Bone Wars
The Bone Wars was the prolonged and hostile rivalry between American paleontologists Edward Drinker Cope (1840–1897) and Othniel Charles Marsh (1831–1899), which unfolded primarily from the late 1860s through the 1890s and centered on competitive excavations for dinosaur and other vertebrate fossils across the western United States.[1][2] The feud escalated after Marsh publicly exposed Cope's mistaken reconstruction of the plesiosaur Elasmosaurus platyurus in 1869, with its head erroneously placed on the tail, igniting personal vendettas that overshadowed their shared scientific pursuits.[1] This competition accelerated fossil discoveries, yielding over 130 new extinct species, including Marsh's identifications of Stegosaurus and Triceratops, which enriched museum collections and public fascination with prehistory while establishing key stratigraphic insights into Mesozoic life.[1][2] Yet the rivalry's defining controversies involved unethical methods, such as bribing quarry workers and landowners, deploying spies to track rivals, dynamiting access to competitors' sites like Como Bluff, and issuing premature, flawed publications to secure naming priority, often resulting in taxonomic errors.[1][2] The exhaustive campaigns ultimately bankrupted both men—Cope selling his collection at a loss before his 1897 death and Marsh resigning from the U.S. Geological Survey in 1892—demonstrating how unchecked personal ambition can propel scientific progress at the expense of rigor and collegiality.[1]Principal Figures
Edward Drinker Cope
Edward Drinker Cope was born on July 28, 1840, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to a prosperous Quaker family headed by Alfred Cope, a merchant who co-owned a shipping firm, and Hannah Edge Cope. This affluent background granted Cope financial independence early in life, freeing him from dependence on university salaries or government grants that supported many contemporaries. Despite the Quaker emphasis on pacifism and restraint, Cope exhibited a combative temperament from youth, channeling it into scientific inquiry rather than military service during the Civil War, for which his father sent him abroad to study. His early fascination with natural history manifested in detailed notebooks on specimens, such as ichthyosaurs displayed at local institutions, fostering a self-taught foundation in anatomy and classification.[3][4][5] Cope's formal education was limited, consisting primarily of private tutoring and attendance at Quaker institutions like the Friends Select School from 1849 to 1853, after which he pursued independent study in Europe to avoid conscription. Returning to Philadelphia, he worked under the guidance of anatomist Joseph Leidy at the Academy of Natural Sciences, initially concentrating on herpetology by recataloging its collections of reptiles and amphibians. Leidy's influence directed Cope toward comparative anatomy, bridging living and extinct vertebrates; this shift propelled him into paleontology, where he applied rigorous dissection to fossil material, prioritizing empirical observation over speculative geology. His initial publications, beginning in his late teens, centered on herpetological systematics, establishing him as a prodigy unburdened by institutional hierarchies.[6][5][3] Sustained by family wealth and occasional private funding, Cope embraced an entrepreneurial model for paleontology, self-financing operations that emphasized speed and volume in output. This approach yielded over 1,400 scientific papers across his career, often challenging orthodox interpretations through direct anatomical evidence and a preference for acquisitive effort over theoretical caution. Driven by personal ambition for recognition in scientific circles rather than stable employment, Cope's independence allowed bold pursuits unbound by committee oversight, though it later strained his resources amid escalating field costs. His Quaker heritage informed a moral framework valuing truth-seeking, yet his willingness to contest established authorities underscored a pragmatic realism in advancing knowledge.[5][4][6]Othniel Charles Marsh
Othniel Charles Marsh was born on October 29, 1831, in Lockport, New York, to Caleb Marsh, a shoe manufacturer and farmer facing financial difficulties, and Mary Gaines Peabody, who died of cholera when Marsh was under three years old.[7] His maternal uncle, the wealthy financier and philanthropist George Peabody, provided crucial financial support that enabled Marsh's education, sparing him from his family's economic struggles.[8] Marsh attended Yale College, graduating in 1860, and received a scholarship to study geology, mineralogy, and chemistry at Yale's Sheffield Scientific School.[7] Following his undergraduate studies, Marsh traveled to Europe for advanced training, spending time in Germany where he studied at the University of Berlin, focusing on mineralogy, microgeology, chemistry, anatomy, and paleontology.[7] This period exposed him to rigorous European scientific methods, particularly the systematic classification approaches emphasized by figures like Professor Goeppert of Breslau, which shaped his emphasis on meticulous anatomical analysis and ordered taxonomy in vertebrate paleontology.[7] Upon returning to the United States, Marsh leveraged his uncle's influence to secure a position at Yale, becoming the first professor of vertebrate paleontology there in 1866 and curator of the Geological Cabinet at the newly endowed Peabody Museum in 1867, an institution funded by Peabody's donation of $150,000 specifically to house Marsh's growing collections and advance scientific research.