6

Tracking Triceratops and Mining Mini-Mammals

Hatcher couldn’t have been in New Haven for more than two weeks, because he was in Washington on January 18, 1889, where he returned to the Muirkirk iron ore beds but found nothing of consequence. Two days later, he wrote from Gulf, North Carolina, and related he’d found several fine fish teeth in coal slates. A large company had just starting pumping out the old Egypt shaft where North Carolina State geologist Ebenezer Emmons had found his “mammal” remains, but it would be a long time before they mined any coal. One other nearby mine had not had any work done on it since the previous year. He vowed to give the place a fair trial, but he knew his chances would be better if coal was coming out. By the twenty-fifth, Hatcher sent Marsh several teeth and dermal plates or skull fragments of reptiles, some fish teeth, a few bones from Muirkirk, and a nearly complete skull of an ichthyosaur or plesiosaur missing only the front of the snout. He proclaimed it “undoubtedly the best thing that has ever been found here in the line of reptiles,” although the specimen does not seem to be listed in the records of either the Peabody or USNM. Yet he’d failed to find any mammals despite braving frigid days of rain with a heavy cold and a very sore throat. Another week’s work produced more reptile bones and teeth, but the search for mammals remained unsuccessful.¹

Fortunately, prospects seemed to be brightening for the coming season out west, for on February 1, Hatcher responded to Marsh about a possible dinosaur skull his mentor had gotten wind of: “I am glad you’re going to get other horn core & fragments from Guernsey & hope we may get skull soon.” This seems to be the first reference to what would become the first scientifically documented specimen of Triceratops, and according to a cowboy on Guernsey’s ranch who had seen the skull, it sported “horns as long as a hoe handle and eye holes as big as your hat.” In another comment, Hatcher revealed that he had set up an investment for Marsh’s older sister, Mary, in his hometown, reassuring Marsh that he hoped “the bank at Long Pine will transact that business satisfactorily to the young lady and yourself & that she will be well pleased with her investment. I know everything will be done right.”²

Despite the dearth of mammals at Gulf, Hatcher argued to Marsh on the seventh that he already had “much better material from here than [Emmons] had.” In addition, Hatcher had a letter from the bank in Long Pine “saying they . . . would send the young lady her papers just as soon as they get them closed and recorded.” He also reported that he’d received “a letter from Mr. Guernsey [that] says he will start for Wyoming today & he will be pleased to show me the skull from which he got horncores & assist me in getting it when I come west in the Spring.”³

The note from Guernsey led to unraveling a remarkable case of mistaken identity. In 1887, Marsh had received an enormous pair of fossilized bony horns from Whitman Cross, a geologist for the Federal Survey in Denver, which had been discovered by George Cannon Jr. along Green Mountain Creek. Marsh immediately identified them as belonging to “one of the largest American bovines” and christened them with the name “Bison alticornis” and assigned a Pliocene age to the specimen. But that age didn’t conform with the fact that Cross had been finding remains of dinosaurs in the same beds from which the fossilized horns were collected, leading him to suspect that the Denver beds were either Cretaceous or very early Cenozoic in age. Were these bony horncores really from an ancient bison? It fell upon Hatcher to solve the mystery.⁴

Upon reaching Long Pine by February 26, Hatcher said Peterson was lined up for the season and was pleased with the gift of a watch from Marsh. He hoped Burwell would be on board soon. On a more personal level, Hatcher intimated, “Mrs. H wishes to thank you for the presents sent her and the baby.” Regarding the investment for Marsh’s sister, Hatcher indicated that Mary’s money was loaned on the lot and building to be built adjoining the bank. The building was insured with good security, and interest would be paid promptly, so “she need not be at all uneasy for her investment is a good one.” With that, Hatcher planned to leave and meet Guernsey in a day or two at Lusk, Wyoming.⁵

Once in Lusk, Hatcher had to wait for Guernsey to return from Chicago, so he wrote Marsh to send the money to Chadron for March, a full $200, because he had bought $50 of fruit trees for his farm, and the sooner he planted, the sooner he’d have fruit. If Marsh couldn’t send $200, then “send $150 & credit me for $50 on my note as per agreement.” The $200 seems to represent Hatcher’s monthly salary plus a $100 fee for use of Hatcher’s team and wagon. This is the first mention of Hatcher borrowing money from Marsh. Hatcher then explained that the papers for Mary’s investment had been delayed due to sorting out a previous mortgage on the property, but that it was still a “good, safe investment” that would draw 10 percent from February 1, with interest paid semi-annually.⁶

