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A gripping narrative of a fearless paleontologist, the founding of America's most loved museums, and the race to find the largest dinosaurs on record.
In the dust of the Gilded Age Bone Wars, two vastly different men emerge with a mission to fill the empty halls of New York's struggling American Museum of Natural History: Henry Fairfield Osborn, a privileged socialite whose reputation rests on the museum's success, and intrepid Kansas-born fossil hunter Barnum Brown.
When Brown unearths the first Tyrannosaurus Rex fossils in the Montana wilderness, forever changing the world of paleontology, Osborn sees a path to save his museum from irrelevancy. With four-foot-long jaws capable of crushing the bones of its prey and hips that powered the animal to run at speeds of 25 miles per hour, the T. Rex suggests a prehistoric ecosystem more complex than anyone imagined. As the public turns out in droves to cower before this bone-chilling giant of the past and wonder at the mysteries of its disappearance, Brown and Osborn together turn dinosaurs from a biological oddity into a beloved part of culture.
Vivid and engaging, The Monster's Bones journeys from prehistory to present day, from remote Patagonia to the unforgiving badlands of the American West to the penthouses of Manhattan. With a wide-ranging cast of robber barons, eugenicists, and opportunistic cowboys, New York Times best-selling author David K. Randall reveals how a monster of a bygone era ignited a new understanding of our planet and our place within it.
A Science Friday Best Book to Read This Summer
A gripping narrative of a fearless paleontologist, the founding of America's most loved museums, and the race to find the largest dinosaurs on record.
In the dust of the Gilded Age Bone Wars, two vastly different men emerge with a mission to fill the empty halls of New York's struggling American Museum of Natural History: Henry Fairfield Osborn, a privileged socialite whose reputation rests on the museum's success, and intrepid Kansas-born fossil hunter Barnum Brown.
When Brown unearths the first Tyrannosaurus Rex fossils in the Montana wilderness, forever changing the world of paleontology, Osborn sees a path to save his museum from irrelevancy. With four-foot-long jaws capable of crushing the bones of its prey and hips that powered the animal to run at speeds of 25 miles per hour, the T. Rex suggests a prehistoric ecosystem more complex than anyone imagined. As the public turns out in droves to cower before this bone-chilling giant of the past and wonder at the mysteries of its disappearance, Brown and Osborn together turn dinosaurs from a biological oddity into a beloved part of culture.
Vivid and engaging, The Monster's Bones journeys from prehistory to present day, from remote Patagonia to the unforgiving badlands of the American West to the penthouses of Manhattan. With a wide-ranging cast of robber barons, eugenicists, and opportunistic cowboys, New York Times best-selling author David K. Randall reveals how a monster of a bygone era ignited a new understanding of our planet and our place within it.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
About the Author-
David K. Randall is the New York Times best-selling author of four books, including Dreamland and Black Death at the Golden Gate. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and elsewhere. A senior reporter at Reuters, he lives in Montclair, New Jersey.
Reviews-
January 1, 2022
Leading paleontologist Brusatte follows up the New York Timesbest-selling TheRise and Fall of the Dinosaurs withThe Rise and Fall of the Mammals, summing up a next act that includes humans, whose world dominance has caused an extinction event costing an estimated 80 percent of wild mammals in the last century alone (75,000-copy first printing). In A Portrait of the Scientist as a Young Woman, Elkins-Tanton--principal investigator of NASA's $800 million Psyche mission--tells her story and that of the nearly all-metal protoplanet 16 Psyche, located in an asteroid belt 589 million kilometers from Earth and optimum not just for mining but more crucially for imparting the story of how planets like ours were formed (50,000-copy first printing). In What Your Food Ate, MacArthur-honored geologist Montgomery joins with biologist Bikl� to argue that good health starts with good soil and good farming practices. A National Book Award finalist for The Soul of an Octopus and New York Times best-selling author of The Good Good Pig, Montgomery returns with The Hawk's Way to describe her work with Jazz, a bright-eyed female Harris's hawk with a four-foot-plus wingspan and decidedly a predator rather than a pet (60,000-copy printing). Award-winning theoretical physicist and cosmologist Padilla explains Fantastic Numbers and Where To Find Them, plumbing nine numbers explaining how the universe works, from the impossibly large Graham's number to 10^{-120}, which measures the unlikely balance of energy needed to allow the universe to exist for more than a blink of the eye (100,000-copy first printing). By detailing the discovery of Tyrannosaurus Rex in the Montana wilderness, the New York Times best-selling Randall explains the triumphant emergence of New York's American Museum of Natural History while also showing how The Monster's Bones inspired an ongoing fascination with dinosaurs and their role in shaping Earth. Multi-award-winning sf author Robinson recounts everything he's learned in the more than 100 trips he has taken to The High Sierra since his first, life-changing sojourn in 1973 (50,000-copy first printing). From a theoretical physicist whose international best sellers have gracefully explained to lay readers how the universe works, Rovelli's There Are Places in the World Where Rules Are Less Important Than Kindness offers essays embracing not just science but literature, philosophy, and politics.
Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
April 15, 2022 The story of the world's most iconic dinosaur. The central human figure in this book is a man named Barnum Brown (1873-1963), who transcended his humble upbringing on a Kansas farm to become one of the nation's most accomplished paleontologists. Reuters senior reporter Randall, author of Black Death at the Golden Gate, among other books, offers an astute and entertaining account of Brown's indefatigable pursuit of fossils and the intense competition he entered into with rival hunters. The author sets Brown's major discoveries against a broader consideration of the cultural significance of his greatest find, in 1900: the first partial skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex, "the largest known predator in Earth's history." Randall carefully outlines the shifts in scientific understanding prompted by the appearance of this "monster," and he makes a persuasive case for its profound impact on our conception of the history of life on Earth. As he notes, "the thud with which its discovery landed and shifted our understanding of ourselves and our planet reverberates still." The author vividly renders the early and ongoing commercial appeal of T. rex, and a prominent theme is the often contentious intersection of science and big business in the fossil trade: Museums and private collectors began to contend fiercely for specimens in the late 19th century, with the fearsome T. rex becoming, after Brown's discovery, the most prized target. Also memorable are Randall's investigations of some of the most colorful personalities in the burgeoning field of dinosaur studies, including the infamous combatants in the so-called Bone Wars, Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope, whose struggles for personal distinction were often outrageously unscrupulous. In the epilogue, Randall charts the dramatic growth of the T. rex industry over the past century or so, underscoring the importance of Brown's pioneering efforts. An absorbing account of early dinosaur discoveries and their cultural legacies.
COPYRIGHT(2022) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
June 6, 2022 Reuters reporter Randall (Black Death at the Golden Gate) chronicles the fossil-hunting exploits of Barnum Brown (1873–1963) in this colorful adventure saga. Hailed as “the Father of the Dinosaurs” in his New York Times obituary, Brown discovered his first fossils in coal deposits his father dug up on the family’s Kansas farm. His uncanny knack for finding the mineral-preserved remains of ancient creatures eventually landed him a job working for paleontologist and railroad scion Henry Fairfield Osborn, who was leading the Department of Vertebrate Paleontology at the American Museum of Natural History. Randall takes note of how Osborn’s racist and eugenicist beliefs intertwined with his overweening ambition, but the focus is on Brown, who most famously discovered and excavated the first documented tyrannosaurus rex remains in Montana’s Hell Creek Formation. Randall draws on Brown’s unpublished memoirs and biographies by his daughter, Frances, and second wife, Lilian, to draw a multidimensional portrait of the paleontologist, and astutely analyzes the T. rex’s place in popular culture while maintaining that the most important lesson to be learned from the dinosaur’s “fearsome reign” on Earth may be that “the climate always wins.” Paleontology buffs will thrill to this vibrant, treasure-filled account.
Starred review from May 1, 2022
Randall's (Black Death at the Golden Gate) book takes the reader across the North and South American continents in pursuit of the great dinosaur bones, leading to the discovery of the Tyrannosaurus rex in 1902 in Montana. Randall breathes life into the human side of natural history, detailing the pioneers, paleontologists, and other personalities that discovered the dinosaurs, including the 19th-century scientists Richard Owen, Henry Fairfield Osborn, Othniel Charles Marsh, Edward Drinker Cope, and Barnum Brown. In addition to the discovery of Tyrannosaurus rex, the book explores the discoveries of other great prehistoric creatures during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including Brontosaurus and Triceratops. The landscapes of the Badlands in the American West and Patagonia in South America are well described. In addition to the adventure of paleontological excavation, Randall also considers how museum collections are developed, exploring the rivalries between great institutions like the Carnegie Museum and Pittsburgh and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Barnum Brown's travels and his discoveries for the American Museum of Natural History are thoughtfully recounted. VERDICT Randall successfully writes the human story behind the discovery of dinosaurs; a book that will delight readers of science and history.--Jeffrey Meyer
Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Christoph Irmscher;Wall Street Journal
[An] entertaining, skillfully told history of Gilded Age fossil-hunting... Randall expertly captures the poisonous mix of personal ambition, ruthlessness, big money and nationalist zeal that drove it.
Steve Brusatte;Atlantic
David K. Randall brings alive that swashbuckling time at the turn of the 20th century, when dinosaurs were still a relatively new concept... [He] combines his journalist's eye for details with a storyteller's flair for spectacle. His tale is as rollicking as a Western—and in many senses, it is one... Along the way, Randall grapples with a profound question: Should fossils be treated as commodities?
Library Journal (starred review)
Randall successfully writes the human story behind the discovery of dinosaurs; a book that will delight readers of science and history.
Publishers Weekly
[A] colorful adventure saga... [Randall] astutely analyzes the T. rex's place in popular culture while maintaining that the most important lesson to be learned from the dinosaur's 'fearsome reign' on Earth may be that 'the climate always wins.' Paleontology buffs will thrill to this vibrant, treasure-filled account.
Kirkus Reviews
Astute and entertaining... Randall carefully outlines the shifts in scientific understanding prompted by the appearance of [the T. Rex], and he makes a persuasive case for its profound impact on our conception of the history of life on Earth... An absorbing account of early dinosaur discoveries and their cultural legacies.
Deborah Blum, best-selling author of The Poisoner's Handbook
The Monster's Bones is such an irresistibly good read and such a compellingly smart book. David Randall takes his tale of fossil-hunting and museum building and deepens it into something more—a story in which both the long-vanished dinosaurs and the humans who discover them are equally dangerous in their own unique ways.
Jason Fagone, best-selling author of The Woman Who Smashed Codes
A spectacular yarn of science and adventure, The Monster's Bones takes us back to the birth of paleontology, when a Kansas farm boy made the find of a century—and a wealthy racist in New York tried to exploit it. Randall has excavated a classic, a story every bit as big and head-spinning as the T. Rex at its center.
Paul Sereno, Ph.D., Paleontologist, University of Chicago
Barnum Brown and T. rex, the dinosaur he literally exploded from the depths of time from remote Montana quarries, lie at the heart of David K. Randall's paleontological thriller that is a tell-all of how the man came to be, a fortuitous journey from a small town in Kansas to the halls of America's greatest natural history museum in New York. I read the volume spellbound... Readers are taken back in time to feel the grit and drama of the early fossil discoveries. And those stories serve to highlight the enduring promise of paleontology—the chance to be the next Barnum Brown.
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