Earl Douglass
Earl Douglass (born October 18, 1862 in Medford , Minnesota , † January 13, 1931 ) was an American fossil collector and vertebrate paleontologist . In 1909 he discovered one of the largest Jurassic dinosaur sites, the Dinosaur National Monument in Utah .
Douglass was interested in geology as a teenager, but started as a fossil hunter relatively late, when he was in his thirties. He studied at the University of South Dakota and Iowa State College , with a bachelor's degree in 1893. He was initially a school teacher in Minnesota , South Dakota and Montana . In 1899 he studied geology at the University of Montana with a master’s degree in 1900, after which he was two years on a scholarship at Princeton University . In 1902 he joined the paleontology department of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh . Since their famous Diplodocus skeleton was found in Wyoming, there has been an interest in further dinosaur finds . He first collected in Montana and was sent to Utah in 1907, where he came across a very rich Jurassic archaeological site in 1909, which was placed under protection as Dinosaur National Park in 1915. Among other things, he found a complete Apatosaurus ( Brontosaurus ) there, which has been exhibited in the Carnegie Museum since 1915 (since 1979 again with a correct, recovered skull). Douglass excavated there until 1922 and sent over 350 tons of bones (which provided 23 assemblable skeletons) to the Carnegie Museum. He then worked for other museums ( National Museum of Natural History , University of Utah ) at the excavation site for two years (the Carnegie Museum itself had enough fossils). In 1924, Douglass left the Carnegie Museum and prepared his finds at the University of Utah.
He had been married since 1905 and had a son.
literature
- GE Douglass Speak to the Earth and It Will Teach You, The Life and Times of Earl Douglass, 1862-1931 , BookSurge Publ. 2009
Web links
- Biography at Dinosaur National Monument
- Earl Douglass Papers, University of Iowa ( May 3, 2013 memento on Internet Archive )
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Douglass, Earl |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American paleontologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 18, 1862 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Medford , Minnesota |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 13, 1931 |