It wasn’t until March 19 that Hatcher reported he “didn’t get that big skull as Mr. Guernsey could not find it.” But his ranch foreman, Edmund Wilson, who originally found it, would be back in the spring and guide Hatcher to it. Having seen the country, Hatcher was confident he could take a fully supplied crew there that summer and have good results, but he couldn’t do anything without a crew, since there was no means of subsisting. In the meantime he’d go to Rapid City to see Craven and Burwell, then stop at Long Pine to check on his farm and the investment.⁷

From Long Pine on the twenty-fifth, Hatcher wrote that Gus Craven had three brontothere skulls and one nice pelvis, as well as the fact that Carpenter had an excellent skeleton that Marsh could probably purchase. So during the summer, Hatcher hoped to hopscotch from Carpenter’s site near Rapid City, to Burwell’s brontothere sites around Chadron, and back to Guernsey’s potential dinosaur locality around Lusk. Again, he asked Marsh to send $150 and credit him $50 on his note. He further informed Marsh that Mary’s investment papers had been sent and intimated, “Our boy is very sick.”⁸

Meanwhile, Marsh laid out his priorities for Hatcher’s season on March 28 in a confidential memorandum, stating his desire for him to work a good deal in the Laramie Formation, with the possibility of calling on George L. Cannon Jr. of Denver and getting him to show Hatcher the typical localities in the region where previous fossils had been found, including the eastern slope of Green Mountain, where two thirds of a large dinosaur skeleton was possibly preserved based on specimens already sent to Yale. Hatcher was to secure all the remaining bones and the rights to the locality. Marsh also directed Hatcher to visit a locality where Eldridge had found lots of bones, because Marsh had seen portions of six “Ceratops” or allied skulls from the Denver region, so there must be good skulls there. He might also want Hatcher to visit Colorado Springs and Cañon City to see typical Jurassic localities, but Hatcher should say nothing to Cannon or others about his plans. Regarding the geologic relationships, Marsh would send Cross’s paper, adding that although his stratigraphy and lithology were admirable, he was wrong about the age, which Cross concluded was Tertiary rather than Cretaceous.⁹

Back in Long Pine on the twenty-eighth, Hatcher wrote saying there was a basin of Laramie badlands on Buck Creek in Wyoming thirty to forty miles northeast of Lusk where Guernsey’s big skull was. They were several miles in extent and would take several months of work to prospect thoroughly but would require a complete field outfit because the nearest ranch was twenty miles away. He’d require two men, three horses, and a camp outfit costing about $300 per month. Regarding the other prospects, he thought the Rapid City specimen well worth pursuing, and they ought to keep an eye on the brontothere beds, too. In terms of Mary’s investment, it would go towards building a two-story, double brick building 60 x 120 feet, with the upper story to be used as a Masonic temple and the lower to rent for two storerooms. Hatcher informed Marsh the same group had secured the two adjoining lots and planned to build on them. They intended to borrow $4,000 at 8 percent, which Hatcher thought would be a good investment for five years for Marsh, since the building and lots would be worth two or three times the amount loaned and would have the Masonry behind it. Finally, a concerned Hatcher lamented, “Our boy has been very sick the past week and I have had no sleep since I got home . . . and am not feeling very first rate.”¹⁰

Marsh must have been anxious to get Guernsey’s skull, for on April 4 Hatcher responded, “I know of no other way of getting the big skull than to wait for Mr. Wilson to come back and show it to me. Guernsey has promised to do all he can toward getting it for me & I can only rely on his promise.” More bad family tidings followed: “My wife’s mother is expected to die any moment so that I do not want to leave here until there is a change one way or the other. But that will come soon.” On the eighth, Hatcher expected to go out with Wilson for the skull within ten days, even though Anna’s mother was still “very low.” Hatcher said he’d leave on the thirteenth for Lusk to meet Wilson.¹¹

However, on the nineteenth, Hatcher revealed he and Anna had been dealt an even more devastating blow:

It seems my bad luck never will stop this Spring. My little boy died yesterday & my wife is very sick now. The baby was very sick about two weeks ago & then he got better & the doctor said was out of danger when my wife’s mother was taken down. She got better & I was ready to start work Saturday the 13th when the baby suddenly got worse again. So as to lose no time I started Peterson with team outfit & saddle horse for the field in Wyoming intending to overtake him by R.R. at Chadron or Lusk. I thought sure the baby would get better & the Dr. said all along that he was in no danger but I watched him closely & felt differently about it. We did all we could for him & as he never was sick scarcely a moment of his life before I did certainly think his strength would pull him through.

