House of Lost Worlds: Dinosaurs, Dynasties, and the Story of Life on Earth

by Richard Conniff

Overview

This fascinating book tells the story of how one museum changed ideas about dinosaurs, dynasties, and even the story of life on earth. The Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, now celebrating its 150th anniversary, has remade the way we see the world. Delving into the museum’s storied and colorful past, award-winning author Richard Conniff introduces a cast of bold explorers, roughneck bone hunters, and visionary scientists. Some became famous for wresting Brontosaurus, Triceratops, and other dinosaurs from the earth, others pioneered the introduction of science education in North America, and still others rediscovered the long-buried glory of Machu Picchu.
 
In this lively tale of events, achievements, and scandals from throughout the museum’s history. Readers will encounter renowned paleontologist O. C. Marsh who engaged in ferocious combat with his “Bone Wars” rival Edward Drinker Cope, as well as dozens of other intriguing characters. Nearly 100 color images portray important figures in the Peabody’s history and special objects from the museum’s 13-million-item collections. For anyone with an interest in exploring, understanding, and protecting the natural world, this book will deliver abundant delights.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780300220605
Publisher:	Yale University Press
Publication date:	04/12/2016
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	307,530
File size:	41 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Richard Conniff is a prize-winning science writer and journalist and the author of nine books including The Species Seekers: Heroes, Fools, and the Mad Pursuit of Life on Earth. His articles appear frequently in Smithsonian magazine, the New York Times, National Geographic, and other publications. He lives in Old Lyme, CT.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Hunting for Truffles ix

1 A West That Was Actually Wild 1

2 The Patriarch 9

3 The Education of O. C. Marsh 22

4 The Wooing of George Peabody 28

5 Rock Render 39

6 A Rumor of War 51

7 The Marsh Expeditions 58

8 Professor M on the Warpath 73

9 The Year of Enormous Dinosaurs 82

10 Fossils, Buffalo, and the Birth of American Conservation 95

11 A Building of Their Own 105

12 In the Shadow of O. C Marsh 113

13 The Prince of Bone Hunters 127

14 Bone Wars 136

15 Trilobite Magic and Cycad Obsessions 146

16 Mapping Ancient Worlds 159

17 A City Raised Like a Chalice 172

18 Teaching Evolution 184

19 The Rise of Modern Ecology 199

20 The Beauty of the Beasts 208

21 The Art of Being Invisible 218

22 Into the Unmapped World 226

23 Zoology in the Time of Geneticists 243

24 The Man Who Saved Dinosaurs 266

Epilogue 274

The Peabody's Scientists 281

Acknowledgments 291

Notes 293

Illustration Credits 317

Index 323

Interviews

What do you hope readers will learn from their encounter with your book?
I want readers to come away feeling that this is a ripping good yarn of exploration, with big engaging characters taking enormous risks and bringing back great discoveries that make us think in new ways about the world.
 
If you were to embark on an expedition with one of the scientists you discuss, who would that be?
It would be the 1870 expedition by paleontologist O. C. Marsh and a dozen Yale students into an American West that was still wild, still home to millions of bison, still under the control of Native American tribes. That expedition launched Marsh’s remarkable career, bringing to life unimaginable creatures from lost worlds. And it opened the eyes of a bottom-of-the-class Yale graduate named George Bird Grinnell, who went on to become one of the most influential figures in the American conservation movement, a savior of the bison, and an anthropologist of vanishing tribal cultures.
 
Which scientists intrigued or surprised you the most?
James Dwight Dana and his poignant struggle to reconcile his commitment to science with his deep religious faith. Dana was among the first people to whom Darwin confided about his work on the theory of evolution by natural selection. (“I groan when I make such a confession,” he wrote to Dana.) Dana’s struggle took place as the scientists of the Peabody Museum were delivering to his doorstep convincing fossil evidence.

Editorial Reviews

Natural History Museums are enjoying a renaissance of appreciation as invaluable libraries of the earth’s biological and cultural diversity. Less well known is the high quality of science pursued in these institutions. Richard Conniff’s riveting account of the history of Yale’s Peabody Museum shows how scientific research is a museum's heart and soul every bit as much as the scientific treasures stored and displayed in them.”—Niles Eldredge, author of Eternal Ephemera

Niles Eldredge

What a rich history this book tells, and with such enthusiasm, humor, and attention to the oddest details! Richard Conniff makes you want to dive into the collections that have been accumulating for 150 years at the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, gathered with loving scholarly attention, transforming our knowledge of the natural world and the human race.”—Frans de Waal, author of Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?

Frans de Waal

From the great Bone Rush of the 19th century to biology's genetic revolution, the Peabody Museum of Natural History has been a scientific powerhouse for a century and a half. There's no better guide to the way this singular institution has changed the way we see nature than Richard Conniff. In warm, enthusiastic prose, he takes us to sun baked badlands strewn with dinosaur skeletons, the sterile quiet of the modern biology lab, and beyond, drawing us back to meet the people who built the Peabody as they strove to understand life and time.”—Brian Switek, author of Written in Stone and My Beloved Brontosaurus

Brian Switek

This book is about one of the great stories of science’s ongoing coming of age. But the best reason to read it is that author Richard Conniff can’t seem to help but do what science writing should always do: he tells a story so well that you don’t realize how much you’re learning in the sweep of every paragraph.”—Carl Safina, author of Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel

