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Dale Alan Russell (1937-2019): Voyageur of a Vanished World

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Dale Alan Russell (1937-2019): Voyageur of a Vanished World Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences Dale Alan Russell (1937-2019): Voyageur of a Vanished World Journal: Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences Manuscript ID cjes-2020-0163.R1 Manuscript Type: Tribute Date Submitted by the 26-Nov-2020 Author: Complete List of Authors: Cumbaa, Stephen L.; Canadian Museum of Nature, Currie, Philip J.; University of Alberta, Biological Sciences Dodson, Peter; University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences; University of Pennsylvania, DepartmentDraft of Biomedical Sciences Mallon, Jordan; Canadian Museum of Nature Keyword: Dale Alan Russell, biography, dinosaurs, mosasaurs, extinction, evolution Is the invited manuscript for consideration in a Special Tribute to Dale Russell Issue? : © The Author(s) or their Institution(s) Page 1 of 37 Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 1 Dale Alan Russell (1937-2019): Voyageur of a Vanished World 2 Stephen L. Cumbaa1, Philip J. Currie2, Peter Dodson3,4, Jordan C. Mallon1,5,* 3 4 1Beaty Centre for Species Discovery and Palaeobiology Section, Canadian Museum of Nature, 5 P.O. Box 3443, Station D, Ottawa, ON K1P 6P4, Canada 6 2University of Alberta, CW 405, Biological Sciences Building, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E9, Canada 7 3Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary 8 Medicine, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA 9 4Department of Earth and EnvironmentalDraft Science, School of Arts and Sciences, University of 10 Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA 11 5Department of Earth Sciences, Carleton University, 2115 Herzberg Laboratories, 1125 Colonel 12 By Drive, Ottawa, ON K1S 5B6, Canada 13 14 *Corresponding author 15 1 © The Author(s) or their Institution(s) Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences Page 2 of 37 16 Abstract 17 We review the distinguished and varied career of our friend and colleague, 18 palaeontologist Dr. Dale A. Russell, following the recent news of his death. Dale relished his 19 work, and approached his research—whether it be on mosasaur systematics, dinosaur extinction, 20 or the evolution of animal intelligence—with great gusto. A deep and contextual thinker, Dale 21 had a penchant for metanarrative rarely equaled in these times of increased research 22 specialization. This quality, combined with his outgoing and collaborative nature, allowed Dale 23 to make friends and colleagues with highly varied research interests throughout the world. We 24 remember Dale fondly, and cherish the opportunity to share the stories of his adventures (and 25 misadventures) across the globe. 26 Draft 27 Key words: Dale Alan Russell, biography, dinosaurs, mosasaurs, evolution, extinction 2 © The Author(s) or their Institution(s) Page 3 of 37 Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 28 Introduction 29 Dale Alan Russell (Figure 1) died on December 21, 2019, six days short of his 82nd 30 birthday. Dale was the first modern student of Canadian dinosaurs, revitalizing their study 31 following the fabled decades of collection by Charles M. Sternberg and his contemporaries. 32 During his 30-year tenure at the Canadian Museum of Nature (previously the National Museum 33 of Canada, and the National Museum of Natural Sciences), he described dinosaurs from Canada, 34 China, North Africa and elsewhere. He sought to understand both the dinosaurs themselves and 35 the environments in which they lived. His restless energy drove him to explore remote regions of 36 the earth, from the Canadian High Arctic, to the New Caledonian cloud forest, from the High 37 Atlas Mountains of Morocco and the RiftDraft Valley of the Lake Turkana region of northern Kenya, 38 to the deserts of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia in China. He endeavoured to understand dinosaur 39 habitats by exploring modern analogues to Cretaceous lowland habitats in Florida, Louisiana, 40 and North Carolina, where he documented swamp cypresses, magnolias, turtles and alligators in 41 their natural habitats. He was among the first palaeontologists to give serious consideration to an 42 extraterrestrial cause of dinosaur extinction (Russell and Tucker, 1971), nearly a decade before 43 the Alvarez hypothesis gained traction. Dale is remembered not only for his fertile imagination, 44 his becoming modesty, and his nearly manic sense of humor, but also for his enthusiasm on 45 matters botanical. Not only did he learn about his fungi and plants of interest (mushrooms, figs, 46 ferns, etc.), but he cultivated them both at home and in the office, consumed them, and induced 47 his friends and co-workers to consume them (fiddlehead fern soup, anybody?). He is 48 remembered with great affection by all who knew and admired him. Some reflections and 49 cherished memories of Dale are provided in Supplementary Data 1. 