Cousin Ruth and the Stone Bones

Years ago, Ruth discovered fossil camel and rhinoceros bones exposed in a mound in western Nebraska. This was no idle claim: the bones were properly identified, catalogued and displayed at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln with full credit given to the finder. Yesterday, we returned to the site of her discovery.


A Brule clay mound rose about 100 feet above the surrounding terrain. Ruth said the fossils she found were "just lying on the ground." I was incredulous. "A tooth was exposed, and then we dug out the jaw." The mound was located about two miles north of the North Platte about 200 feet higher than the current highwater mark but still well within the wide valley the river has cut over eons. The ground was littered with smooth, flat granite and basalt stones which had been carried from the mountains several hundred miles to the west and then deposited here when the channel shifted south.



William, Ruth's son, made the first new discovery. It was a rib fragment which "chinged" when he tapped it against another rock. He thought it was metal and was prepared to discard it. Soon his brother Edward found some fossil bone fragments. They were indeed just lying on the ground. They were near the top of the mound and somewhat protected by thick slabs of limestone which originally capped the oligocene clay mound and inhibited erosion. The age of clay suggests the bones we found protruding from it were 25-30 million years old.

Sullivan's Brontosaurus

Jurassic Park reinvented dinosaurs. Before Steven Speilberg brought them back to life, however, they were dusty skeletons in natural history museums or Emmit Sullivan sculptures in South Dakota's Dinosaur Park.

Dimetrodon


Sullivan rendered tail dragging, reptilian behemoths life size in concrete over steel mesh and then painted them bright green. Today they look cartoonish, but I suspect that has more to do with what has happened to dinosaurs over the seven decades which have passed since Sullivan and his WPA crew were at work.



The fate of two iconic dinosaurs, brontosaurus and trachodon, tells part of the story. They were demoted. Brontosaurus has been reclassified as Apatosaurus; Trachodon is now Hadrosaurid. Both were the creations of early bone hunters. Later research has shown they were cobbled together from two or more creatures. But they captured the imagination and became real for generations of enthusiasts.

Trachodon and Brontosaurus


Paleontologists have a much deeper understanding of dinosaurs now than they did in Sullivan's time. The closest living relatives of dinosaurs, we are told, are birds, not reptiles. Most probably were not green; they probably did not drag their tails. Contrary to conventional wisdom, they were survivors and ruled the planet for over 100 million years. Only recently did we learn their tenure was abruptly terminated when the Earth collided with a very large rock (estimated to be about the size of Mount Everest) 63 million years ago. Otherwise, they might still be in charge.

Stegosaurus


None of that serious scholarship detracts from the charm of the Dinosaur Park. Sullivan's sculptures will continue to inspire. Kids at least. Riding Triceratops beats peering at presidents on Mount Rushmore any day.

T. Rex and Triceratops