I suspect you think I am doing nothing this Summer, but you do not know all I have had to contend with this Spring. I came home from the West as we agreed that I should to spend two weeks getting things started on my place so that I could be gone for the summer. Have been here three weeks & sickness has kept me busy night and day & I have seen nothing but misfortune.

I do not know what to do & can not tell you anything until my wife gets better, which I hope she will soon. But it will be very lonely for her here all alone now, he was so much company to her. Perhaps I may have to stay here with her awhile anyway. You see just how I am situated so take what action you see fit. If left to myself I shall certainly try to do the best I can for you & as soon as I can. If you are tired waiting on me longer, you can send out someone to take my place & I will give them all the help in my power. What shall I do with my men and teams? They are up there somewhere now. If you want to trust the securing of the big skull to them I can write them and have them do the best they can. Do as you see fit. I no longer have any suggestions to offer. . . .

Unfortunately, the name of Anna and John Bell’s first son is not now known; he is listed simply as “Child Hatcher” in the Hatcher Family Association records.¹²

A series of telegrams and letters on the twentieth and twenty-first established that Wilson had returned and awaited Hatcher, who requested $250 from Marsh. Marsh, although anxious about the skull, nevertheless simply counseled “use your best judgment about work.” Hatcher sent Peterson and Burwell on to Lusk to go out with Wilson, “look after” the skull, and prospect for others. He’d catch up as soon as possible. Then Hatcher pleaded over his plight to Marsh:

I asked you if you could send me $250.00. When I was ready to go before the baby died I just had money enough to run me a month in the field. Now I have to borrow money to pay Dr. bill, funeral expenses & for lot in graveyard. If you will let me have it, I will pay you whatever rate of interest you think right & will pay the note at the rate of $50 per month (after I have paid the other note) until paid. You have accommodated me so often that it seems like an imposition to ask you to accommodate me now when I still owe you $100.00. But unless I get the money of you I shall either have to sell some of my stock here for just what people are amind to pay me or borrow the money & pay 3% a month on it.

Please let me know if you can let me have the money, & if you can, make out the note as you would like to have it & send it to me & I will sign it. Answer by telegram yes or no. . . .

My wife is a little better and I hope to be able to leave soon.¹³

Struggling to return to a more business-focused mind-set six days later, Hatcher reported that Peterson and Burwell had found Guernsey’s skull, and with Anna feeling better now, he hoped to go and pack it up in a few days, if he could get the money to “straighten up his affairs.” Marsh came through with the money by loaning Hatcher $250, which Hatcher received on May 2. Profoundly grateful, Hatcher responded, “You do me a great favor by letting me have the money. . . .” Since Marsh declined to set the interest rate, Hatcher designated it at 10 percent. Hatcher also advised Marsh about the buildings in Long Pine in which Marsh was considering investing, cautioning that the building must be smaller than originally conceived and only veneered in brick rather than solid. Although they would still pay 8 percent on the $6,500 borrowed, the security would be based on the honor of the Masonic lodge there, “not the mortgaged property that it should be.”¹⁴

Shortly after, Hatcher set off for the skull and sent a dispatch from Lusk on May 7:

The big skull is ours. . . . It is badly broken up, but was in good condition when found three years ago. They broke the horncores off it and rolled it down the bluff & broke lots of it into small pieces some of which we found over 100 yds. below. I doubt if we can ever find all the pieces. Lower jaws were there. When packed it will weigh 1000 lbs. or over. It will probably be a week before I can get it packed & in here, let me know whether to express or freight. Express will cost about $100.00.

