Othniel Charles Marsh Papers in the Archive at the Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University
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Dinosaur Wars Program Transcript
Page 1 Dinosaur Wars Program Transcript Narrator: For more than a century, Americans have had a love affair with dinosaurs. Extinct for millions of years, they were barely known until giant, fossil bones were discovered in the mid-nineteenth century. Two American scientists, Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh, led the way to many of these discoveries, at the forefront of the young field of paleontology. Jacques Gauthier, Paleontologist: Every iconic dinosaur every kid grows up with, apatosaurus, triceratops, stegosaurus, allosaurus, these guys went out into the American West and they found that stuff. Narrator: Cope and Marsh shed light on the deep past in a way no one had ever been able to do before. They unearthed more than 130 dinosaur species and some of the first fossil evidence supporting Darwin’s new theory of evolution. Mark Jaffe, Writer: Unfortunately there was a more sordid element, too, which was their insatiable hatred for each other, which often just baffled and exasperated everyone around them. Peter Dodson, Paleontologist: They began life as friends. Then things unraveled… and unraveled in quite a spectacular way. Narrator: Cope and Marsh locked horns for decades, in one of the most bitter scientific rivalries in American history. Constantly vying for leadership in their young field, they competed ruthlessly to secure gigantic bones in the American West. They put American science on the world stage and nearly destroyed one another in the process. Page 2 In the summer of 1868, a small group of scientists boarded a Union Pacific train for a sightseeing excursion through the heart of the newly-opened American West. -
Joseph Henry
MEMOIR JOSEPH HENRY. SIMON NEWCOMB. BEAD BEFORE THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OP SCIENCES, APRIL 21, 1880. (1) BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR OF JOSEPH HENRY. In presenting to the Academy the following notice of its late lamented President the writer feels that an apology is due for the imperfect manner in which he has been obliged to perform the duty assigned him. The very richness of the material has been a source of embarrassment. Few have any conception of the breadth of the field occupied by Professor Henry's researches, or of the number of scientific enterprises of which he was either the originator or the effective supporter. What, under the cir- cumstances, could be said within a brief space to show what the world owes to him has already been so well said by others that it would be impracticable to make a really new presentation without writing a volume. The Philosophical Society of this city has issued two notices which together cover almost the whole ground that the writer feels competent to occupy. The one is a personal biography—the affectionate and eloquent tribute of an old and attached friend; the other an exhaustive analysis of his scientific labors by an honored member of the society well known for his philosophic acumen.* The Regents of the Smithsonian Institution made known their indebtedness to his administration in the memorial services held in his honor in the Halls of Congress. Under these circumstances the onl}*- practicable course has seemed to be to give a condensed resume of Professor Henry's life and works, by which any small occasional gaps in previous notices might be filled. -
Physics and Astronomy (Classes QB, QC, and Selected Portions of Z)
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS COLLECTIONS POLICY STATEMENTS Physics and Astronomy (Classes QB, QC, and selected portions of Z) Contents I. Scope II. Research strengths III. Collecting policy IV. Acquisition sources V. Best editions and preferred formats VI. Collecting levels I. Scope The Collections Policy Statement on Physics and Astronomy covers the subclasses of QB (Astronomy) and QC (Physics), as well as the corresponding subclasses of Class Z. In addition, some of the numerous abstracting and indexing services, catalogs of other scientific libraries, and specialized bibliographic finding aids for these fields are classed in Z. See also the related Collections Policy Statements for Chemical Sciences and Technology. II. Research strengths A. General The Library’s collecting strength in subclasses QB and QC is generally at the research level. The Library has long runs of many important serials such as American Journal of Physics, Journal of Applied Physics, Journal of the British Astronomical Association, and other publications of notable societies and associations, as well as the major abstracting and indexing services in physics and astronomy including Science Abstracts. Series A, Physics Abstracts, and its predecessors, and Astronomischer Jahresbericht and its successor, Astronomy and Astrophysics Abstracts. The Library’s extensive general collections in physics and astronomy are further enhanced by the numerous technical reports held in the Automation, Collections Support & Technical Reports Section, and by specialized materials held by the Manuscript, Rare Book and Special Collections, Geography and Map, and Prints and Photographs Divisions. In addition, the Library’s already extensive collection of U.S. astronomy and physics dissertations in microform is now supplemented by the digital dissertations archive from the ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global database. -
