Receptionist
became scientist, was among first to carbon-date Kennewick Man
By: NED RANDOLPH - Staff Writer
From the
moment his skull was found by the Columbia River in 1996 in eastern
But it was
Kirner, who tirelessly studied the radiocarbon age of bone fragments,
eventually succumbed to the limitations of her own bone tissue. Diagnosed with
a rare form of bone marrow cancer, the Diamond Bar resident died of the disease
July 31.
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56-year-old mother and grandmother, Kirner will be
remembered at a public memorial service at the
She was 48 when she was diagnosed with stage 4 multiple myeloma
in 1998 and was given four to six months to live. She fought on for another
eight years.
Her research on Kennewick Man's skeletal DNA revealed the remains had Asiatic
origins, which supported the theory that modern man reached the
"She was very big into education, really interested in ancient societies
and how certain peoples migrated to certain areas of the world," daughter
Jennifer Hakes said.
Kirner's second husband, former San Diego Chargers
lineman Gary Kirner, said the two would go to
football games at his alma mater, USC, long after she became ills.
Gary Kirner retired from the NFL in 1970 and worked
for Texaco for 33 years. In the end, he was the full-time caregiver for his
wife.
"She used to look to me as a hero, and I looked to her as a hero,
too," he said. "I was proud of her before (Kennewick Man), but that
was nice for her. I was always impressed with her intelligence. She would talk
about events at a party that happened five years ago, and I would look at her
blankly. She could remember stuff in incredible detail. It was amazing. And
even with this incredible intellect, she was humble."
Donna Kirner started from humble origins. For more
than 10 years, while married to her first husband, she was a PacBell customer
service representative, said Hakes, who was born in 1970.
Eventually, in 1982 Kirner decided to go back to
school and enrolled in
"She finally decided, 'This is not what I want out of life,' " Hakes
said. At 33, her mother discovered a new passion in archaeology, while working
on an excavation dig near
She then transferred to UC Riverside, where she earned a bachelor's, master's
and eventually Ph.D. in anthropology, studying under the renown
scientist, Dr. Ervin Taylor.
"She was climbing the ladder as far as being an authority in her field and
really becoming well known, and she got sick a year after that," Hakes
said.
"It's sad that it took that long to start her life's dream and have it cut
short. She was brilliant," she said. "That's what she loved to do. It
was natural for her."
Kirner also took special pride in Palomar's
role in her development, which led her through the
"She went all the way through until she was making significant
contributions to Carbon-14 dating knowledge," her husband said.
Using a powerful accelerator-mass spectrometer, scientists can count carbon
atoms to determine the age of any organic material up to 50,000 years old.
Kirner helped fine-tune the process so tiny samples
gave accurate estimates of age. She used various chemicals to crystalize the bone fragment, which she ran through the
accelerator at Lawrence Livermore Lab in
"Donna, she got the date with the smallest sample size than anyone else
(used) to that date," her husband said. "If you have something like
the Kennewick Man, or whatever, you don't want to use a lot of that for your
assessment. She used microsamples. That's where she
was unique."
She was also strong. As her bones deteriorated under the painful disease, she
never complained, said Gary Kirner, who was married
to her for 18 years.
"He was real supportive of the whole archaeology thing," Hakes said.
"He thought she was a brilliant scientist."