And it got better: “Yesterday . . . , I found very fair Hadrosaurus skull about 300 yards below big skull in nearly same horizon . . . also a fragment of another big skull.” Wilson, who found the first skull, wanted to work for Marsh, and Hatcher recommended him as young, ambitious, honest, and intelligent. Hatcher pledged to keep expenses down to $300 per month but couldn’t run the operation for less. Then he ended with a request to send $100 “to pay the boys . . . and Wilson.”¹⁵

By the twentieth, Hatcher was planning his trip to Denver on June 1. He’d need $100 per month plus expenses, but that wouldn’t leave much to pay for help if fossils were found. He wasn’t sure how Peterson and Burwell would do, since they hadn’t found anything significant during his previous absence, but he hoped “to find some good localities for mammals & other small things and set them to work on them” while he was gone. He was sending five crates containing the big skull and a lower jaw of a hadrosaur, along with a package containing four or five species of Laramie mammals. The lot also included some fossil fish fragments, reptiles and birds found in the same bed with mammal teeth, along with the humerus of a mole-like mammal. He’d yet to receive the $100 requested to pay Wilson and men for the previous month and needed $300 for everything this month. He reminded Marsh to credit him for $50 on his loan and added a note about the mammals:

I hope you will be pleased. . . . They are by no means abundant. The few I send you requiring several days careful search after the localities were found. I hope you will not despise them because they are few in numbers & will make the best of them.

If you describe the big skull, give Edwin B. Wilson & Chas. A. Guernsey credit for finding it. I have dug the ground over and over again for pieces of it, but I feel sure that many of them will never be found. I saw no teeth.

He closed by noting he’d been suffering terribly from “rheumatism” in his hand and left hip the last two weeks.¹⁶

Over the next two weeks, another skull and skeleton of Triceratops were found and partially collected, so on the thirty-first Hatcher shipped another five crates to Marsh, including the lower jaws, a maxillary, three vertebrae, and various other bones. It would take another week or ten days to finish collecting the skull because Hatcher was afraid to remove it simply by pasting, for it was so large and clumsy it might break of its own weight. So he pleaded for patience, since it was much more complete than Guernsey’s specimen. He noted the teeth were like that of a hadrosaur and thought a little jaw he had sent last summer from Montana belonged to one of these horned dinosaurs rather than a hadrosaur. Stratigraphically, he believed that if the horncores from Denver were from typical Denver beds, there can be little doubt of their being Cretaceous. He also gleaned a few more mammal teeth, but Marsh apparently thought they weren’t packed well enough, so Hatcher defended his technique: “I do not think the fossils I sent . . . were so poorly packed as to receive any damage. The mammals were in a little box with plenty of cotton.” He thought Marsh might want to decide for himself the age of the formation independent of his opinion, and went on to defend himself further:

You seem to find considerable fault with me this Spring about not writing often & various other things. No doubt you had cause to be exasperated with my slowness this Spring but then I could not possibly be away from home then, and no one regretted it worse than I did. You complain all the time about my not writing oftener. I write you every time I come to town as fully as I can. You must remember that there are no street corners with letterboxes on them out where I am at work. And since it takes me 3 days to go to town and back if I do anything I can not be in town very often. I have to do everything up here myself so far this summer as neither of my men are worth h-l room. If I send them to hunt for specimens they never find any & if I set them to work on anything they break it all in pieces before they get it up. I am doing the very best I know how to do, and I would like you to realize it. Of course I make mistakes but I try to do what is best for all.¹⁷

Things seemed to be patched up between Marsh and Hatcher by the eighth, but Marsh wanted the crew to stop work on dinosaur skeletons and intensify the search for mammals. Hatcher confirmed that almost all mammals sent recently were from a locality where the big skull was, but he had found mammal fossils in four different localities, although he had spent no time looking for them. So he’d focus on that next week and send them all when he came in to pick up Marsh’s student Charles Emerson Beecher. Hatcher’s receipts reveal that Peterson’s salary had increased to $60 per month, while Burwell’s was $50. On June sixteenth, apparently in response to Marsh’s query, Hatcher wrote that he’d found no dermal or sternal plates with the ceratopsian skeleton and couldn’t say whether the new skull was larger than Guernsey’s since the latter was so broken up. He repeated that the mammals and dinosaurs were from forty miles north of Lusk, and since he’d now found mammals in ten or twelve isolated localities, he couldn’t say if they were all from the same horizon because of the distance between them and the disturbed condition of the strata. He hoped Beecher could manage his crew when he left for Denver and wanted Marsh to visit during his upcoming trip west. With that, he shipped four crates of ceratopsian bones and three cans of small specimens including mammal teeth. But the work in the rain was taking a toll: “I am troubled terribly with rheumatism at present. It comes on by spells.” He also needed a better reference to help him identify the bones he was excavating: “Can you get me a copy of Leidy’s Cretaceous reptiles? That [Cope’s] miserable Judith Basin paper isn’t fit for a fire lighter.”¹⁸

