State prosecutor and amateur archaeologist Erik Westerby had a dream of discovering Denmark’s first Palaeolithic settlement. He energetically and systematically searched the soil and relief maps of Denmark to find his ‘needle in a haystack’. Finally, in 1944, he struck gold when he discovered a Late Palaeolithic settlement at Bromme, northwest of Sorø. But all was not well. Westerby fell ill and was obliged to let Therkel Mathiassen of the National Museum of Denmark handle the excavation of the site, which he undertook in 1945. Unhappy with Mathiassen’s methods, Westerby continued to excavate at Bromme until 1950. The site was then left untouched till 2021, when the old excavation was reopened. This article examines the feud between Westerby and Mathiassen in light of the recent excavation. Archival work and the unique opportunity to re-excavate prior excavations made it possible to see that Westerby was correct in most of his critique of Mathiassen’s methods, which casts doubt on the later research that has been based on Mathiassens’s work.