[8][7] Marsh's academic career at Yale was bolstered by federal ties, particularly through his appointment as vertebrate paleontologist for the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) starting in 1882 under director John Wesley Powell, which provided substantial government funding for large-scale expeditions and access to western territories.[1] This USGS role, sustained until 1892, allowed Marsh to conduct extensive field operations supported by official resources, distinguishing his work from privately funded efforts and contributing to perceptions of institutional elitism due to his reliance on taxpayer-backed infrastructure.[1] Described as ambitious and possessive, Marsh adopted a methodical and secretive style in his research, prioritizing thorough preparation and institutional permanence over hasty outputs, which contrasted with more rapid publishing approaches and sometimes strained collaborations owing to his egotistical tendencies.[9] His focus on building Yale's paleontological legacy through systematic collection and classification reflected a commitment to long-term scientific edifice rather than immediate acclaim.[9]Historical Background
Antecedents in American Paleontology
In the early 19th century, fossil collecting in the United States was largely confined to the Eastern seaboard, where amateur naturalists and quarry workers unearthed specimens from marl pits in New Jersey and Cretaceous deposits along the Atlantic coast. These efforts yielded mostly isolated bones of marine reptiles, fish, and invertebrates, with initial interpretations often linking finds to biblical deluges rather than deep time.[10] A pivotal shift occurred in 1858 when William Parker Foulke excavated a nearly complete skeleton of Hadrosaurus foulkii from a Haddonfield, New Jersey, marl pit, marking the first substantial dinosaur specimen recovered in North America.[11] Joseph Leidy, a Philadelphia anatomist regarded as the founder of vertebrate paleontology in the United States, described the specimen that year, recognizing its bipedal posture and distinguishing it from reptilian lizards, thus inaugurating systematic study of Mesozoic vertebrates over Pleistocene megafauna like mastodons.[12][13] Leidy's descriptive work extended westward through collaborations with early geological surveys, emphasizing meticulous anatomy over speculative reconstruction. He analyzed fossils from Nebraska and Dakota territories collected during pre-Civil War expeditions, identifying dinosaurs such as Trachodon and Troodon from fragmentary remains, while prioritizing empirical classification amid limited material.[14] Ferdinand V. Hayden, a geologist leading surveys from the 1850s, contributed initial dinosaur bones from Montana and Wyoming outcrops during his 1854–1855 expedition, forwarding specimens to Leidy for identification and underscoring the potential of Rocky Mountain formations.[15] These efforts remained sporadic, constrained by rudimentary transportation and focus on mineral resources, with Western vertebrate fossils vastly outnumbering Eastern ones but undescribed due to logistical barriers.[16] The American Civil War's end in 1865 catalyzed westward expansion, as homesteaders and the Transcontinental Railroad's construction—commencing cuts through Jurassic strata from 1865 onward—revealed extensive outcrops of the Morrison Formation across Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah.[17] This Upper Jurassic unit, spanning over 1 million square kilometers and comprising variegated shales, sandstones, and limestones, preserved abundant dinosaur remains in fluvial and lacustrine deposits, yet pre-1868 explorations had merely hinted at its vertebrate wealth through scattered megalosauroid teeth and sauropod fragments.[18] Such exposures transformed inaccessible badlands into viable collecting grounds, signaling untapped reservoirs of prehistoric life that dwarfed Eastern yields, though systematic paleontological pursuit lagged behind surveying for settlement and rail routes.[19]Initial Interactions and Ignition of Rivalry (1868–1876)
In 1868, Edward Drinker Cope hosted Othniel Charles Marsh at a fossil quarry in Haddonfield, New Jersey, sharing access to specimens as part of their initially cordial professional relationship. Unbeknownst to Cope, Marsh negotiated directly with the quarry owner to receive future fossils independently, an action that introduced early mistrust despite their prior acquaintance in Berlin in 1864.[2] [1] That year, Cope acquired the type specimen of the plesiosaur Elasmosaurus platyurus from Kansas, unearthed by army surgeon Theophilus H. Turner during fort construction. In a 1869 publication, Cope described and restored the skeleton, but committed a fundamental anatomical error by inverting the vertebral column, affixing the skull to the tail rather than the neck—a misjudgment rooted in incomplete specimen preparation and overreliance on partial articulation.[20] [21] During a 1870 visit to the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia, Marsh directly confronted Cope with the reconstruction flaw, highlighting the vertebrae mismatch. Concurrently, anatomist Joseph Leidy published a formal critique confirming the error, which Cope attempted to mitigate by purchasing available copies of his paper. This public exposure eroded Cope's standing and crystallized personal resentment, as Marsh's intervention prioritized anatomical accuracy over collegiality, underscoring incentives for precedence in paleontological descriptions.[2] [22] Into the early 1870s, both paleontologists pursued U.S. government funding amid expanding surveys of Western territories rich in Cretaceous and Tertiary deposits. Cope aligned with Ferdinand Hayden's expeditions, securing logistical support for Kansas fieldwork, while Marsh drew on familial influence and Yale affiliations for resources. Mutual recognition of shared hunting grounds in Kansas and Nebraska intensified disputes over specimen acquisition and naming priority, transforming professional overlap into direct competition driven by prestige and institutional backing.[6] [23]Escalation of the Conflict
