Answering a Reader’s Eastern U.S. Model – Part III: The Map Without Error – Part III

Continuing with David McKane’s many comments left on this blog, and specifically below the continuation of the  errors on his “errorless maps.”

White Arrow shows the area along McKane’s East Wilderness from which Moroni drove the Lamanites—this area is not by any sea

    In another example of McKane’s map errors of his Land of Promise, he seems to forget, that in placing his East Wilderness, where “there were many Lamanites on the east by the seashore” (Alma 22:29) to the east of his Sea East, that after Capt. Moroni drove the Lamanties out of the East Wilderness: “Moroni caused that his armies should go forth into the east wilderness; yea, and they went forth and drove all the Lamanites who were in the east wilderness into their own lands, which were south of the land of Zarahemla” (Alma 50:7), that Moroni “caused that the inhabitants who were in the land of Zarahemla and in the land round about should go forth into the east wilderness, even to the borders by the seashore, and possess the land” (Alma 50:9, emphasis added), and then “the Nephites began the foundation of a city, and they called the name of the city Moroni; and it was by the east sea; and it was on the south by the line of the possessions of the Lamanites” (Alma 50:13, emphasis asdded).
    Now on his map, any city built anywhere in his East Wilderness on the south by the Lamanite lands would not be by a seashore. McKane’s Sea East and East Sea are hundreds of miles to the north and east. Once again, a huge discrepancy in his map.
    Another example of his map is showing that there is a 180-mile gap between his Land of Zarahemla and his Land of Desolation in his Land Northward. Nothing in the scriptural record suggests such a distance or separation of the Land Southward and the Land Northward.

Top: White arrows shows the distance between his two lands, i.e., the Land of Zarahemla and the Land of Desolaltion; Yellow Arrow shows McKane’s location of the Mulek landing site; Bottom: Elevation differences needing locks to reach (red circle) Lake Ontario

    Secondly, McKane labels the Land of Desolation as the “First landing of the people of Zarahemla/Mulek via the St. Lawrence Sea Way.” First of all, the St. Lawrence Seaway (one word) was not built until 1824 when the first part, the Welland Canel was built, and overall is “a system of locks, as well as canals and channels that permit ocean-going vessels to travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes.” These 15 locks and several canals bypass numerous rapids in the St. Lawrence River that kept any kind of shipping from traveling from Montreal to Lake Ontario for several thousand years.
    The St. Lawrence Seaway opened in 1959 and cost $470 million, with Queen Elicabeth II and president Dwight D. Eisenhower formally opening the Seaway. Prior to that time, no shipping of any kind could move upriver past Montreal because of several rapids, the biggest and most impassable was the Lachine Rapids at Montreal. Not until the Corps of Engineers dug a canal around Montreal could shipping continue onward to reach Lake Ontario, and not until 1954, could that shipping be elevated to the height of Lake Ontario and sail into the lake from the river.
    The idea that the People of Zarahemla, the Mulekites, came to the Land of Promise from that source is ludicruous and totally without merit. While the St. Lawrence River is at sea level, Lake Ontario sits at 243-feet elevation. Sailing ships, “driven forth before the wind” simply cannot sail into the wind and currents of the St. Lawrence and reach that elevation even if there were no rapids--nor could barges driven by wind and currents.
    In addition, the idea that the Mulekites landed in the Land Northward would be a huge surprise to Amaleki, who with Mosiah I, discovered the Mulekites in the Land of Zarahemla, no doubt in the vicinity of the city of Zarahemla, and were told by chief Zarahemla himself, that his people “journeyed in the wilderness, and were brought by the hand of the Lord across the great waters, into the land where Mosiah discovered them; and they had dwelt there from that time forth” (Omni 1:16).
    Consequently, McKane is wrong in both his map and his location for the Mulekites, who landed in the area of the Land of Zarahemla, where Mosiah found them, and they had lived there since the time of their landing. As for the quote in Alma 22:30, it is not about the Mulekites, but the Jaredites, and the reference to Zarahemla is that Limhi’s 42-man expedition found the bones of the Jaredites.
    Another error is found in his map and idea of migrating land animals. His map reads “Migrating land animals being the buffalo migrating back and forth from Canada.”

In former times, American bison (Bison bison), or plains buffalo, migrated regularly through the Great Plains. Herds of as many as 4,000,000 animals moved from north to south in fall and returned when spring rains brought fresh grass to the northern part of their range. Bison traveled over more or less circular routes and spent the winter in areas 200 to 400 miles from the summer range. While it is true there were American buffalo in Canada—their migratory route took them from the American west northward through the Dakotas along the Great Plains just east of the Rocky and Mackenzie Mountains in Western Canada to Great Bear Lake (118º-123º W longitude, about 1550 miles to the west of McKane’s migratory area in Canada), and nowhere near the Great Lakes from which McKane has them migrating.
    In addition, if anything more needs to be said about this additional discrepancy in his map, the scriptural record does not say these Jaredite animals were migrating back and forth form the Land Northward, but that “their flocks began to flee before the poisonous serpents, towards the land southward, which was called by the Nephites Zarahemla” (Ether 9:31). We are not talking about animals migrating back and forth from Canada, but animals driven out of the Land Northward because of the serpents.
    Another case of discrepancy in McKane’s map is where he quotes: “And it came to pass that the Nephites had inhabited the land Bountiful, even from the east unto the west sea, and thus the Nephites in their wisdom, with their guards and their armies, had hemmed in the Lamanites on the south, that thereby they should have no more possession on the north, that they might not overrun the land northward” (Alma 22:33), then shows this map:

Because it doesn’t agree with the scripture, McKane conveniently leaves out the names of the other three seas on his map, with (white 1) being his Sea West (we have added the white arrows, circle and yellow arrow for emphasis)

 

Which has three distinct errors:
1. When it says from the East to the West Sea, you have a tiny area  (white circle) where the “East” is the Land Northward—and how come the Land Northward is East and not North?
2. McKane has most of the Land of Bountiful not from the east, but from (white arrow) the Sea West  running to the West Sea;
3. McKane places the Lamanites to the east of the Sea East and then claims they are South of the Land of Zarahemla;
4. The Lamanites would not be hemmed in as Mormon tells us, since (yellow arrow) they could move into the Land Northward in a wide open area that would be indefensible by the Nephites.
    We are not sure how many discrepancies we need to point out, but McKane claims no one has ever found an error in his errorless maps?
    Really?
(See the next post, ”Answering a Reader – Part IV The Map Without Error – Part IV,” for more information on David Mckane’s maps that he claims not only have no errors, but no one has ever been able to find any discrepancies with them and the scriptural record, which so far that is all we’ve found)