Re: More Piltdown, Osborn & Tyrannosaurus (was Re: Beautifully horrible)

[Danvarner@aol.com]

In a message dated 98-07-23 20:00:03 EDT, you write:

<< 
 At 09:15 PM 7/22/98 -0700, William Gibson Parker wrote:
 >He [Henry Fairfield Osborn of the AMNH]
 >seems to have supported the fossil's authenticity, and
 >few people in his time would dare to cross him.  This was apparent in the
 >mounting of the Brontosaurus skull fiasco.
 
 As I tell my students, Osborn was THE Big Man in Vert Paleo for the early
 decades of the century, and his legacy lasted long after he did.  >>
  
  I must say that Osborn must have harbored some doubt about Piltdown Man for
one reason: Charles R. Knight never, to my knowledge, did a restoration of
that taxon. Knight was Osborn's personal artist and they both shared a great
enthusiasm for prehistoric men (homonids hadn't appeared yet). Knight's oeuvre
contains many Neanderthals and "Cro-Magnons" but I have yet to see any
Eoanthropus.
  Even more curiously, Knight and Robert Broom were great friends, yet I have
never run across a Knight depiction of Australopithecus, robust or otherwise.
That piece of art would be the Holy Grail of restoration art. Dan Varner.