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Jawbone of U.S. Marine killed in 1951 found in boy’s rock collection, experts say

Experts have confirmed that a human jawbone that was mysteriously discovered in a child’s rock collection once belonged to a United States Marine, who died during his military service over 70 years ago. The identification was made thanks to the work by a group of college students and a high school intern who may be the youngest person to help solve a genetic genealogy case.

U.S. Marine Corps Captain Everett Leland Yager was killed in a military training exercise in July 1951, according to a news release issued this week by Ramapo College, the New Jersey institution where students performed tests on the jawbone and eventually linked it back to him. A separate statement from the college’s Investigative Genetic Genealogy Center noted that the military exercise involved an airplane accident, although it did not provide more details than that.

This image of U.S. Marine Corps Captain Everett Leland Yager appeared in the Palmyra Spectator newspaper on Dec. 20, 1944.

Ramapo College


The accident that left Yager dead happened over California, and experts said his remains were recovered afterward in the state’s Riverside County and buried in Palmyra, Missouri. It was assumed at the time that all of the remains were recovered and buried. But, decades later, in 2002, a human jawbone containing several teeth was submitted to local law enforcement in northern Arizona, where a boy’s parents believed their child had picked up the bone before mistakenly adding it to his rock collection.

The Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office conducted basic DNA testing on the bone, officials said, although the initial tests did not yield any clues as to whom the remains may have belonged. Because there were no samples in government databases that matched the bone, their investigation into the remains tagged “Rock Collection John Doe” entered a hiatus that would last another 20 years or so.

Sheriff’s investigators and the Yavapai County Medical Examiner referred the unsolved case to the genetic genealogy center at Ramapo College in January 2023. With help from a Texas laboratory specializing in missing and unidentified people and a forensics lab in Utah, the jawbone was given a genetic profile that could then be added to genealogy databases online. 

In July of that year, students participating in a bootcamp at the college, which focused on investigative genetic genealogy, were given the chance to work the case as part of their course. Along with an intern at the center who was still in high school, the group of college students developed a lead and sent their findings back to the sheriff’s office in Arizona. Finally, this past March, testing on a DNA sample from Yager’s daughter was compared with the sample from jawbone, confirming the former Marine’s identity. 

“No one is quite sure how the jawbone ended up in Arizona since the accident took place in the air over California. One theory is that a scavenger, such as a bird, picked it up and eventually deposited it during its travels over Arizona,” Ramapo College officials said in this week’s news release. 

The intern who assisted last summer’s student cohort, Ethan Schwartz, may be the youngest person to help resolve an investigative genetic genealogy case, according to the release.

Emily Mae Czachor

Emily Mae Czachor is a news editor at CBSNews.com. She typically covers breaking news, extreme weather and issues involving social and criminal justice. Emily Mae previously wrote for outlets like the Los Angeles Times, BuzzFeed and Newsweek.

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What a slowdown in international travel could mean for America’s tourist hubs

Sault Ste. Marie in Michigan is a small city with a thriving economy. That’s because visitors from its larger northern sister city in Ontario, Canada, keep the border town’s economy humming. 

Situated on opposite sides of the St. Marys River, the U.S. and Canadian counterparts are connected by the Sault Ste. Marie International Bridge, over which thousands of vehicles pass each month. 

“It’s so intertwined,” said Linda Hoath, executive director of the Sault Area Convention & Visitors Bureau, who noted that many people have family members on both sides of the U.S.-Canada border. “There’s no separation between the two communities,” she said.

But with the U.S. trade war unleashed against Canada in recent months — along with reports of detentions of travelers at the Canadian border by U.S. immigration authorities and threats of annexation by President Trump, the chasm between the two neighbors has grown, as fewer Canadians make the trip south to the United States. 

According to Sault Ste. Marie’s International Bridge Administration, the passenger car traffic in April was down 44% compared with last year. And while the waning bridge traffic may not mean much from the view of Canada’s second-largest province and most popular destination, to the historic Michigan town it certainly does. 

“They have 70,000 people,” Hoath said. “And if they’re not coming over and buying in our stores, then it affects us much more.” 

Slowdown in travel to the U.S.

Sault Ste. Marie is not alone in its tourism concerns. Though travel this Memorial Day weekend is expected to be the highest on record, one group has been noticeably absent at U.S. travel checkpoints in recent months: international travelers.

International travel to the U.S. fell 14% in March compared with the same period last year, according to the the U.S. Travel Association. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the biggest dip in travel, 20.2%, was from Canada, according to research from Tourism Economics, a unit of investment advisory firm Oxford Economics. 

Earlier this year, former Prime Minister Trudeau urged Canadians to refrain from vacationing in the U.S., after President Trump slapped a 25% tariff on Canadian goods. The drop-off in Canadian travel is a notable shift, given that Canada was the biggest source of inbound travel to the U.S. last year, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council. 

