Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 January 1915 — STILL IN STONE AGE [ARTICLE]

STILL IN STONE AGE

REMARKABLE NATIVES OF THE CAROLINE IBLANDB.

One of Their Moot Striking Peculiar!* ties le Their Use of Grindstones as What Might Be Catted a Form of Currency.

When the Japanese conquered Yap, capital of the Caroline islands, they found a good many things there to surprise them, for there is no quainter spot on the face of the globe, no place where the customs are more strange and more delightfully humorous from the point of view of the western world. Some time ago Dr. William Henry Furness 111. the scientist of Philadelphia, made at£|jpit to the islands and studied the character and customs of the inhabitants —probably the first time such a thing was ever done* He brought home with him a large collection of ethnological specimens, which he presented to the University museum, which is a department of the University of Pennsylvania. The most remarkable of the specimens are what appear to be a lot of grindstones. These are coin of the realm in the Caroline islands and nothing else is used except a few clam shells for very small change. Now, in the Caroline islands nature provides the people with everything that most men work hard to get—food, shelter and clothing. The food is abundant, the shelter easy to make and the amount of clothing depends entirely upon the style and not comfort, The only thing the people need money for is to get ornaments of various sorts, and so it came about that grindstones became the currency of the realm. It nfay he noted that when the first white people reached Yap there was not in any of the Caroline islands anything resembling metal. These people were still In the stone age, and there they are for the most part today. The grindstones are not for use, for they have no need for axes or scythes. They come from the Pellew islands, many miles away, and are fetched on rafts with sails and paddles, although In modem times prosaic steamships sometimes perform the service. A chicken can be bought with a grindstone weighing 100 pounds, a pig for 600 pounds and a wife for half a ton. Some of these Btones are* 12 feet in diameter and weigh five tons. They are only rudely circular and have a hole in the center proportioned to the size.

The owner of the money does- not consider that possession is even one point in the law. Generally he does not take his stone with him. The richest family In the Islands, the one which may be called the Rockefeller outfit of Yap, is In what would be by most persons looked upon as in a sad condition. It owns by far the largest grindstone ever mined in the Pellew islands. Figures as to its size vary,-bat there is no doubt that it is enormous nor that it is owned by the multimillionaire family of Yap. The seemingly unfortunate thing is that it is at the bottom of the Pacific ocean, having fallen off the raft inf transportar tion. That, however, does not mean anything to the people of Yap. They are not ostentatious of their wealth. They own that stone and that is all there is to it. The university museum has other specimens from Yap which make one think that Alice in Wonderland was not wholly a figment of the Imagination. It may be that Lewis Carroll had been to the Caroline islands.