Members of the Department of Paleobiology have
been leading vertebrate paleontology expeditions since before the
museum was built. The first dinosaur expeditions were led by
Othniel Marsh, then at Yale University , who collected most of the
dinosaurs on display in the main exhibit hall. He was followed by
Charles Gilmore, who served as Curator of Reptiles and Amphibians
for more than 20 years. His expeditions added dinosaurs such as
Brachyceratops tour collections.
A long hiatus in dinosaur collecting followed
Gilmore’s death in 1945, which would not end until Dr. Michael
Brett-Surman began his field work in the Big Horn Basin of Wyoming
in 1992. Today the work of finding and collecting new dinosaurs
continues, with the addition of a new Curator of Dinosaurs, Dr.
Matthew Carrano. We invite you to take a tour of some of our recent