Utah History To Go - Rivals Fought Tooth and Nail Over DinosaursGood
morning, and best wishes for a healthy and enjoyable new year.
I've just learned that in July 1877, W. E. Carlin (first name as yet
unknown) was one of two railroad workers who discovered a massive find
of "Jurassic fossils near Como Bluff, Wyoming, that stretched for seven
miles." The words "massive find" are really insufficient to describe
this discovery; eventually 30 tons (!) of fossils were shipped to Yale
paleontologists from that discovery.
This information comes from an article by Will Bagley, a historian and
amateur paleontologist, that appeared in the March 25, 2001 edition of
The Salt Lake Tribune.
Right now, frankly, our "Carlins in Early Wyoming" page is really just a
template. There are a few graphics on the page, and some decent
background information about the state, but almost no Carlin information
whatsoever. In fact, the page only includes one person's name, taken
from SSDI records. In effect, the page is just there, waiting for some
data. Now we may have it.
We know there must have been a few Carlins in early Wyoming, since
there's a Carlin Ranch,
near Medicine Bow in Albany County, WY (near Laramie). But we don't have
any informationa about that ranch other than its name and geographic
location; specifically, we have no idea of the specific Carlin who
founded the ranch, or when.
Ah, the virtues of having extra time! <g>
Our existing "Carlins in Wyoming History" webpage is at
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/states/wyoming.htm .
For information about Carlin men and women in the early history of any
U.S. state, just use the same URL above, but substitute the name of the
state about which you have an interest. All state names are spelled out
in full, so, for example, the "Carlins in South Dakota" page is at
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/states/southdakota.htm .
----- ----- -----
BTW, to keep things relatively sane and organizized, all webpages
dealing with Carlin men and women in the early history of US states are
now grouped within the category /states/, as in:
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/states/____ etc.
All reference pages are in the category /ref/. For example, if you'd
like to see a list of the progenitors of all Carlin family lines of
which we're aware, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/ref/founders.htm
.
All pages that list Carlin women and men in terms of their profession or
occupation are now within the category /professions/. For example, to
read about Carlin labor leaders, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/professions/laborleaders.htm . Or for
Carlin genealogists, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/professions/genealogy.htm .
All pages that delineate genealogical information are grouped under the
name /septs/. So if you're looking for information about the family of
Capt. John Carlin, who commanded Carlin's Battery (artillery) during the
Civil War, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/septs/CaptJohnCarlin.htm
. Or for information about the family of Capt. James Cornelius Carlin of
the Confederate Navy, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/septs/CaptJamesCCarlin.htm .
Our "Roll of Honor" webpages listing Carlins who've served on active
military duty are now all grouped within the file name /mil/. So if
you're interested in Carlins who served during the Mexican War, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/mil/w-mexican.htm . Or for Carlins who
served during the War in Vietnam, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/mil/w-vietnam.htm .
For Carlin men who've earned the Purple Heart, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/mil/purpleheart.htm . And for a master
list of all "Roll of Honor" webpages, go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/mil/veterans.htm .
It's all actually quite logical, although the time involved in
restructuring these pages is, well, hard to justify to anyone who might
ask. (Don't! <g>) But when completed, it'll make the Carlin Archives a
lot easier to access.
With all best wishes for the new year,
Fred
P.S. If you have any questions about a page location during this
transition period, please write to me at fred_carlin(a)att.net or to our
HelpDesk at helpdesk(a)carlin.org.uk .
P.P.S. Just to keep things global, which is proper, all information
about Carlin women and men in a particular country are grouped under the
category /geo/. So if you want to check out Carlins in New Zealand, just
go to
http://www.attorney.carlin.net/geo/int-newzealand.htm . Or for
Australia, go to /geo/int-australia.htm . For the UK, it's
geo/int-uk.htm . It's all quite logical (at least to me).
<smile and enjoy the new year>
___________________
From The Salt Lake Tribune
Rivals Fought Tooth and Nail Over Dinosaurs
By Will Bagley
Date: 03/25/2001 Edition: Final Section: Utah Page: B1
In July 1870, a military escort left Fort McPherson in Nebraska,
shepherding a dozen Yale students, each outfitted with a bowie knife,
six-shooter, rifle, waterproof matches and geological hammer. Othniel
Marsh, America's first professor of paleontology, was in charge of the
civilians. Unlike most Easterners who visited the Great Plains to hunt
buffalo, Yale College's first scientific expedition was after bigger and
more ancient quarry: dinosaurs. News of this odd enterprise attracted
the attention of Buffalo Bill Cody, who then served briefly as the
expedition's guide.
In December, the bone hunters returned from Wyoming and Utah with
thirty-six boxes of fossils, including a hollow bone Marsh had found in
Kansas. It turned out to be from a pterodactyl, the first flying reptile
discovered in North America. Marsh calculated that the creature had a
wingspan of twenty feet and was "truly a gigantic dragon even in this
country of big things."
News reports made Marsh an instant celebrity and attracted the attention
and aroused the jealousy of his old friend, Edward Drinker Cope. One of
America's leading paleontologists, Cope identified a fossil found by
Captain John N. Macomb's 1859 exploration of Canyonlands as Dystrophaeus
Viaemalae, the first dinosaur found in Utah. It was also the first
sauropod-the long-necked plant eaters often called
brontosaurs-discovered in North America.
Cope and Marsh added 136 new species of North American dinosaurs to the
nine scientists had previously identified. There should have been plenty
of glory to go around, but America's most famous dinosaur hunters were
notoriously pugnacious and quarrelsome. In 1872 they got into a fight
over who had rights to dig in Wyoming Territory and began luring away
each other's collectors in what became a ruthless competition for
fossils. When Marsh pointed out that Cope had mixed up the tail and neck
of an elasmosaurus, a large aquatic reptile, his rival's "wounded vanity
received a shock from which it has never recovered," Marsh said. "He has
since been my bitter enemy." So began the Great Dinosaur War that would
rage across the American West for two decades.
In July 1877, railroad workers William Reed and W.E. Carlin discovered a
bone yard of "very thick, well preserved, and easy to get out" Jurassic
fossils near Como Bluff, Wyoming, that stretched for seven miles.
Marsh's agents shipped thirty tons of bones to Yale during the first
year. Reed became one of Marsh's most successful collectors, but Carlin
joined forces with Cope. Their two camps fought over fossils like
warring armies.
In their battles, Marsh had the advantage of inherited wealth, but a
disposition that won him the nickname "The Great Dismal Swamp." Cope
countered with a relentless drive and a certain charm. He visited
Marsh's men in 1879 and entertained them with a comic song, howling like
a coyote at the end of each chorus. Marsh's men found Cope charming, but
explorer John Wesley Powell charged that "professor Cope's mental and
moral characteristics unfit him for any position of trust and
responsibility."
The two men carried their war to Washington, D.C., and the pages of the
New York Herald. Cope called Marsh and Powell "hardened sinners" and
charged Marsh with plagiarism and misappropriation of government funds d
uring his ten years as vertebrate paleontologist for the U.S. Geological
Survey. When the smoke cleared, the two rivals had destroyed each
other's reputations and eliminated government support for paleontology.
Still, Cope and Marsh made enormous contributions to our understanding
of the Earth's ancient past. They made the American West a premier
destination for fossil hunters and named some of the most renowned
dinosaurs, including allosaurus, diplodocus, stegosaurus,
triceratops-and of course, marshosaurus.
_________
Utah historian Will Bagley is a renowned "bonehead."