4. Mary Anning Paleontology (1799 1847)
Growing up in the coastal town of Lyme Regis, on the south coast of England, Mary Anning was surrounded by areas rich in fossils from the Jurassic period. Her father was a cabinet maker, but supplemented his income by searching and mining the cliffs for fossils, and selling his finds to tourists. Marys education was limited, attending a Sunday school to learn to read and write, but she became fascinated with the fossils her father found to make ends meet. After he died at just 44, the family practise continued, selling curious items on a table outside their home and a local inn. In 1811, Marys brother Joseph dug up a 4-foot skull from what was to become known as an ichthyosaur. Mary set about to finding the rest of the skeleton, which she triumphed in a few months later. The family sold the entire skeleton for £23, and it made its way to London where it was put on display. This was significant for the time, with most people believing in the Biblical idea of creation, which suggests that the Earth is only a few thousand years old. Mary continued to make important finds, and in 1823 she found the first ever complete Plesiosaurus, and 5 years later the first British example of a pterosaur, followed by a Squaloraja fish skeleton the next year. She educated herself by reading as much as she could obtain, and dissected fish and cuttlefish to understand the anatomy of the fossils she found. She had no educational background, and so didnt fit in well with the scientific community, and became resentful of the lack of credit she received from the male scientists who published descriptions of the fossils she found. However, she was acknowledged as an expert in many areas, including fossil faeces, and often went hunting with men who were to become famous archaeologists. Marys findings challenged the view of the Earth as people knew it, her discoveries forced the scientific community into looking at the changes in the natural world differently, and although she was not credited by some, she was famous to and respected by others.