Carl Safina

A fascinating and magisterial review of the history of the Peabody Museum, and the major figures who made it. It plunges deeply into science, objects, and the lives of the people who collected those objects and made them ‘speak,’ and it does so in an accessible and, indeed, page-turning way.”—Alison Richard, Yale University

Alison Richard

An important and riveting story of how real-life scientists built a great museum and what it means for biology and natural history. Exciting from beginning to end, House of Lost Worlds is for anyone who loves adventurous reading.”—Bernd Heinrich, author of One Wild Bird at a Time: Portraits of Individual Lives

Bernd Heinrich

Museums are not just full of fossils and minerals. They’re also packed with wonderfully human stories. House of Lost Worlds tells the stories of one of the world’s great natural history museums, and in the process, it becomes a fascinating chronicle of the rise of American science.”—Carl Zimmer, author of Parasite Rex

Carl Zimmer

With a history that extends from the badlands of the American West to the peaks of Machu Picchu, Yale's Peabody Museum is a national treasure. Richard Conniff brings the rich history of the Museum alive with stories of the great characters whose discoveries and ideas transformed science over the past century and a half.”—Neil H. Shubin, The University of Chicago, author of Your Inner Fish

Neil Shubin

Remarkable . . . superbly written and makes the history and individuals come alive. . . . this book should have a much larger appeal than just Peabody-philes because it is so much about the role of museums in the development of American science.”—Thomas E. Lovejoy, George Mason University

Thomas E. Lovejoy

"In House of Lost Worlds, Richard Conniff tells the story of the Peabody through the curious characters connected to it. . . . Throughout the book, [He] emphasizes the discoveries yet to be made and the pleasure of finding out something new."—Science News

Science News

"Conniff [is] a writer with a gift for teasing out the bizarre human dramas endemic to natural history. . . . While House of Lost Worlds chronicles the Peabody’s achievements and luminaries quite thoroughly, it also takes a hard-nosed look at its debacles."—Jennie Erin Smith, Wall Street Journal

Wall Street Journal - Jennie Erin Smith

A fascinating and magisterial review of the history of the Peabody Museum, and the major figures who made it. It plunges deeply into science, objects, and the lives of the people who collected those objects and made them ‘speak,’ and it does so in an accessible and, indeed, page-turning way.”—Alison Richard, Yale University

“An important and riveting story of how real-life scientists built a great museum and what it means for biology and natural history. Exciting from beginning to end, House of Lost Worlds is for anyone who loves adventurous reading.”—Bernd Heinrich, author of One Wild Bird at a Time: Portraits of Individual Lives

“Museums are not just full of fossils and minerals. They’re also packed with wonderfully human stories. House of Lost Worlds tells the stories of one of the world’s great natural history museums, and in the process, it becomes a fascinating chronicle of the rise of American science.”—Carl Zimmer, author of Parasite Rex

“With a history that extends from the badlands of the American West to the peaks of Machu Picchu, Yale's Peabody Museum is a national treasure. Richard Conniff brings the rich history of the Museum alive with stories of the great characters whose discoveries and ideas transformed science over the past century and a half.”—Neil H. Shubin, The University of Chicago, author of Your Inner Fish

“Remarkable . . . superbly written and makes the history and individuals come alive. . . . this book should have a much larger appeal than just Peabody-philes because it is so much about the role of museums in the development of American science.”—Thomas E. Lovejoy, George Mason University

From the Publisher

★ 2016-01-13
A rich and enthusiastic history of Yale University's impressive Peabody Museum of Natural History. The Peabody traces its roots back to a Yale undergraduate, Othniel Charles Marsh. In 1866, when Marsh was appointed to a paleontology professorship at Yale, he asked his wealthy banker uncle George Peabody, the father of modern philanthropy, to fund a museum. He generously gave them $150,000, and the second Peabody Museum was born (he had funded Harvard's Peabody two weeks earlier). As Conniff (The Species Seekers: Heroes, Fools, and the Mad Pursuit of Life on Earth, 2010, etc.) notes in this thoroughly enjoyable history of the museum, it would emphasize, at Peabody's request, "zoology, geology, and mineralogy." Harvard got the people; Yale got the dinosaurs—and plenty of them, thanks to Marsh. He led numerous expeditions into the West and discovered hundreds of new species (many named after him) while dealing with Native Americans, even befriending Oglala Sioux chief Red Cloud, helping him meet with President Ulysses Grant to discuss treaties. Marsh was involved in the contentious "Bone Wars" with rival paleontologist Edward Drinker Cope, but it did lead to both discovering fossils of many of the best known dinosaurs. Conniff covers all the major figures who helped make the museum great: James Dwight Dana (geology), George Bird Grinnell (founder of the Audubon Society), Addison Verrill (maritime fossils), G. Evelyn Hutchinson (ecology), Hiram Bingham III (discoverer of Machu Picchu), and museum director Richard Swann Lull, who testified on evolution at the Scopes trial. Some of the millions of items collected over the years are displayed for all to enjoy, while most lie in the museum's basement or archives and storage facilities around West Haven, waiting to be rediscovered. Colored, boxed sections highlighting people and events and over 100 illustrations and photos provide a pleasant coffee table-book feel, and 23 pages of footnotes attest to Conniff's exhaustive research. Celebrating the museum's 150th anniversary, this book sparkles with delightful stories and anecdotes about natural history told in a lively style.

Kirkus Reviews