Florida State University Libraries
Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2017 Fossil Excavation, Museums, and Wyoming: American Paleontology, 1870-1915 Marlena Briane Cameron Follow this and additional works at the DigiNole: FSU's Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES FOSSIL EXCAVATION, MUSEUMS, AND WYOMING: AMERICAN PALEONTOLOGY, 1870-1915 By MARLENA BRIANE CAMERON A Thesis submitted to the Program in the History and Philosophy of Science in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts 2017 Marlena Cameron defended this thesis on July 17, 2017. The members of the supervisory committee were: Ronald E. Doel Professor Directing Thesis Michael Ruse Committee Member Kristina Buhrman Committee Member Sandra Varry Committee Member The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members, and certifies that the thesis has been approved in accordance with university requirements. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ iv Abstract ............................................................................................................................................v 1. INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................................1 2. THE BONE WARS ....................................................................................................................9 -
Defining the Mesozoic
DEBRA LINDSAY THE MESOZOIC/DEFINING DISCIPLINES: LATE NINETEENTH- CENTURY DEBATES OVER THE JURASSIC–CRETACEOUS BOUNDARY DEBRA LINDSAY Department of History and Politics University of New Brunswick, Saint John, NB, Canada E2L 4L5 [email protected] ABSTRACT The last two decades of the nineteenth century were exciting times in American paleontology, with disputes over Jurassic dinosaurs between Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh appearing in the press. Less well known is the dispute over defining the Mesozoic that began in 1888 when Marsh invited Lester Frank Ward, a colleague with whom he had been working on the Potomac Formation for the United States Geological Survey, to speak on the plant fossils found there. Initially agreeing with Marsh that the Potomac was a Jurassic formation, work on fossil cycads led Ward to conclude that the Potomac was Lower Cretaceous. As Ward and Marsh grappled with the question of how to determine the age and identity of Mesozoic systems, they joined other paleontologists and Earth Sciences History geologists such as William J. McGee, Albert Charles Seward, and Samuel W. Williston in 2011, Vol. 30, No. 2 a debate that often reflected scientific training and sub-specializations as much as pp. 216–239 stratigraphic principles, becoming caught up in a trans-Atlantic dispute in which their reputations were on the line as they claimed that ‘their’ fossils were key determinants of Mesozoic systems. In the end, Marsh’s reputation as a paleontologist was far better established than that of Ward, who moved on to another career as a sociologist at Brown University, but cycad discoveries from Maryland, Colorado and Wyoming, and fieldwork, trumped laboratory studies—even when performed by a master systematist—as the Potomac Formation proved to be Lower Cretaceous. -
Scientific BIOGRAPHY and the CASE of GEORGES CUVIER
Hist. Sci.) xiv (1976), 101-137 1976HisSc..14..101O SCIENTIFic BIOGRAPHY AND THE CASE OF GEORGES CUVIER: WITH A CRITICAL BIBLIOGRAPHY Dorinda OutralU University of Reading The purpose of this introduction is to provide some interpretative tools for the reader of the body of secondary literature on Georges Cuvier which is examined in the attached critical bibliography. Criticism and analysis of existing work is therefore emphasized, and the problems in volved in constructing a positive biography of Cuvier are only briefly examined. Not only strictly biographical studies, but also work on all aspects of Cuvier's achievement, have been so strongly informed by pre suppositions about his character, that a knowledge of this bias and its characteristic expressions is nece.<;sary before previous work on Cuvier can be properly interp'reted. This bibliography is thus also intended as a necessary clearing of the ground before further study of Cuvier's career can be undertaken. This is true not only because it is necessary to discover the precise extent of factual inadequacy in our knowledge of Cuvier's life and achievement, but also because we need to increase our awareness of the role which biographical inquiry has played in the history of science, for without this awareness, the full implications of the adoption of the form cannot be assessed. Interest in Georges Cuvier has increased considerably during the last decade, but so far almost no account has been taken of the extraordinary biographical tradition through which we view him. Almost every presen tation of Cuvier since his death in 1832 has been dominated by emphases which were established very soon afterwards, and which have continued to monopolize the attention of historians of the life-sciences until very recently. -
“The Advancement of Science: James Mckeen Cattell and the Networks Of
