Generations: Tracking American Paleontology and Anatomy Over 17 Decades

The Big Bang tells us the story of the origin of our universe beginning in a flash of light some 13.8 billion years ago.Genesis tells the story of the origin of humankind beginning in a flash of light perhaps 6,000 years ago-or perhaps not.The Gospel of Matthew tells us the story of the origin of Jesus, 42 generations from Abraham to Jesus, the light of the world.Luke tells an even more expansive story, 77 generations from God to Adam down to Jesus.Humans, scientists no less than common folk, love a good story, and if it involves origins, so much the better.We desire to know where we came from and where we are going.I am no exception.This article is the story of my origins, specifically my academic origins.My academic story goes back only seven generations, but best of all, I can trace it forward beyond me another four generations, making of me an academic Job.When I began my career, I was a callow youth with no interest in "history."I was eager to soak up all of the foundational knowledge and current research that I was capable of absorbing.I recollect (with embarrassment) the first time I took off the bookshelf a new book, "The Meaning of Fossils," by Martin J. S. Rudwick (Rudwick, 1972).As I perused the pages, I wrinkled my nose in disgust and thrust it back onto the shelf.There was no paleontology to be gleaned from that tome-only history!When as a sapling I was exposed to history, I did not appreciate it for what it was.As an eager undergraduate at the University of Ottawa, I had the wonderful privilege in 1967 of working at the National Museum of Canada during the summer before my senior year.Not only did I rub shoulders all summer with curator Dale A. Russell, heir to the great trove of dinosaur fossils collected by Lawrence Lambe and the fabled Sternberg family, C. M. Sternberg (1885-1981) himself used to come in once a week or so.Born in 1885, Sternberg was then a sprightly 82.His father, C. H. Sternberg (1850-1943), collected for E. D. Cope (1840-1897), the Philadelphia Quaker, who was a great rival to Yale's O. C. Marsh (1831-1899).One of my keenest regrets today is that I never took a photograph of or with Charlie Sternberg-no selfies in those days!When I attended my first Society of Vertebrate Paleontology meeting at Yale in 1967, Alfred Sherwood Romer (1894-1973), George Gaylord Simpson (1902-1984), E. C. Olson (1910Olson ( -1993)), and E. H. Colbert (1905Colbert ( -2001) ) were in attendance, among many others.Thus, I walked with history, and indeed was in awe of such luminaries, but still did not fully appreciate what a privilege it was.Romer, Colbert, and Olson were outstandingly approachable, and easy to talk to; Simpson was much less so.Today I marvel that when I began in paleontology the revered senior members of our profession dated from the end of the 19th century and the first decade in the 20th century.Today's neophytes are not so lucky-it is my generation who are seniors, for better or for worse.Not long ago Kevin Padian mused to me, "Peter, remember those old farts when we started?Well, we are the old farts now!" Sad but true.Academics do not spring fresh from the brow of Jove.Mentorship is incredibly important in the sciences as in most human endeavors.I was blessed to have not one but three mentors.The first of these was Dale A. Russell, then the young curator of fossil vertebrates at the National Museum of Canada (now the Canadian Museum of Nature).(I was saddened by Dale's recent death Dec. 21, 2019, just short of his 82nd birthday).I was an undergraduate at the University of Ottawa, and Dale took me under his wing.He provided me employment in the fossil preparation lab at the museum in the summer of 1967, the summer before my senior year in University.This wonderful experience, punctuated by visits by Charlie Sternberg and visiting paleontologist Wann Langston, Jr. , confirmed my desire for a career in dinosaur paleontology.Russell's Ph.D.

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