Fergus County argus. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1886-1946, 1906-03-23
Skeleton Of the Most Gigantic Animal
That Ever Roamed the Earth
Fl und In Montana.
THE "TYRANNosARAURUs REX"
HE Bones Are Now Being Grated and
Will Go to an Eastern In.
stitution.

of the real king Of beasts. An expe-
dition sent out by the American Mus
cum of Natural History in New York
has just reported the resurrection of
the largest flesh-eating land animal
thus far known to the world. This
constitutes one of the. most remak.
able finds in the recent history OF
paleontology.
The curator of the department of
vertebrate paleontology Of this mus
cum. Prof. Henry s. Osborne, under
whose direction the expedition was
sent out, has conferred upon this new
ly discovered monster the title "Tyran-
nosaurus Rex" In plain english this
means the "Tyrant King of Saurian,"
or the King Of Tyrant saurians.
The remains of this denizen of the
past are being shipped to New York
in a number Of carefully made boxes,
some of the boxes weighing over two
tons. When these old bones arrive,
they will be examined and cleaned
with as much care as If they were
full Of diamonds-for to science this
discovery Is more important than that
of great many diamonds. A large
force of skilled workmen will be de-
tailed to the job, every bone will be
placed in its proper place in the skel-
eton, missing bones will be modelled
out of plaster of paris, and in few
months the completed skeleton will
be placed on exhibition in the halls
Of the museum where visitors may
see what this king of beasts a few
million years ago was like.
Monster Thirty-Nine Feet Long.
Enough parts of this animal have
been found to make it possible to es-
innate quite exactly what his size
was. From the end Of his tail to the
front of his nose he probably measur-
cd about 80 feet. The distance from
his skull, as normally poised, to the
ground, would be about 10 feet-more
than three times the height of an Or
diDary human skeleton.
OF such Importance to science is
this discovery that it has necessitat-
cd Redistribution of the carniver.
GUS dinsaurs of the Cretaceous geolog-
.;cal period. Tyrannosaurus now be-
comes the name of a new genus.
These flesh-eating dinosaurs of the
latter part of the age of reptiles now
show themselves to have been far
more diversified than had been suppos-
ed. The particular hobby of these
creatures seems to have been to make
life miserable for all the herbiverous
dinosaurs of the period.
One of the newly named forms is
that of Dynamosaurs-"Powerful Liz.
ards" It seems that their particular
prey was the duck-billed dinosaur OF
Iguanodont. The Igunanodonts were
partly protector from attack by bony
QA0IOo 1OVdCCu oAOu6 IAAO o1ONo VI IAC
body. Another interesting family was
the Ornithomimidae-"Bi Mimick
ers," who were relatively small but
extremely swift-footed.
The "Tyrant's Prey"
But for real bigness and other ter
rifying qualities, Mr.. Tyrannosaurus
undoubtedly took the prize. He was
large and strong enough to attack the
great three-horned Triceratops, one
of the most interesting of the Dinosaul
family, a fine skeleton of which hal
recently been set up in the Nationa
Museum at Washington. This ANNA
had skull which projected upward
over tine neck like fireman's helmet
and over each eye there was mas
sive horn directed forward, a thirx
but much smaller horn being gener
ally just over the nose. He was abou
twice the size Of an elephant, beinl
upward of 25 feet in height. HI
weighed about ten tons.
And the most remarkable fact of al
Is that in the opinion of Professo
Osborn and his fellow scientists in tn
American Museum of Natural History
this same gigantic three-horned beas
was the prey of the Tyrannosauru
Rex. How scientists should be abb
to understand that it was the flesh Q
this particular beast that would
most satisfying to the king monste
of them all is one of those riddle
which the man in the street has nc
yet solved. But fresh evidence of thi
fact, hitherto only partly suspected,
now coming out of the large colle'
items made by the museum during tn
past few years.
The story of how this discovery wa
made is one of the romances
science. A few years ago Directe
Ho-naday of the New York Zoologic'
park, returning from hunting trl
in the wilds of Montana, brought tn
curator a fossilized horn which he ha
picked up on his trip.
"Is it Of any value?" asked Il
sportsman of the scientist.