As to what’s behind the overall slowdown in international travel to the U.S., experts point to the Trump administration’s stricter immigration policies, the strength of the U.S. dollar and long visa wait times. Aggressive tariff policies have also left a bad taste in many travelers’ mouths.

“Shifting sentiment and perceptions of the U.S. are expected to continue to weigh heavily on travel demand,” said Aran Ryan, director of industry studies at Tourism Economics. 

As of April, flight bookings to the U.S. for the May–July travel window are 10.8% lower than they were the same period last year, according to the research firm. It projects an 8.7% decline in international arrivals in 2025.

Economic Impact

The slowdown in international travel threatens to destabilize America’s tourism industry which plays a vital role in supporting the nation’s economy.

“International inbound travel is hugely important from an economic standpoint — people that come to the U.S. and visit spend on average $4,000 per visit,” a spokesperson from the U.S. Travel Association, told CBS MoneyWatch.

Those dollars may already be slipping away: The World Travel & Tourism Council projects that spending by international visitors to the U.S. will drop to $169 billion, or 7%, this year, from $181 billion in 2024. That’s a 22.5% decrease from peak tourist spending of $217 billion in 2019, before the pandemic.

Fewer international travelers could also take a toll on the workforce that props up America’s tourism industry: Nearly 10% of American jobs are tied to the travel industry, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council. 

An ongoing decline in international travel to the U.S. could result in a loss of over 230,000 jobs — with the dining and lodging industries expected to be the most hard hit, according to a recent analysis from the economic research firm IMPLAN.

“It’s not going to devastate the U.S. economy in terms of GDP, but it is very significant in terms of employment,” Jenny Thorvaldson, IMPLAN’s chief economist and data officer, told CBS MoneyWatch.

Hoath, who runs the visitor center in Sault Ste. Marie, said she is already worried about what those losses could mean for her community. 

“When we’re looking at the bridge and it’s packed, people have to get their employees together,” she said. “But if it’s not so busy, what happens to your employees? They’re not making the money. Some people will be laid off.”

Hotel bookings in the city of 14,000 are already down 77% year to date, according to the Sault Area Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Shifting focus to domestic travelers 

As international tourism dampens, local communities like Flagstaff, Arizona, are rerouting their attention to domestic travelers. 

Despite the city’s wide international appeal, the travel season has gotten off to a slow start. Flagstaff has seen a 15% to 20% drop in international tourists year over year, according to Trace Ward, director of Flagstaff’s Convention and Visitors Bureau. 

While he hopes that decline will only be temporary, Ward is looking for ways to bring in more American tourists. One strategy he has in mind is adding more direct flights to the area and possibly attracting a new airline. The city is also promoting its Lowell Observatory‘s new Astronomy Discovery Center, which offers visitors a glimpse of the cosmos.

“I look forward to the excitement of the international traveler coming back full steam, but until then, we’re gonna sell to whoever is interested in coming here,” Ward said.

Hoath, likewise, has shifted her focus toward attracting visitors from within the States, and has decided to halt spending on any advertising in Canada.

“When you don’t have a ton of funds, you’ve got to put them where you know they have a better possibility of working,” she said.

Mary Cunningham

Mary Cunningham is a reporter for CBS MoneyWatch. Before joining the business and finance vertical, she worked at “60 Minutes,” CBSNews.com and CBS News 24/7 as part of the CBS News Associate Program.

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74-year-old hiker dies while attempting rim-to-rim hike at Grand Canyon

A 74-year-old man died while hiking the Grand Canyon, the National Park Service said Monday.

The man, identified as Dennis Smith of Olympia, Washington, was attempting to hike from the canyon’s South Rim to the North Rim, the park service said. The rim-to-rim trek covers a distance of about 24 miles and is described as a “strenuous” hike by the National Park Foundation. 

Smith, who was an “avid and experienced hiker,” according to the park service, was found unresponsive on North Kaibab Trail at around 4:45 p.m. last Thursday. The park service describes the trail as “the least visited and most difficult of the major inner canyon trails at Grand Canyon National Park.” 

Bystanders and park service personnel attempted to resuscitate Smith, but he was pronounced dead at the scene. A cause of death was not shared. His death is under investigation by the Coconino County Medical Examiner’s Office. 

The Grand Canyon’s North Kaibab Trail, near Coconino Overlook.

NPS/Michael Quinn


People doing a rim-to-rim hike are recommended to start before the sun rises and take a break during the hottest part of the day to avoid heat-related illnesses, the National Park Foundation said. 

