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T. rex Turns
100
The Tyrannosaurus rex at Carnegie Museum
of Natural History is famous. It is
the first "type" specimen used to identify the species, and for
most of the 20th century it was considered the largest carnivore
known to have lived on Earth. And this year it is celebrating its 100th birthday.
While
the real T. rex lived about 65
million years ago in the Late Cretaceous period, its life as a modern
museum exhibit, and as an icon of modern life began just 100 years
ago. Today there are still only a
half dozen fairly complete real T. rex fossil skeletons, even though replicas in
museums are common.
The
fossil bones of the T-rex type
specimen were collected in Hell Creek, Montana, in 1902-03 by a field party
led by Barnum Brown, a paleontologist from the American Museum of Natural
History in New York. Only partially
mounted for display in New York, in 1941 the fossil material came to
Pittsburgh as part of a museum exchange of fossil materials.
In 1941
the cost of $7,000 for selling the
specimen to Pittsburgh included reimbursement of the original excavation
costs of $2,200. Shipment to
Pittsburgh by tractor-trailor cost an additional $108. But a generous trustee and friend of the
Carnegie Museum, George H. Clapp, underwrote the costs.
Under
director Andrew Avinoff, Carnegie Museum of Natural History promptly
mounted the complete T. rex for display in 1942. The skeleton is scheduled to be remounted
as part of the museum's plan for a new Hall of Dinosaurs.
 
DinoMite
Days
Pittsburgh
will be taken back to a fanciful age of dinosaurs during DinoMite Days, when different
dinosaur designs will transform city streets, office buildings and local
gardens into a wonderful outdoor public art exhibit.
Approved
as a public art project by the Pittsburgh Art Commission, DinoMite Days will be the most
colorful, widespread display of local artistry the region has ever seen.
Using a grant from the Laurel Foundation of Pittsburgh, the museum will
produce a series of realistic but undecorated dinosaur models that artists
can turn into playful works of art.
After a display, there will be an auction where sponsors can adopt
the artistic dinosaurs for permanent display in different parts of the
city. The proceeds will benefit
non-profit organizations in Pittsburgh.
Each dinosaur will have a plaque indicating the name of the
"sponsaur" and artist.
The
concept is based on the successful public art project called Cow Parade,
first introduced in Zurich, Switzerland, and soon successfully adopted in
New York, Chicago and several other North American cities. While cities
have used cows, moose and horses, in Pittsburgh dinosaurs are a natural
choice because of the preeminence of Carnegie Museum of Natural History in
its research on dinosaurs. Dinosaurs appeal to people of all ages.
Research
Casting International of Toronto, which created the Dippy statue outside
the museum, will design, manufacture and deliver the fiberglass dinosaurs
in sizes ranging between 5.5 and 10
feet. Next an art jury comprised of
representatives from Pittsburgh art organizations will select the artists,
who will have approximately four to six weeks to complete their dinosaurs,
and will receive an honorarium when their dinosaur is completed and
approved. At the end of the public display period, the dinosaurs back to DinoMite Days for a scheduled
auction on October 4, 2003.
Sponsors
can select a beneficiary to receive a percentage of the proceeds from the
donated dinosaurs. The remaining proceeds will benefit Carnegie Museum of
Natural History's public and educational programs. At the auction, "We
expect everyone will have a great time … while we raise a lot of money for
many of the region's cultural groups and organizations," says DeWalt.
As a
playful way of shining an international spotlight on the region, DinoMite Days should benefit many
local businesses. Chicago's "Cows on Parade" attracted an
estimated 10 million visitors to the city and added $200 million to the
local economy.
Organizations
wishing to become DinoMite Days
"sponsaurs" can contact Chris Bell, Carnegie Museum of Natural
History Director of Development at (412) 622-5778 beginning July 1. Or visit http://www.dinomite days.org
Coming to
Pittsburgh
The Most Complete T-rex Skull in the World
What will the most complete T-rex skull in the world
reveal? It's hard to say. But
audiences at Carnegie Museum of Natural History will be among the first to
know.
There
are perhaps 10 skulls of T-rex in
the world, and this new one, discovered recently in South Dakota, has been
called by experts the best T-rex
skull in existence. Unlike others,
it was not distorted or disarticulated after being buried in an ancient
river bed some 67-70 million years ago.
Some
40-50 percent of the skeleton has been found, and the rest of the specimen
is being removed from the stone by expert Phil Fraley in New Jersey. But the owner of the specimen wanted the
skull itself to be prepared at Carnegie Museum of Natural History because
of the museum's reputation as the Home of the Dinosaurs.
Curator
Mary Dawson says it is hard to predict what new information will be
discovered until the skull is prepared.
We know that T-rex had
binocular (three-dimensional) vision because of the position of its eyes,
and that it had large spaces for its olfactory lobes, suggesting it had a
powerful sense of smell and was perhaps therefore a scavenger. Scientists
now think that its nostrils were in a more forward position, like a
snake's, than the early reconstruction suggested. There is more to be learned about its
brain cavity, the back part of its skull, and its palate.
Collected
by a commercial group, the specimen was sold to a private collector who
wants to put it to educational use as a traveling exhibit, and share it
with people who would otherwise never see the real thing. Carnegie Museum of Natural History will
make a cast of it for its own collection.
Still
embedded in about a half-ton of stone matrix, the skull will be on display
at the museum's PaleoLab in October. The public can witness its preparation
for approximately 10 months, before the mold is made and a cast is
produced.
Shanghai visits Pittsburgh
Six
Chinese experts from the huge Shanghai Science & Technology Museum
(SSTM) being built in China's largest city recently visited Carnegie Museum
of Natural History to study its educational programs and dinosaur displays. The new SSTM is part of China's national
plan to revitalize the country through science and education, and combines
Shanghai's older Natural History Museum with the technology of a new
Science Center. The size of 13 football fields, at a cost of about $170
million, it contains two IMAX theaters, an IWERKS theater, a "Wisdom
Gallery," a "Life Gallery," and other features that reveal
similarities and contrasts between Eastern and Western approaches to
education. Powdermill Nature Reserve and Carnegie Science Center were also
visited by the Shanghai delegation, and in the fall, the Natural History
Museum will send advisors to Shanghai.
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