1856 - Giant skeleton uncovered in an Italian coal mine?
CLAIM: An 11’6” human skeleton was uncovered from an Italian coal mine. (Hovind, 2003 , 50:10) RESPONSE: The earliest this story surfaces in the creation-evolution literature appears to be in Carl Baugh's 1987 Dinosaur (insert page number), where the sketch above (Baugh claims that it is a photograph) appears with the caption "A miner fell through a hole in a mine in Italy and found this 11'6" skeleton". It is also reproduced in the 1991 second edition of Dinosaur and is available from the Internet Archive . (Plate B) No mine name, date, journal, or museum is supplied. Baugh would later state that he had received the image and story from fellow creationist Clifford Burdick, but did not have any documentation to confirm anything beyond Burdick's verbal anecdote regarding the skeleton. Kent Hovind would later display it as well (adding that the skeleton was supposed to have been uncovered in 1856), but that was as far as the story went. As ...