July 30, 2025 - Driving from Alaska to Maryland
Field Museum, Chicago
The Field Museum was jamed. Not surprising since it attracts up to 2 million visitors annually.
Admission cost wasn't bad for us old fogeys.
We had lunch in the museum cafeteria. That was expensive. For four hotdogs, some chips, some softdrinks: $90! But we were hungry and that hot dog tasted pretty good!
A Pterosaur glides overhead. It is neither dinosaur nor bird. The name Pterosaur is Latin for "winged lizard".
This particular species of pterosaur was the largest and is called Quetzalcoatlus. It was so big that scientists have debated whether it could even fly. Current theories suggest that it could, at a speed of up to 67 miles per hour.
I believe that Quetzalcoatlus could fly; why would it have wings if it couldn't fly?
The head of a second Quetzalcoatlus can be seen below the flying Quetzalcoatlus, standing on the 2nd floor.
The Tsavo Man-Eaters were a pair of large man-eating male lions in the Tsavo region of Kenya, which were responsible for the deaths of many construction workers on the Kenya-Uganda Railway between March and December 1898. The lion pair was said to have killed dozens of people, with some early estimates reaching over a hundred deaths. While the terrors of man-eating lions were not new in the British public perception, the Tsavo Man-Eaters became one of the most notorious instances of dangers posed to Indian and native African workers of the Uganda Railway. They were eventually killed by Lieutenant-Colonel John Henry Patterson, who wrote his account of his hunting experience in a semi-biography The Man-eaters of Tsavo.
After 25 years as Patterson's floor rugs, the lions' skins were sold to the Field Museum of Natural History in 1924 for $5,000. The skins arrived at the museum in very poor condition. The lions were reconstructed and are now on permanent display, along with their skulls. The actual skulls are at lower left.
These are male lions, but they are mane-less. They don't look at all like the male lions one usually sees. I guess they were pretty fierce though. Killers.
A movie was made about the Lions of Tsavo called The Ghost and the Darkness (1996), with Val Kilmer playing John Henry Patterson and also starring Michael Douglas.
Actual photo of the first of the two Tsavo man-eating lions shot by Lt. Col. Patterson.
The beast in this picture looks much more like a lion than the mounted speciman in the diorama. It also looks much bigger.
The second man-eater from Tsavo shot by Lieutenant-Colonel Patterson.
A spectacular mural of the Great Rift Valley in what is now Kenya, East Africa.
The Rift Valley is often called the “cradle of humankind.” Some of the oldest known fossils of early human ancestors have been discovered there, especially in Olduvai Gorge, Hadar and Lake Turkana
Important discoveries include: Louis Leakey and Mary Leakey uncovering early hominin fossils and stone toolls, Donald Johanson discovering “Lucy,” a famous Australopithecus fossil in Ethiopia in 1974, and Fossils of species like Australopithecus afarensis, Homo habilis, and early Homo erectus. These discoveries helped establish the scientific consensus that modern humans evolved in Africa.
The mural was painted by Canadian artist Carol Christianson. Although she composed this view without ever having visited the region, many people who have worked or lived in the Rift Valley are sure they can recognize the very spot.
The Field Museum had awesome dioramas of wild animals; the best I've ever seen.
Animal exhibitions and dioramas such as Nature Walk, Mammals of Asia, and Mammals of Africa allow visitors an up-close look at the diverse habitats that animals inhabit.
Field Museum scientists collected most of these animals more than fifty years ago on research expeditions around the world.
Long before television brought images of animals in their natural habitats into people's living rooms, museum exhibits of mounted specimens offered the oppportunity for people to learn about animals from all over the world. Today, our displays still allow you to see what these animals, some of which are now endangered or extinct, look like up close in their natural habitats.
On August 12, 1990, American explorer and fossil collector. Sue Hendrickson discovered of the remains of a Tyrannosaurus rex in South Dakota in the Cheyenne River Reservation. Her discovery is the most complete skeleton of Tyrannosaurus known to science. This skeleton is now known as "Sue" in honor of her.
On May 17, 2000, the Field Museum unveiled Sue, the largest T. rex specimen discovered at the time. Sue has a length of 40.5 feet, stands 13 feet tall at the hips, and has been estimated at 8.4–14 metric tons (9.26–15.4 short tons) as of 2018. The specimen is estimated to be 67 million years old.
Sue, the largest and most complete (90%) Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton yet discovered
Sue died at age 28, a record for the fossilized remains of a T. rex until Trix was found in 2013.
The original skull is not mounted to the body due to the difficulties in examining the specimen 13 feet off the ground, and for nominal aesthetic reasons (the replica does not require a steel support under the mandible).
At left is a sculptural reconstruction of a Neanderthal, based on the skeleton to his right. Neanderthals first evolved in Europe at least 400,000 years ago. The last of them died out about 30,000 years ago.
The Neanderthal skeleton (middle) is estimated to be 50,000 to 70,000 years old and was discovered at the La Ferrassie site in France in 1907.
The skeleton at far right is of a Homo Spapien; i.e., modern human. Homo Sapiens first evolved somewhere between 300,000 and 195,000 years ago, in Africa.
A fascinating facial-reconstruction of "Magdalenian Woman", from one of the most famous prehistoric human skeletons ever discovered.
She was discovered in 1911 at the Abri de Cap Blanc, a rock shelter in the Dordogne region of outhwestern France famous for its carved friezes of horses and bison. The find was made when a workman drove a pickaxe into the cliff face in the rock shelter, shattering the skull. It is the most complete Upper Paleolithic skeleton in Northern Europe.
When Magdalenian Woman was acquired in 1926 for the Field Museum in Chicago, Illinois by Henry Field, then curator of Physical Anthropology, it was hailed as one of the most significant acquisitions the museum ever made. On the first day the precious specimen was exhibited, tens of thousands of visitors flocked to the museum to see it.
She lived during the late Ice Age, roughly 13,000–15,000 years ago, during the Magdalenian culture period of Upper Paleolithic Europe.
There is still some debate about the age of Magdalenian Woman. Initially it was thought she was a teenage girl, estimated around 14–16 years old, but more recent analysis suggests she was actually 25 to 35 years old when she died. Her remains were found beneath carved prehistoric artwork, suggesting she may have been intentionally buried there. The skeleton was unusually well preserved for its age. Studies of her bones suggest she may have suffered from nutritional stress or illness during childhood. She belonged to the same broad culture that created many of Europe’s famous cave paintings, including those at Lascaux.
The term “Magdalenian” comes from La Madeleine, the French site where archaeologists first identified this Ice Age culture. The Magdalenian people are known for: sophisticated bone and antler tools, cave art, carved sculptures, spear throwers, and highly mobile hunter-gatherer lifestyles following reindeer and other game after the last Ice Age peak.
The reconstruction gives a very human, modern-looking face to an Ice Age European. There's no anatomical difference between this Homo Sapiens and you and me.
Coming out of the Field Museum, looking at Soldier Field, home of the Bears! Our minivan is parked under there somewhere.
The Field Museum was excellent. We probably saw half of it, if that. I would like to come back some day.
A partial shot of the Obama Presidential Library, under construction. Someone must have touched it with the ugly stick.