The park service warned that the Grand Canyon will experience extreme heat in the coming days. Temperatures in the inner canyon are expected to reach 100 degrees Fahrenheit, so visitors should avoid the area between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. Those attempting difficult treks like the rim-to-rim hike that involve the inner canyon are “encouraged to be self-reliant to prevent emergency situations for themselves and responders,” the park service said. They should also monitor inner canyon conditions. 

“Be aware that efforts to assist hikers may be delayed due to limited staff, the number of rescue calls, and employee safety requirements,” the park service said. 

About 10 people die at the Grand Canyon every year, CBS affiliate AZFamily reported. This is the first death at the park that the park service has reported this year. 

A 33-year-old hiker died at Arizona’s Gold Canyon, near Phoenix, amid unseasonably warm temperatures on May 11. Four other hikers who had been with him said they had been hiking for about six hours when he had a seizure and fell unconscious. The hikers had run out of water and were suffering from heat-related illnesses, the survivors said. First responders later pronounced the man dead at the scene. 

Kerry Breen

Kerry Breen is a news editor at CBSNews.com. A graduate of New York University’s Arthur L. Carter School of Journalism, she previously worked at NBC News’ TODAY Digital. She covers current events, breaking news and issues including substance use.

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Greer Fire in eastern Arizona grows to 9,500 acres with no containment

A wildfire that broke out in a rural area of eastern Arizona has burned over 9,500 acres as of Thursday and continues to move north, according to officials. 

The Greer Fire, named after the unincorporated community where the fire originated, remained at 0% containment. The fire started Tuesday morning and continues to move north, “fueled by winds, vegetation, and terrain,” according to the Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management.  

The unincorporated community of Greer is located within the White Mountains and is surrounded by the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest. It had a population of 58, according to the 2020 Census.  

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs indicated that some area residents had been evacuated. 

“The team at (the Department of Forestry and Fire Management) is actively engaged with local and federal partners responding to a fire near Greer in Apache County that has already destroyed multiple structures,” Hobbs wrote in a social media post Tuesday. “Residents are being evacuated and are advised to stay out of the area. I’m thinking of all those affected and am deeply grateful for our brave firefighters.”  

The fire has moved through Hobson Canyon and is pushing onto state trust lands, the state fire department said. 

It was buoyed by wind gusts up to 35 mph Tuesday night, and another red flag warning is forecast for the area through Wednesday, with wind gusts of up to 45 mph expected, officials reported. The fire prompted road closures, including Highway 260 closed in both directions near Greer.

As of Thursday, more than 400 personnel were assigned to combat the blaze. 

The Greer Fire burns in eastern Arizona. May 14, 2025. 

Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management


Kierra Frazier

Kierra Frazier is a news editor for CBS News & Stations.



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Fresh & Ready Foods recalls products after listeria sickens 10 people in California, Nevada

Fresh & Ready Foods is voluntarily recalling numerous products, after at least 10 people in the U.S. have been sickened in a listeria outbreak linked to its ready-to-eat food products, federal officials said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Saturday that federal, state and local officials are investigating the outbreak linked to foods produced by the San Fernando, California-based food producer. 

The FDA says the 10 people who fell ill were in California and Nevada, and required hospitalization.

This voluntary recall is being initiated due to possible contamination with listeria monocytogenes, an organism that can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems, according to the FDA. 

Healthy individuals may experience short-term symptoms including high fever, severe headache, stiffness, nausea, abdominal pain and diarrhea, the recall notice states. Pregnant women infected by the organism can experience miscarriages and stillbirths.

Affected products

The voluntary recall is limited to products with “Use By” dates from 4/22/2025 to 05/19/2025. The FDA says the products were sold in Arizona, California, Nevada and Washington at locations including retailers and food service points of sale, including hospitals, hotels, convenience stores, airports and by airlines. 

You can see the full list of products, including size, item numbers, packaging and used-by dates here.

Packaging label of one of more than 60 products Fresh & Ready Foods is voluntarily recalling, after at least 10 people in the U.S. have been sickened in a listeria outbreak

FDA


Listeria symptoms usually start within two weeks of eating contaminated food. Mild cases can include muscle aches, tiredness and vomiting and diarrhea, while more severe symptoms may include stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance and convulsions.

Federal officials said they started investigating the recent outbreak last year but didn’t have enough evidence to identify a source of the infections. They said the investigation was reopened in April when FDA investigators found listeria in samples collected from Fresh & Ready Foods that matched the strain from the outbreak.

Fresh & Ready Foods said in a news release that it took immediate corrective actions including removing equipment to address the issue.

The FDA found that six of the 10 people who got sick had been hospitalized before becoming ill with listeria. The FDA found that items made by Fresh & Ready Foods had been served in at least three of the health care facilities where the patients had been previously treated.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that the test samples from sick patients were collected from December 2023 to September 2024.