50 Early Years 3 © The Author(s) or their Institution(s) Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences Page 4 of 37 51 Dale was born on December 27, 1937 in San Francisco. He was the second of three 52 children of Clarence R. and Marion C. Russell (Figure 2). Ten years Dale’s senior, his older 53 brother, Donald Eugene, is a distinguished mammalian palaeontologist (recipient of the Romer- 54 Simpson Medal of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology in 2005) who has spent most of his 55 career in France, where he now resides. His younger sister Dian Patricia was born in 1940. The 56 family moved to a 40-acre farm in Enterprise, Oregon in 1943. Brother Don remembers Dale’s 57 youthful interest in dinosaurs, which he never outgrew. He tells of a young Dale crafting a small, 58 wooden stegosaur, with unmistakable plates along its back. 59 Dale matriculated at Eastern Oregon College in La Grande, but a year later transferred to 60 the University of Oregon in Eugene. HereDraft he was mentored by J. Arnold Shotwell, a pioneer of 61 taphonomy, with whom he worked for several summers in the rich Oligocene fossil beds of 62 southeastern Oregon, also with a foray into Idaho (Figure 3). Dale graduated from the University 63 of Oregon in June 1958 and began a master’s program in palaeontology at the University of 64 California, Berkeley. During his time at Berkeley, Dale participated in field work in California, 65 Nevada, Wyoming, and Baja California. He received his master’s in palaeontology from UCB in 66 June 1960. His thesis (unpublished), supervised by Don E. Savage, was on fossil mammals of 67 Palaeocene-Eocene age from northwestern Wyoming. He published his first paper (of many; full 68 bibliography available in Supplementary Data 2) on an Oligocene insectivore from Montana 69 (Russell, 1960). Dale entered the Ph.D. program at Columbia University under the supervision of 70 Edwin H. Colbert in September, 1960. The topic of his dissertation was a review of the 71 mosasaurs of North America. The years at Columbia were pivotal for a number of reasons. Of 72 course, they resulted in a Ph.D. in short order (awarded January, 1964). Two other events stand 73 out that affected the rest of his life: his conversion to Roman Catholicism at Easter, 1961, and his 4 © The Author(s) or their Institution(s) Page 5 of 37 Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 74 meeting Janice Alberti in front of the Law School on the Columbia campus in October 1962. 75 Janice became his wife on July 18, 1964. She also became Dr. Janice Russell, Ph.D. in May 76 1977, with a history degree from Columbia. 77 In 1964, Dale began a one-year post-doctoral fellowship at Yale University, supervised 78 by John H. Ostrom. While there, he published his first mosasaur paper (Russell, 1964), on 79 intracranial kinesis, indelibly marking him as a specialist in the anatomy of Mesozoic reptiles. 80 He also began the laborious process of turning his dissertation into a museum monograph 81 (Russell, 1967). 82 Establishment in Ottawa 83 Dale had the extraordinary goodDraft fortune of landing a curatorial position in the National 84 Museums of Canada, in what quickly became the National Museum of Natural Sciences (NMNS, 85 now the Canadian Museum of Nature [CMN]), and moved to Ottawa in January 1965. Moves to 86 Ottawa, one of the coldest national capital cities in the world, in the month of January, are not 87 necessarily recommended, but Dale embraced the opportunity. He became heir to one of the 88 greatest collections of Cretaceous dinosaurs in the world, built up by Lawrence M. Lambe, 89 Charles H. Sternberg and his three sons, and Wann Langston, Jr. Chief among these, however, 90 was Charles M. Sternberg, who at age 80 still visited the palaeontology lab with regularity, both 91 then and for many years thereafter. The lab was then located in an annex at Sussex Drive and 92 George Street in the ByWard Market, less than 1 km from Parliament Hill. The wooden floors of 93 the massive roughhewn limestone building creaked, and the collection room was allegedly 94 haunted by the ghost of Lambe, who surprisingly was also reported when the lab and collection 95 moved in the fall of 1968 to an industrial park in the west of Ottawa on Woodward Drive. 5 © The Author(s) or their Institution(s) Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences Page 6 of 37 96 Dale jumped into his new position with gusto. By summer (June–July 1965), he was 97 already in the Arctic (Northwest Territories) collecting Cretaceous vertebrates along the 98 Anderson River in shallow marine deposits, recovering a Niobrara-like fauna of mosasaurs, 99 plesiosaurs, and toothed birds (Russell, 1967). He did make a point of returning to Ottawa for the 100 birth of his son Frank on August 26. In January 1966, he visited the Royal Ontario Museum in 101 Toronto to investigate their fine collection of Canadian dinosaurs, collected principally by 102 William A. Parks and Levi Sternberg. In May, he was off to London and Brussels, still chasing 103 down mosasaurs.
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