Detail View: Image Archives: Trigonias Quarry and Camp

00-2100A(A).jpg

00-2100A

Excavation, General

Trigonias Quarry and Camp

Harvey C. Markman

photographer

Stefanie A. Derkatsch

scanning technician and creator of digital collection

Landscape of the Trigonias quarry with tent and fence visible. Glued to the back of this original print mount is a typed label. The text recounts the "The Fence Post Incident," a false story of how the Trigonias quarry was discovered. In this story, the dig was discovered after a fragment of bone was uncovered by a rancher who had been digging holes for fence posts. This false story circulated in a number of publications without challenge until the Museum's Annual Report of 1942 printed a more realistic account of how the rich deposit of bones was discovered by Philip Reinheimer, H.D. Boyes, Frank Howland and Harvey Markman in 1920. The discovery would prove to be an extraordinarily rich deposit of prehistoric bones, yielding at least three complete Trigonias skeletons as well as at least thirty-seven skulls, fifty-nine pairs of mandibles, eight pelvic girdles, eight trays of vertebrae, several complete sets of ribs, and numerous limb bones. The bones discovered were a variety of prehistoric rhinoceroses and pigs. Duplicate fossils were used in exchange with various institutions across the country including The Field Museum and Harvard University. Location: near Horsetail Creek.

1920

date of photograph

USA, Colorado, Weld County

yes, shadow, highlights, brightness, and contrast adjusted using Photoshop CS5

image/jpg

3.00 MB

7.68 X 9.01 black and white fiber based paper mounted on board, scanned with Epson Exprssion 10000XL at 350dpi, 8bit grayscale with unsharp mask level high

use with permission Denver Museum of Nature & Science