Fresh & Ready voluntarily recalled several products, which can be identified by “use by” dates ranging from April 22 to May 19 of this year under the brand names Fresh & Ready Foods, City Point Market Fresh Food to Go and Fresh Take Crave Away.

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Hiker dies, 4 rescued after heat-related emergency in Arizona’s Gold Canyon

A hiker died Sunday in the Arizona desert, where temperatures had soared to unseasonable heights, according to emergency responders and local news reports.

The man died after hiking in Gold Canyon, at the base of Arizona’s Superstition Mountains east of Phoenix, CBS News affiliate AZ Family reported, citing the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office. Fired crews said he suffered a seizure and cardiac arrest. He was 33 years old.

The sheriff’s office told AZ Family that deputies received a call from five hikers. One of them, the man who later died, became unresponsive after six hours on the trail. Several others in the group were also suffering from heat-related issues and said they had run out of water, according to AZ Family. Weather reports show temperatures in the area peaked at around 100 degrees Fahrenheit on Sunday.

By the time deputies arrived at the scene, the hiker who had fallen unconscious was confirmed dead, the news outlet reported. Life-saving measures were performed multiple times to try to revive him, but they were unsuccessful.

The Pinal County Medical Examiner will determine the hiker’s cause of death, but foul play is not suspected, AZ Family reported. CBS News contacted the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office for more information.

All other hikers in the group were rescued by emergency crews but refused transport to the hospital, according to the Superstition Fire and Medical District, which responded alongside Pinal County authorities during the incident.

13:01 5/11/25
SFMD, along with assistance from @mesafiredept and @pinalcountysheriff responded to a 1st alarm Mountain…

Posted by Superstition Fire & Medical District on Sunday, May 11, 2025

“As temperatures climb, so does the risk. Heat illness can set in fast, even for experienced hikers,” officials said in a Facebook post, noting that summertime temperatures in Arizona can reach 110 degrees Fahrenheit or higher. In those conditions, “heat exhaustion or heat stroke can occur in under an hour,” they warned.

Emily Mae Czachor

Emily Mae Czachor is a news editor at CBSNews.com. She typically covers breaking news, extreme weather and issues involving social and criminal justice. Emily Mae previously wrote for outlets like the Los Angeles Times, BuzzFeed and Newsweek.



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Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego says Democrats

Levittown, Pennsylvania — At a town hall Saturday in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Sen. Ruben Gallego of Arizona encouraged the Democratic party to return to its roots as the “big tent” party. 

“What happened the last election is that we got so pure, and we kept so pure that we started kicking people out of the tent,” Gallego said. “It ends up there aren’t enough people in the tent to win elections.” 

Gallego cited podcast host Joe Rogan as an example of someone “kicked out” of the tent because his message did not completely align with the party’s. 

“I’m sure you guys heard like, ‘Oh, well, the Democrats need to have their own Joe Rogan,'” Gallego said. “We had Joe Rogan. We canceled Joe Rogan years ago. Democrats don’t want to admit this. We did, and then it was, became questionable whether we should go on Joe Rogan or not. We did this to ourselves.”

The first-term Democratic senator from Arizona touted his own success in a battleground state as an example of how Democratic candidates can win moving forward. Gallego defeated Republican Kari Lake in the Arizona Senate race last year by two points.

“I represent a state that has 330,000 more registered Republicans than Democrats,” Gallego said. “You have to get a lot of votes, and that means we’re going to have to have alliances with people that we may not agree with 100% of the time, right?”

This success has fueled speculation that Gallego is considering running for president in 2028. He’s one of a handful of Democrats making stops across the country, talking to voters, similar to Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. 

“Of course, I’ve thought of it, but I’m also, you know, about to… have my third kid coming June 12, and I don’t want to get divorced, and I just became a US senator,” Gallego told CBS News. “I love my job, and I need to make sure I do both jobs well. That’s not what I’m thinking about right now. 

When asked if he thinks it will take a moderate like him to win Pennsylvania in 2028, Gallego said it will take someone who is able to empathize with voters on issues impacting them. 

“I think it’s going to take someone that really understands what’s going on. People were hurting in the last election. I think the Democrats messed up by not really focusing on that,” Gallego said. “This person is gonna be able to communicate that like, yeah, things are bad. The economy hurts. You’re hurting, and I’m here to help you out.”

Gallego spoke in Bucks County, a key battleground area north of Philadelphia that President Trump flipped by a few hundred votes in 2024. 

Distrust and anger toward the Democratic party were palpable at the town hall when one participant asked Gallego how Democrats should change their messaging moving forward. 

“People don’t vote for a party, right? It’s us that run as Democrats. We need to be the face of the party, and we need to be out there,” Gallego said. “The problem is that we are too effing safe all the time.” 

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