When Langston, Jr.

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When Langston Jr. (* 10. July 1921 in Oklahoma City , † 7. April 2013 ) was an American vertebrate - paleontologist , especially for reptiles such as dinosaurs and amphibians .

Langston studied geology and paleontology at the University of Oklahoma (Bachelor 1943, Master thesis 1947 A new genus and species of Cretaceous theropod dinosaur from the Trinity of Atoka County, Oklahoma ) and received his doctorate in 1952 at the University of California . From 1946 to 1948 he was an instructor in geology at TexTech College . From 1949 to 1954 he was a taxidermist at the Museum of Paleontology at the University of California, and from 1951/52 as a lecturer . From 1954 to 1962 he was at the National Museum of Canada as curator for vertebrate paleontology (succeeding Charles M. Sternberg , the son of Charles H. Sternberg ). He then conducted research at the Texas Memorial Museum (now the Texas Natural Science Center) and the University of Texas, where he headed the Vertebrate Paleontology Laboratory from 1969 to 1986 (his successor was Erik Lundelius). In 1974 he was at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History and from 1975 he was Professor of Geology at the University of Texas at Austin (from 1983 as Jaeger Professor ). Even after his retirement in 1986 he continued to work on excavations. He also took care of the collections at Texas A&M University .

In 1950 he described the predatory dinosaur Acrocanthosaurus with J. Willis Stovall . In Canada, he dug in the rich dinosaur sites from the Upper Cretaceous in Alberta , including in Scabby Butte (north of Lethbridge ) where the Ceratopsier Pachyrhinosaurus was found from 1957, where Charles M. Sternberg made the first discoveries in the early 1950s. In Texas, Langston examined, among other things, cretaceous vertebrate fossils from Big Bend National Park. Among other things, he examined extinct crocodiles, the large pterosaur Quetzalcoatlus from Big Bend National Park (where Douglas A. Lawson first found this pterosaur in 1971) and reptiles from the Permian.

In 2007 he received the Romer Simpson Medal of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology , of which he was Vice President in 1973/74 and whose President he was 1974/75. In 1988 he became an honorary member.

He has been married since 1946 and has two children.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Obituary
  2. ↑ Life data according to American Men and Women of Science , Thomson Gale 2004
  3. ↑ Stovall, Langston Acrocanthosaurus atokensis, a new genus and species of Lower Cretaceous theropods from Oklahoma . American Midland Naturalist, Vol. 43, 1950, pp. 686-728
  4. ↑ Photos by Scabby Butte
  5. ^ History of Collections in Alberta
  6. ↑ Langston The thick-headed ceratopsian dinosaur Pachyrhinosaurus (Reptilia: Ornithischia), from the Edmonton Formation near Drumheller, Canada . Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, Volume 4, 1967, pp. 171-186. Langston The ceratopsian dinosaurs and associated lower vertebrates from the St. Mary River Formation (Maestrichtian) at Scabby Butte, southern Alberta . Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, Vol. 12, 1975, pp. 1576-1608
  7. ^ Langston Fossil crocodilians from Columbia and the Cenozoic history of the Crocodilia in South America . Univ. Calif. Publ. Geol. Sci., Vol. 52, 1966, pp. 1-157
  8. ↑ With Lawson in the 1970s and with Alexander Kellner in the 1990s. AWA Kellner, W. Langston "Cranial remains of Quetzalcoatlus (Pterosauria, Azhdarchidae) from Late Cretaceous sediments of Big Bend National Park, Texas." Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, Volume 16, 1996, pp. 222-231. Langston Pterosaurs , Scientific American, Volume 244, 1981, Volume 2. Langston The great pterosaur , Discovery, Volume 2, 1978, No. 3, p. 20
  9. ↑ Langston Carrolla craddocki; a new genus and species of microsaur from the Lower Permian of Texas . The Pearce-Sellards series, Vol. 43, 1986, pp. 1-20
personal data
SURNAME Langston, Wann Jr.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American paleontologist
DATE OF BIRTH July 10, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH Oklahoma City
DATE OF DEATH April 7, 2013