1 The Advancement of Science: James McKeen Cattell and the Networks of Prestige and Authority, 1894-1915 ROBIN VANDOME The need for an authoritative and widely-accessible American scientific periodical was keenly felt by 1880, when the weekly Science was established in New York by the journalist John Michels, with the financial backing of scientific entrepreneur Thomas Edison. As the astronomer and mathematician Simon Newcomb had observed with regret in 1874, “The difficulty is not that our scientific men are indifferent to knowledge, but that they do not go through the laborious and thankless process of digesting and elaborating their knowledge and publishing it to the world.”1 Some promising scientific publications had, in fact, emerged, ranging from the commercial Scientific American (established in 1846) and the specialist American Naturalist (established in 1867 and limited, as Newcomb noted, “entirely to biology”), to the more philosophically-inclined magazine aimed at a broadly-educated audience, Popular Science Monthly (established in 1872).2 But the only periodical that met Newcomb’s high standards for the publication of new research was the venerable American Journal of Science and Arts (established in 1818), and even that title was restricted largely to the earth sciences at the expense of many new disciplines.3 Multiple efforts to cater to general scientific interests in a single periodical were made in the 1870s and 1880s, only for most to flounder after a few months or years, in line with the typical pattern for new magazines in this period.4 The shorter-lived contemporaries of Science included the Science Record (1872-77), Scientific Monthly (1875-76), Scientific Observer (1877-87), Science News (1878-79), Illustrated Scientific News (1878-81), Scientific Man (1878-82), a second Science Record (1884-85), Science Review (1885-86), and Science and Education (1886-87), among still others.5 By 1900, however, Science clearly 2 filled the gap felt by the likes of Newcomb. -
George P. Merrill Collection, Circa 1800-1930 and Undated
George P. Merrill Collection, circa 1800-1930 and undated Finding aid prepared by Smithsonian Institution Archives Smithsonian Institution Archives Washington, D.C. Contact us at [email protected] Table of Contents Collection Overview ........................................................................................................ 1 Administrative Information .............................................................................................. 1 Historical Note.................................................................................................................. 1 Descriptive Entry.............................................................................................................. 2 Names and Subjects ...................................................................................................... 3 Container Listing ............................................................................................................. 4 Series 1: PHOTOGRAPHS, CORRESPONDENCE AND RELATED MATERIAL CONCERNING INDIVIDUAL GEOLOGISTS AND SCIENTISTS, CIRCA 1800-1920................................................................................................................. 4 Series 2: PHOTOGRAPHS OF GROUPS OF GEOLOGISTS, SCIENTISTS AND SMITHSONIAN STAFF, CIRCA 1860-1930........................................................... 30 Series 3: PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SURVEY OF THE TERRITORIES (HAYDEN SURVEYS), CIRCA 1871-1877.............................................................................................................. -
The Fighting Pair
THE FIGHTING PAIR ALLOSAURUS VS STEGOSAURUS — Allosaurus “jimmadsoni” and Hesperosaurus (Stegosaurus) mjosi Upper Jurassic Period, Kimmeridgian Stage, 155 million years old Morrison Formation Dana Quarry, Ten Sleep, Washakie County, Wyoming, USA. THE ALLOSAURUS The Official State Fossil of Utah, the Allosaurus was a large theropod carnosaur of the “bird-hipped” Saurischia order that flourished primarily in North America during the Upper Jurassic Period, 155-145 million years In the spring of 2007, at the newly-investigated Dana Quarry in the Morrison Formation of Wyoming, the team from ago. Long recognized in popular culture, it bears the distinction of being Dinosauria International LLC made an exciting discovery: the beautifully preserved femur of the giant carnivorous one of the first dinosaurs to be depicted on the silver screen, the apex Allosaur. As they kept digging, their excitement grew greater; next came toe bones, leg bones, ribs, vertebrae and predator of the 1912 novel and 1925 cinema adaptation of Conan Doyle’s finally a skull: complete, undistorted and, remarkably, with full dentition. It was an incredible find; one of the most The Lost World. classic dinosaurs, virtually complete, articulated and in beautiful condition. But that was not all. When the team got The Allosaurus possessed a large head on a short neck, a broad rib-cage the field jackets back to the preparation lab, they discovered another leg bone beneath the Allosaurus skull… There creating a barrel chest, small three-fingered forelimbs, large powerful hind limbs with hoof-like feet, and a long heavy tail to act as a counter-balance. was another dinosaur in the 150 million year-old rock. -