Bones for Barnum Brown : adventures of a dinosaur hunter

236 Pages·1985·11.69 MB·English

by  Roland T Bird

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FOREWORD BY Edwin H. Colbert
INTRODUCTION & ANNOTATIONS BY James 0. Farlow
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BONES
BARNU/A
BROWN
Adventures of a Dinosaur Hunter
By Roland T. Bird
Edited by V. Theodore Schreiber
With a Foreword by Edwin H. Colbert
Introduction & Annotations by James 0. Farlow
Texas Christian University Press
Fort Worth
Copyright © 1985 by V. Theodore Schreiber
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Bird, Roland T. (Roland Thaxter), 1899-1978
Bones for Barnum Brown.
Includes index.
1. Bird, Roland T. (Roland Thaxter), 1899-1978
2. Paleontologists—United States—Biography.
I. Schreiber, V. Theodore. II. Title.
QE707.B57A33 1985(cid:9) 560'.9 [B](cid:9) 84-24047
ISBN 0-87565-007-4
ISBN 0-87565-011-2 (pbk.)
Designed by Whitehead & Whitehead / Austin
The dinosaur on the cover is a Triceratops, a horned dinosaur or ccratop-
sian. Working with related ceratopsians, Barnum Brown and his co-
workers in the laboratory at the American Museum made an important
discovery by identifying a previously unrecognized bone in the lower
Jaw.
Foreword
IT WAS MY PRIVILEGE to have known Yet for R. T. such literary excursions perhaps
Roland Thaxter Bird during those years were side trips, not to be compared with his work
when he was right-hand man to Barnum Brown. on the actual fossils. So it was that the last task he
That was mainly back in the thirties, when Brown performed for the American Museum, the assem-
was enjoying his well-deserved reputation as a bling of the Glen Rose footprints in one of the
hunter of dinosaurs, and when Bird was his enthu- dinosaur halls, was for him an especially happy as-
siastic, energetic, and innovative field assistant. signment. Moreover, it was a fortunate assignment
They made a great team. for the museum, because only R. T. could have
In addition to being a dinosaur hunter, Brown done the work as it needed to be done. Today it is a
was an indefatigable practitioner of public rela- truly spectacular display, in every way his monu-
tions, all for the furthering of ways and means to ment to be admired through the years by millions
raise support for his field program. So he was of people.
much in the limelight. R. T. (as he was affection- As has been said, R. T. was a thoroughly mod-
ately known to friends and colleagues) thus was est man, completely devoted to the fossils on
much within the long shadow cast by Brown, but I which he was working. At times he was just a bit
am sure he did not mind. He was a quiet, modest unworldly. I distinctly remember the occasions
person, and for him the quest for fossils was of par- when someone from the museum business office
amount importance. would come to the laboratory and on bended knee
Consequently, R. T. spent many months each (figuratively, if not literally) beg R. T. to cash or
year out in the field looking for and collecting the deposit his latest paycheck so that the museum
ancient bones he loved so well—part of the time books could be balanced. R. T. would then shuffle
with Brown, part of the time by himself or with through a drawer where he had the check, or possi-
some assistants—while Brown was off on his spe- bly several checks, stashed away, awaiting the day
cial pursuits. Those days out under the arching sky, when he could attend to such mundane matters as
so graphically recounted by R. T. in this book, bookkeeping.
were the adventures for which he lived. For him, R. T.'s brother, Junius, a noted archaeologist
work in the museum laboratory was all right but ensconced at the other end of the museum, would
not exactly his first priority. Always he was think- now and then drop in for a visit, but not for long
ing ahead to the next field season. would he divert R. T. from his appointed work.
But this did not preclude thoughts about the Likewise, the other men in the laboratory enjoyed
meaning of the fossils he collected. Indeed, R. T. visiting with R. T., who was a friend to all, but the
published some evocative articles on the Lower talks were usually brief; R. T. must get on with his
Cretaceous sauropod footprints that he collected work.
near Glen Rose, Texas, and it was my particular The scope of his work, as set forth in the pages
pleasure to have collaborated with him on a de- that follow, is told by one of the last of the "old
scription of the huge Upper Cretaceous crocodile time" fossil hunters, one of the men out to collect
that he collected from the Texas Big Bend region. bones and footprints, unencumbered by problems
vii
of taphonomy, sedimentology, the esoteric aspects for bringing this manuscript to publication and to
of stratigraphy, population structures, and other James Farlow for his excellent introduction, provid-
concerns that so often furrow the brows of today's ing an informative background that should be help-
paleontologists. We are all indebted to R. T. for ful for those who read this book.
having shared his experiences with us.
We are also indebted to Theodore Schreiber Edwin H. Colbert
viii
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Introduction
ROLAND THAXTER BIRD was born on quently suffered from colds), and Henry feared
December 29, 1899, the first of four chil- that his son might also contract tuberculosis. Upon
dren of Henry and Harriet Slater Bird of Rye, New the advice of the family doctor R.T. was sent away
York. Henry Bird was a successful businessman, a from the coastal town of Rye to live on an uncle's
practical man who insisted that his children learn a farm in the Catskills; there he developed an interest
trade; thus at one point in his youth R. T. was ap- in cattle and their husbandry that he retained for
prenticed to a plumber. At the same time, however, the rest of his life.
Henry Bird (or "Pater," as his children called him) As a young adult R.T. went to work on a farm
had a deep respect for learning. He was himself a in Florida, caring for Jersey cattle and traveling
distinguished amateur entomologist who did im- about the country showing them at exhibitions. He
portant studies on noctuid moths. invested in real estate during the Florida land rush
The Bird household was a warm and stimulat- of the 1920's and, like so many others, lost what
ing environment. As children, R.T. and his sister little money he had in the economic crash at the
Alice (the closest of his siblings in age) were each end of the decade. After constructing a motorcycle-
given one of the original Teddy Bears; Harriet camper, Bird wandered about the country, visiting
made vests for the bears, and R.T. built cars, boats, all of the states and supporting himself by doing
airships, and even a house with electric lights for odd jobs; so it was that in November, 1932, at
them. Alice also had a china doll, and on one occa- the age of thirty-two, he passed through northern
sion she and R.T. decided that the doll needed a Arizona and discovered the fossilized skull that
baby, so they stuffed tissue up its dress to make it changed his life.
look pregnant—presumably to the consternation Bird's career as a dinosaur hunter was short but
of their elders. Pater had purchased first editions of eventful. He assisted in the collection of some very
both Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn and fre- important specimens, and his discovery of sauropod
quently read aloud from them to his children, not footprints in the Cretaceous rocks of Texas made
infrequently being interrupted by his own uncon- him a significant figure in the history of paleon-
trollable laughter. Not surprisingly, R.T. devel- tology. To put his career, and that of Barnum
oped a lifelong love for the works of Mark Twain, Brown, the employer Bird admired so much, into a
and in writing his memoir thought of himself as a proper perspective, we need to review the history
kind of latter-day, scientific Huck Finn. Given the of the study of dinosaurs.
nature of his childhood environment, it is not sur- In 1802 a boy named Pliny Moody found some
prising that R.T. went on to distinguish himself as fossilized footprints in rocks of the Connecticut
a fossil collector, or that his brother Junius became River Valley near South Hadley, Massachusetts.
a leader in the field of South American archaeology. These tracks were so similar to those of birds that
Harriet Bird died of tuberculosis at the age of local people referred to them as poultry tracks, or
forty-two, when R.T. was only fifteen years old. the footprints of Noah's raven. More and more
The boy's health had never been robust (he fre- such tracks turned up at an increasing number of