The Great Dinosaur Hunters and Their Discoveries

by Edwin H. Colbert

Fascinating, lavishly illustrated story of dinosaur research from beginnings in 19th-century England to 1960. Achievements of Buckland, Mantell, Cope, Marsh, Huxley, Sternberg, Brown, many other researchers. Also expeditions, excavations, reconstruction, rivalries, more. 116 photographs. 47 figures and maps.

Genres: Palaeontology, Science, History, Nonfiction, Dinosaurs, Biology

384 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1984

Reviews

[Wendelle]

A romance of the early paleontologists, the lives, adventures and the strange highs and lows the turns of their lives took, penned in a lively style reminiscent of Victorian writers like Jules Verne. These paleontologists took many different forms: they were gentlemen of leisure or they scrambled for money, or got transformed from one status to the other; they were anatomy experts who stayed in their lab or study and never ventured to the field, or they were manic field diggers; they started early as precocious enthusiasts, or they started late, with paleontology just one of many ventures or interests.

[Kale Link]

I finally got around to finishing this one. This book by Edwin Colbert (who himself was a great dinosaur hunter) walks through the history of the big names in dinosaur paleontology, from the beginnings of the field to the mid-20th century, a little before when this book was published. The chapters are divided into "phases" of discovery, and are recorded roughly chronologically, with a big name or two taking center stage each chapter.

All in all, I think its a good summary of the major players in the field. It definitely focuses more on the hunters and their methods, and less on the science itself. At times, it's a bit tedious, as it resorts to listing many names and the generalities of what they found, without getting into specifics. Overall, though, it's a good account of historical paleontology. Even as a student of the field, I still picked up a few new things. The historical pictures were definitely the highlight for me. Some of the science in the book is glaringly outdated, but that is to be expected with a book published 50 years ago. While the ending was a little weak, I do think it is gratifying that Colbert speculates on the possibility of finding dinosaurs in Antartica, which we have since done.

[David Iverson]

Informative history of 19th & early 20th century dinosaur hunters. Learned about a lot of paleontologists I had not heard of before reading this book.

[Liz]

there was a lot of interesting stuff in this book, but the writing was really dry and skipped around a lot. it has a lot of great old photos and drawings, some great anecdotes about the different paleontologists but its mostly names, dates, and important facts. and there were a lot of instances of the writer mentioning that something really amazing happened and then saying something like "but thats another story that we dont have time to get into.." its disappointing, like watching the movie Space Camp while you're at Girl Scout Camp, just makes you feel a little cheated.

[Ross]

Interesting overview of the men who unearthed, studied, name and documented the myriad of dinosaur remains that have now been accumulated during the last 150 years.
This is a history of science genera work and should be interesting for those who like natural history.