The crew wrestled the big skull out of the outcrop and packed it securely by the twenty-seventh, with Hatcher admonishing Marsh to make a plaster bed for it at the Peabody before taking it out of the crate and beginning to prepare it. Then another plaster bed should be prepared before turning it over to prepare the bottom. He’d spent weeks excavating and packing it, so he didn’t want “a little carelessness there [to] destroy” the details of the internal or external anatomy, which could be clearly revealed down to a row of small tubercles surrounding a large bony plate (frill). He added that “Beecher’s suggestions have been of great value . . . & it now remains to be seen what you will do with it there.” Beecher had even made sketches to guide the preparation. Hatcher inquired about Wilson working with them, but he didn’t want any novices. Then, apparently in response to Marsh’s demands for more mammals and concerns that the crew was slacking off in collecting them, he blasted Marsh broadside:

You seem to think that Laramie mammals are everywhere abundant out here & that all that is necessary is to go out and scoop them, notwithstanding what I have said to the contrary. They are very rare & about two teeth represents an average patient day’s work. They are getting more rare every day & unless we find a new locality you need not expect any more. The first locality I found has afforded 10 times the material of all the rest. However I will do the best I can & hope to be able to report rich localities when I come in again. Peterson has become very proficient in finding these small things & is doing well. You need not be afraid that I or any man under me will soldier on you. The reason we dont [sic] send you more and better mammals is because we cant [sic] find them & not because we do not try.

After expressing his displeasure, he confirmed sending a box that day with several mammals and small things, before making a confession of sorts based on his newfound knowledge of horned dinosaurs:

I now have to write something which you will say exposes my carelessness. But nevertheless I will write it. I now believe that the skeleton that Lamothe had last fall was one of these Ceratops. And that a certain flat bone which I only partially uncovered & which was very cracked up was a part of the large bones on the back of the skull over five feet across. If this be true the skull would be fine. It is a reproach to me but after seeing the skull I feell [sic] almost certain that it is another one. However I may be mistaken. I wish I was there now for two hours with any pick or oyster opener.

Then he was back on attack about money, noting that he had incurred “considerable extra expense the last two months . . . coming to town so often . . . for extra materials . . . [for] packing and I think you ought to bear part of it.” Hatcher was having a house built and needed the money, and he wanted to see Marsh that summer “to have a talk” with him.¹⁹

For his part, Marsh had already pumped out a paper about the new Cretaceous mammals (Marsh 1889) for which Hatcher received the proofs, along with a $200 check, by July 6. Hatcher was pleased, “especially for the credit you give me in your paper,” and was able to reciprocate by mailing three packages containing over five hundred mammal teeth besides many bones. “You will have . . . at least 800 teeth of Laramie mammals, abundant material for two more papers. I broke the record yesterday by finding 87 mammal teeth in one day.” After complimenting Peterson and Beecher for their help, he revealed the secret of their success: “We sifted all the anthills in the two best localities & were rewarded a hundred fold.” He elaborated on this curious collecting method in a later paper published in 1896:

The small mammals are . . . never abundant and on account of their small size are seen with difficulty. They will be most frequently found in what are locally known as “blow outs” [areas where the wind has eroded into the ancient channel sands of the Laramie or Lance Creek Formation] and are almost always associated with garpike scales and teeth, and teeth and bones of other fish, crocodiles, lizards and small dinosaurs. . . . In such places the ant hills, which in this region are quite numerous [usually conical and 12–18 inches high], should be carefully inspected as they will almost always yield a goodly number of mammal teeth. It is well to be provided with a small flour sifter with which to sift the sand contained in these ant hills, thus freeing it from the finer materials and subjecting the coarser material remaining in the sieve to a thorough inspection for mammals. By this method the writer has frequently secured from 200 to 300 teeth and jaws from one ant hill.²⁰

Nonetheless, Hatcher was miffed about his still missing money, complaining, “I will be out of money when I pay for supplies today & unless check gets here will have to borrow when I come in again. Please send as soon as possible.” Again changing tone and recalling his college days, he exclaimed, “very glad Yale won boat race” and noted that he’d “have to congratulate Beecher on his new [PhD] degree.” The next day Hatcher wrote again to announce that he’d begun excavating a new skeleton found two weeks previously that preserved at least several ribs, some foot bones, vertebrae, and several other unidentified bones. If complete, it would be “a monster,” since the vertebral centra were over seven inches in diameter. He hoped the skull was attached. Then, again based on what he’d seen, he critiqued Marsh’s identification of Bison alticornis:

You say . . . “Skull no.1 [YPM VP 1820] has a horn on nasals about a foot or more back of beak” also that you have three feet of beak together & nowhere near back to horncores yet, also that both horncores are in place now so that you know just where you are. This is very strange. I am sure you are mistaking the back of the skull for the front; this would be a very natural thing for you to do, especially if you should follow your “Bison alticornis” for a guide, for I am sure you have them turned wrong. I think that the horn which you think you have found on the beak will turn out to be one of several situated on a large frill on back of skull. If this be the case, it will be a consolation to me to know that I was not the only person puzzled by this exceedingly strange form of skull. I presume you have already received Beecher’s drawings, & they’ll doubtless help you a great deal. Those Ceratopsidae were queer birds.²¹

More mammals, more mammals—Hatcher mailed another 150 mammal teeth to Marsh on July 13, along with a list of the mammal localities from which the teeth in Marsh’s publication were collected. But he cautioned that the flow of teeth would subside unless the crew found new localities. He also confirmed that he’d check with Craven about purchasing his season’s collection of brontothere skulls that had been featured in a newspaper article earlier in July. Finally, he inquired if Marsh knew where William Berryman Scott’s party from Princeton was headed, as he had not seen them and didn’t expect to, since the mammals Hatcher’s crew was finding were not complete skeletons. The receipts submitted show that both Peterson and Burwell were now receiving salaries of $40 per month. On the sixteenth, as the “fearfully hot” summer simmered on, Hatcher and Beecher brought five more crates in for shipment. After reminding Marsh to send the check for July, he admitted that he should have waited until the following year to build his house because it had made him “very hard up.” So he requested that Marsh allow him to skip payments on his loan for a couple of months. In a letter on the twenty-first, Hatcher confirmed he’d written Craven about his skulls. Marsh must have expressed interest in their finding more hadrosaur material, because Hatcher indicated they’d not found any skulls so far but “hoped to run on to one any day.” Elaborating on the new ceratopsian skulls, he reported,

One . . . has four cervicals right in position . . . the atlas, axis and next two. The frill is very beautifully scalloped on border, something we have not noticed in any previous skull. The beak should be entire as it sticks straight down in the rock. The other one Mr. Beecher found within eight rod of this one & it is also very good. These skulls when taken out will weigh about three thousand pounds each. Hence . . . we have some work ahead of us. But I have an abundance of “self conceit” & it does not frighten me at all & you may be sure we will get them out & packed all O.K. I think if it were possible [they should] remain at Yale.

Marsh had apparently approved of hiring Wilson, who was to start on the twenty-eighth, and despite his bravado, Hatcher was glad to have another man to help handle the massive skulls.²²

Money matters were foremost in Hatcher’s mind when he wrote to Marsh on August 3, as he acknowledged receiving a $250 check that seemed to indicate Marsh had credited $50 to his loan despite Hatcher’s request to the contrary. He groused,

I will try to get along. But I can not run this party any longer for $300 per month. I had left last month less than $80. This will not pay for my time & horses, wagon & harness. When it comes to paying $15.00 for materials for 2 boxes & other things in proportion I can not stand it. It will cost me nearly $100 to get those two boxes with the big skulls in them to Lusk. Now you know that this is too much to ask of me for the wages I get. I am not asking for any increase in salary but I can not stand this extra expense any longer. I have obligations to meet that I must make.

He had hoped Marsh would come out to “see how work goes here,” and they could discuss it, but Marsh had no plans to come. He then indicated that Lucien Warren Stilwell was trying to purchase Craven’s collection, but Craven agreed to wait two weeks for Hatcher, so he and Beecher were heading to the “Bad Lands” to deal. They struck a bargain with both Craven and Joseph Brown for $300 by the fifteenth, and Hatcher shipped four brontothere skulls, including “a new prong horned fellow.” Despite a lack of communication between Marsh and Hatcher regarding the price Marsh was willing to pay, Hatcher considered his acquisition “cheap” and defended his decision to pay that amount. They also saw Stilwell’s collection in Deadwood, which featured an entelodont skull called Elotherium for $150 and two rhino skulls of Metamynodon for $150 and $100.²³

Returning to Wyoming, the two new ceratopsian skulls were crated and ready to ship by the seventeenth, with Hatcher proclaiming, “If No. 2 made you happy Nos. 3 & 4 ought to make you one hundred fold more so” (No. 2 is YPM VP 1821; No. 3 is YPM VP 1822; No. 4 is YPM VP 1823). The icing on the cake in the shipment would be another can of mammals. But still stewing over finances, he fumed,

After paying for freighting [the skulls], I will be about $8.00 worse off than if I had not dug bones at all this month. In other words, I pay $8.00 for the privilege of working a month & furnishing an outfit that has cost me over $500.00. I want to work and do the best I can for you but I ought to do something for myself too I think. I have been disappointing people all Summer. If I can not do any better I will have to close up & come in pretty soon. All I want is my salary & pay for the use of my horses & outfit above the other expenses.

