoreceptor (or light receptor) cells. The typical amount of lutein and zeaxanthin in the macula (called “macular pigment”) is quite low among Americans, due to low intake of leafy greens. The retina is the most metabolically active tissue in the body, and lutein and zeaxanthin provide antioxi- dant protection. Furthermore, macular pigment reduces glare, enhances contrast and visual acuity, and acts as a fi lter to pro- tect the macula from blue light damage. Blue light is a part of visible light (and sunlight), and electronic devices and energy- effi cient lighting increase our exposure to it, especially in the evenings. The idea that leafy greens benefi t vision began to gain momentum about 20 years ago in research on age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a disease in which the pho- toreceptors in the macula are progressively damaged or lost, causing impaired vision. AMD is the leading cause of blindness worldwide. In 1994, a study on AMD found that higher total carotenoid intake was associ- ated with lower risk of the dis- ease, and lutein and zeaxanthin were the specifi c carotenoids most strongly associated with decreased risk. When looking at foods, higher intake of spinach and collard greens (rich sources of lutein and zeaxanthin) were also associated with decreased risk.More studies followed, many reporting that higher lutein and zeaxanthin intake was linked to lower AMD risk. Supplementation trials in AMD patients also reported increases in macular pigment (more lutein and zeaxanthin in the eye) and improvement in visual perfor- mance. These results sparked the marketing of eye health supple- ments containing lutein and zeaxanthin. However, previ- ous fi ndings on isolated carot- enoid supplements should urge us to be cautious; several trials of beta-carotene supplements have reported an increased risk of lung cancer, cardiovascu- lar disease or overall mortal- ity. This is an unacceptable risk for a nutrient we can easily get from foods, which have no risk. These nutritional benefi ts are also enhanced by accompany- ing phytonutrients in green veg- etables that have further benefi ts to the entire body. The typical American diet is dangerously low in leafy greens, and the average adult’s intake of lutein + zeaxanthin from foods is a meager 1.5 mg per day. Just a single cup of cooked spin- ach or kale contains more than 20 mg of lutein + zeaxanthin, and collards more than 14 mg; commercial vision supplements commonly contain 10-20 mg of lutein plus two mg or less zeaxanthin. So, a healthful diet actually supplies more of these benefi cial nutrients for the eye than supplements do, and of course leafy greens have several advantages over supplements, in particular a huge variety of ad- ditional carotenoids and other benefi cial nutrients, with no risk of excess. Dr. Fuhrman is a #1 New York Times best-selling author and a board certifi ed family physician specializing in lifestyle and nu- tritional medicine. The Eat To Live Cookbook offers over 200 unique disease-fi ghting deli- cious recipes and his newest book, The End of Heart Disease, offers a detailed plan to prevent and reverse heart disease using a nutrient-dense, plant-rich eat- ing style. Visit his informative website at DrFuhrman.com. 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