the skull in the field, which was amazing. he s working and uncovering the teeth one by one by one. it was spectacular. teeth like this just sticking right out of the skull. we re going, oh my god. look at this thing. look how huge it is. this has gotta be bigger than the one at the american museum. it s huge. it s wonderful. we had started a long time ago naming particular dinosaurs, and the name sue, for susan hendrickson, goes down in history, and i think that s a kind of a cool way to reward those amateurs who make these discoveries. we were all experienced diggers. you know, it was just total focused effort.
and we get out on the side, and i put terry to work on cleaning the side of the skull, cause he s really our best preparator. pete let me work on part of the skull in the field, which was amazing. he s working and uncovering the teeth one by one by one. it was spectacular. teeth like this just sticking right out of the skull. we re going, oh my god. look at this thing. look how huge it is. this has gotta be bigger than the one at the american museum. it s huge. it s wonderful. we had started a long time ago naming particular dinosaurs, and the name sue, for susan hendrickson, goes down in history, and i think that s a kind of a cool way to reward those amateurs who make these
it, because we all wanted to see what the skeleton was going to look like. basically, we d take different sections so we weren t in each other s way and just kind of worked the specimen until we could start removing bones. you know, and every time somebody found a bone or fragments, they just said, the s bone. we wouldn t say, skull. we didn t want to jinx it. pretty early on, i hit something hard, and so, i stopped. it s the s word, i said, thinking, i bet i hit the skull. when i got down digging and then started really working with the smaller knife, we found, as we were going down, is the back of the skull. and we re getting down, and here s this skull taking shape,
bones. you know, and every time somebody found a bone or fragments, they just said, the s bone. we wouldn t say, skull. we didn t want to jinx it. pretty early on, i hit something hard, and so, i stopped. it s the s word, i said, thinking, i bet i hit the skull. when i got down digging and then started really working with the smaller knife, we found, as we were going down, is the back of the skull. and we re getting down, and here s this skull taking shape, and we get out on the side, and i put terry to work on cleaning the side of the skull, cause he s really our best preparator. pete let me work on part of
these materials, and he took me over to this big cliff, and he said, take a look. and i looked at it, and i looked at him. i said, is that t. rex? he said, yes, and i think it s all here. and we haven t started digging or haven t moved anything around yet. we ve just been looking at it and taking some pictures and trying to figure out how to proceed. there s a real mass of bones here. some are caught up in concretion, but most appear to be really excellently preserved. and i believe that the tail s going that way and the skull is going this way, but we re just going to have to dig it up and see. collecting fossils is something that s very timely. fossils are discovered because they re weathering out, because the forces of nature, rain, winds, freezing, thawing, even snowfall, have an effect on that fossil. every day that it s outside is a day that it s going to destruction.