Emeritus Professor of Forensic Anthropology, University of Tennessee
Interview location: The Anthropology Research Facility ("The Body Farm"), University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA
Interview date: 29th and 30th November, 2007
Key Themes: Relationship with clinicans, Life, death and the hereafter, Mentors and influences, Motivation, Attributes of a pathologist
Profile | Transcript Summary | Full Transcript
Section 1
- The Body Farm: a brief history of the facility. How Bass obtained the land; what gave him the idea of starting such a facility. "If I'm talking to the police about how long somebody's been dead, I better know something about it."
- Relates the Colonel Shy case – miscalculates date of death by 112 years.
- Points out specific research projects, and explains various aspects of decomposition. "Maggots do not like sunlight, so if you have a body out there the maggots will leave the skin as an umbrella and they'll eat all of the interior organs away."
- Explains how they obtain bodies for research.
- Discusses squeamishness and developing detachment
- Describes training given to police, FBI and federal Disaster Response Teams.
- Development of the profession: replacing anecdotal evidence with science.
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Section 2
- Discusses his perspective on the bodies. "I don't see them as dead bodies. I see them as a forensic case."
- The case of the 'Big Bopper' – settling age-old questions about what happened to the people who died in the Buddy Holly plane crash. “The Big Bopper’s son learned more about his father than I know about mine.”
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Section 3
- Visit to the archives, where cleaned skeletal remains of the bodies are kept.
- Describes specific case of Japanese 'trophy' skull.
- Respect for the dead: explains an annual memorial service is held for families and friends.
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Section 4
- Early family life and education.
- University days. Key mentors: Charlie Snow and Wilton Krogman. “It was ‘aha learning’ as in ‘aha, that's what I want to do!’"
- The development of forensic anthropology – “they were called bone detectives” -- and the relationship with forensic pathology.
- Works with Tennessee police.
- Joins The Smithsonian Institution and works on skeletal material of Plains Indians. "I spent 14 summers out there, digging in the plains… Best summers I ever had."
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Section 5
- Working life. Continuing research and forensic investigations in USA.
- Joins expedition to Hasanlu, Iran.
- Emphasises importance of observation with story of wasp's nest in skull. “You have to be an observer of minutiae.”
- Relates case of ‘the boy in the box’. “The only area of forensics that I have trouble with is death of children.”
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Section 6
- Evolution of new technologies.
- Importance for forensics of DNA, ‘bone fluorescence’ (story of Liz Wilson) etc.
- Discusses his motivation, and the pleasures of teaching.
- Cremations: what can be deduced from the ashes.
- Discusses scandal of body parts stolen from US crematoria, and his role in the investigations. "It's difficult, when [someone's] been cremated, to know whether you got back all that you should have got back of a body."
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Section 7
- Discusses questions for further research – eg. how does chemotherapy for cancer affect decomposition of corpse? What does a 'cadaver dog' smell? What is the relationship between obesity and cremation weight?
- Issues of race: determining race of bodies; related controversies. "I worry about how scientific people are who say that everybody is alike."
- Story of second wife’s death from lung cancer. “She never smoked a day in her life.”
- Examples of cases that illustrate racial and other distinguishing characteristics.
- The importance of solving forensic cases: “You’re not satisfied until you’ve finished the puzzle."
- Discusses the richness of information in a skull. Facial reconstruction as a tool for identification.