As Beecher headed back east around the twenty-third, Hatcher planned to check on his spread in Long Pine and paint his house for ten days, but before leaving he again pleaded with Marsh to come out and “look over ground with me this Fall if only for a day or two.” Anticipating Marsh’s concerns, he warned that since Wilson had been working that month, he’d need more funding than he’d been needing because he’d covered a great deal of extra expense. He figured about $400 for August would about get him even. He promised to make an itemized expense report for the period since he left New Haven so Marsh could see the problem for himself and again pleaded, “I am actually losing money this month by working at $300 per month & furnishing everything. I have taken . . . great . . . pains this season to get things up in good shape & have gone to lots of expense to do it . . . but can go no farther.”²⁴

Marsh came through with the $400, along with reprints of his Ceratopsidae and Laramie mammals papers by September 3, as Hatcher set out on his return to the field. Marsh apparently was also contemplating a visit to the Wyoming badlands, because Hatcher advised him to give advance notice so they could meet him because it would be hard to find them otherwise, and Hatcher urged him on by warning, “If you don’t come out this fall . . . I shall think you do not care much for our Laramie mammals, Ceratopsidae, etc.” The “etc.” may have been for hadrosaurs, for he expressed hope of still finding one of their skulls. Then he closed by recounting that his farm looked well, the house nearly finished and the crops good. Hatcher’s next correspondence on October 5 alerted Marsh to watch for another shipment of big boxes and contained a hope that he got home safely, implying he’d visited in the interim. They must have worked out their financial foibles, because another $400 check arrived by October 5 to cover that month’s expenses. Another shipment of crates and mammals followed on the eleventh, and Hatcher cheerily headed for Long Pine, proclaiming, “Thought I would come home & celebrate my birthday which is today.” He was glad Marsh enjoyed his trip to Denver and succeeded in getting some nice Navajo blankets. He promised to mail a pair of moccasins that Marsh had gotten at Hat Creek and left at camp. Wilson was pleased with the “charm” Marsh had gifted him, and Hatcher added that all enjoyed his visit with them and wished to be remembered to Marsh. Hatcher expected to be back at camp by the twenty-third and would be ready for Denver by November 1.²⁵

Snow covered the ground as Hatcher departed for Denver on the first, after deciding to leave one of Burwell’s ceratopsian specimens in the ground until next season and directing the crew to concentrate on excavating Skull No. 5 and prospecting for more mammal localities. He added, “Glad the big boxes are there safe. You can’t imagine what a relief it is to me to get those boxes off my hands in good shape. They were bad things to handle out here without any tools & in such a miserable place to get out.” Before boarding the train he’d send about two hundred mammals by registered mail.²⁶

From Denver on the seventh, Hatcher reminded Marsh to send the check for October so he could pay the men and cover his expenses in Colorado. He’d been unable to begin his survey of fossil sites due to heavy snow and expressed his general state of displeasure. “I wish I was out of this thing. This man Cannon I do not like very well.” Hatcher claimed George L. Cannon, a local high school teacher, had already presented a paper before the October meeting of the Denver Scientific Society based on information delivered from Marsh’s articles in the American Journal of Science, as well as unpublished information that Marsh personally provided him with when he was there, “in which he at least anticipates if he doesn’t state precisely those facts which my finds here (if I make any) are sure to establish.” Beyond that, the man in charge of the Survey in Denver informed Hatcher that there was no saddle horse available, so Hatcher would have to hike to the localities. By the eleventh, Hatcher had only spent one day in the field and found nothing, again grousing, “Unless snow goes off pretty soon & we get good weather, I shall want to leave.”²⁷

A check arrived for $200, but Hatcher telegraphed for another $100 on the twenty-first, arguing that the money would run out before the end of the month, and “if the weather is good I do not wish to lay up here for want of money.” Evidently, Hatcher had had enough:

I want to quit here the end of the month no matter what happens. I have been in the field now almost regularly since I got out of the hospital in New Haven, almost three years ago. And I want to come in for a while this winter. The past month is enough to take the enthusiasm out of any one. I have had nothing but wet feet, sore throat & colds for the last month. The snow is still on the ground, though not so deep as it was. I stayed in this morning to write letters. Practically, I had just as well stay in all the time. I tell you I am sick of this work here & want to come in for a while & then I can go to work with new enthusiasm in the Spring. I can do nothing here & I am tired of trying.

Ever a man of his word, Hatcher returned to Lusk by December 3, paid off his men with half a month’s extra bonus to boot, and closed the camp. From Lusk he would head to Long Pine and stay there until he received his salary settlement from Marsh, then head east to New Haven.²⁸

Clearly the dinosaurs Hatcher collected are the most spectacular discoveries he made in the eyes of the public, but the mammals are at least as important scientifically because they begin to shed light from more than 66 million years ago on the evolutionary origins not only of our own human lineage but also the mammalian lineages with which we still share the earth today. Beyond their being minute and difficult to find, it’s fairly safe to say Hatcher almost certainly paid a price in pain when he collected them, because the ants that inhabit the anthills from which many of the teeth were gathered take onerous offense to their domicile being demolished and are capable of delivering searing, stinging bites to defend their home. Among the minuscule mammalian jewels that Hatcher snatched from the 66-million-year-old sediments of the Lance Formation were, as now identified in the USNM and Peabody collections, numerous genera of the herbivorous, rodent-like multituberculates (Allacodon, Cimolodon, Cimolomys, Meniscoessus, Mesodma, Camptomus; as well as “Dipriodon,” “Halodon,” “Oracodon,” “Selenacodon,” and “Tripriodon” [all now called Meniscoessus]; “Nanomyops” and “Nanomys” [now called Cimolodon]). There were also five genera of early marsupials (Alphadon, Didelphodon, Pediomys, Protolambda, Hatcheritherium, which was named for Hatcher; as well as “Ectoconodon” and “Stagodon,” which are now called Didelphodon) and more of our own placental relatives (Cimolestes, Gypsonictops, Batodon, and Telacodon, as well as “Nyssodon,” now called Cimolestes). The catalogues also record the small, swift, insectivorous mammal Dryolestes. In addition, seven genera of lizards are recorded (Chamops, Colpodontosaurus, Leptochamops, Iguanavus, Odaxosaurus, Peltosaurus, Paraderma, and “Harpagosaurus” [now called Exostinus]). Amphibians are represented by Albanerpeton, as well as the salamanders Lisserpeton, Piceoerpeton, and Scapherton, while turtles in the fauna included Trionyx and Baena. Another reptile was the alligator Allognathosuchus. Six ray-finned fish called Belonostomus, Coriops, Melvius, Paralbula, Platacodon, and “Kindleia,” which is now called Cyclurus, are represented. Finally, the dinosaurian stars of the show included the horned dinosaur Triceratops, for which Hatcher had given both Marsh and the world their first look at the true size and spectacular anatomy of this genus that has since become one of the most famous and popular dinosaurs of all time. Other dinosaur discoveries included the horned cousin of Triceratops, Leptoceratops, the duckbill Trachodon, the bone-helmeted herbivore called Pachycephalosaurus, the carnivores Paronychodon and Troodon. For good measure, the 1889 season also yielded a sharp, serrated tooth of arguably the most famous dinosaur ever found, Tyrannosaurus. However, there was not yet enough of this animal’s skeleton known to recognize it as a new genus, so it would be another sixteen years before Tyrannosaurus took its place on the Cretaceous stage with Triceratops. Nonetheless, Hatcher found specimens of the tyrannosaur cousin Aublysodon, along with the shorebird Cimolopteryx.

In addition, Hatcher’s 1889 collection contains a couple of specimens of sharks from the 18- to 15-million-year-old Calvert Formation—the great white “Carcharodon,” which is now sometimes called Carcharocles, and the sand shark, Odontaspis. Furthermore, the Peabody houses one specimen of the sauropod called Barosaurus, which was collected by Marsh with the assistance of Hatcher from the Morrison Formation in the Black Hills of South Dakota, and Marsh used the specimen to redescribe the genus in 1890. In addition, six fossils of its evolutionary cousin “Astrodon,” which is now called Pleuroceolus, now reside at the USNM.²⁹