Early Field Expeditions and Discoveries (1872–1877)
Edward Drinker Cope conducted privately funded field expeditions to Colorado and Wyoming during the early 1870s, focusing on vertebrate fossils in remote western terrains that posed logistical hurdles such as arduous overland travel by wagon, scarce water sources, and encounters with hostile weather and wildlife.[24] These efforts built on his earlier work in Kansas but emphasized the untapped potential of Rocky Mountain exposures, yielding fragmentary remains of large extinct reptiles that hinted at unprecedented scales of prehistoric life.[9] Meanwhile, Othniel Charles Marsh directed Yale-sponsored expeditions to Kansas and Nebraska from 1870 to 1873, employing teams of students and local guides to prospect badlands and river valleys, often requiring military escorts for safety amid Native American territories and rugged landscapes.[25] These ventures, limited to four field seasons for Marsh personally, collected mammalian and reptilian fossils that underscored the West's richness, though transportation back East via rail and ship strained resources.[9] By 1877, both paleontologists increasingly relied on local informants to overcome direct fieldwork limitations, with Colorado schoolteacher and geologist Arthur Lakes emerging as a pivotal collector. In spring 1877, Lakes discovered massive fossil bones eroding from a hogback ridge near Morrison, Colorado, in what is now the Morrison Formation, including vertebrae and limb elements from gigantic dinosaurs.[26] Initially contacting Cope, Lakes ultimately shipped specimens to Marsh at Yale after the latter offered prompt payment and recognition, providing the first substantial evidence of Jurassic theropods and sauropods from the region.[27] These finds, excavated from multiple quarries along the ridge, included theropod limb bones later contributing to Marsh's description of Allosaurus fragilis and sauropod vertebrae forming the basis for early Apatosaurus and Camarasaurus material.[26] The era's discoveries, though fragmentary and requiring laborious quarrying in unstable rock layers, revealed the West's bone beds as prolific sources, spurring systematic collection that multiplied known dinosaur elements and validated rivalry as a catalyst for empirical gains despite interpersonal strains. Marsh's teams processed Lakes' haul into three new dinosaur species announcements by late 1877, marking a shift from sporadic eastern finds to organized western yields.[26] Cope's parallel efforts secured comparable reptilian fragments, demonstrating how decentralized prospecting amplified outputs amid funding disparities—Cope's self-reliance versus Marsh's institutional support.[28]Como Bluff Era and Intensified Competition (1877–1892)
In 1877, Union Pacific Railroad foreman William Harlow Reed discovered large fossil bones eroding from the bluffs at Como Bluff, Wyoming, during an antelope hunt along the north side of the ridge.[29] Recognizing their significance, Reed notified Othniel Charles Marsh, who promptly hired him to collect and ship specimens eastward via the nearby rail line.[30] Edward Drinker Cope soon learned of the site's potential and dispatched his own collectors, resulting in both rivals establishing separate quarries along the anticlinal ridge, which exposed rich layers of the Late Jurassic Morrison Formation.[31] The bluff's "boneyard" of densely packed, well-preserved sauropod skeletons—often articulated and easy to extract—drove an escalation in field operations, as the abundance of material promised substantial scientific yields.[32] The proximity of Como Bluff to the Union Pacific Railroad, completed a decade earlier, enabled efficient transport of heavy fossil cargoes, with Marsh's team alone shipping approximately 30 tons of bones eastward in the first year of excavation.[24] This logistical advantage, combined with seasonal summer digs employing small crews of local and former railroad workers, allowed for rapid removal of massive bone beds containing multiple individuals of gigantic dinosaurs.[32] Cope's operations mirrored this intensity, yielding comparable hauls of sauropod remains, including those later associated with Amphicoelias, while Marsh secured specimens forming the basis for Brontosaurus. The site's extraordinary productivity—far surpassing scattered finds elsewhere—intensified the rivalry, as each paleontologist raced to monopolize quarries before depletion, sustaining competitive excavations through the 1880s.[28] Efforts at Como Bluff exemplified the era's operational scale, with workers encasing fossils in plaster jackets for rail shipment, often under conditions of secrecy to guard against rival encroachments. By the early 1890s, however, the primary bone horizons were exhausted, marking the close of this peak phase of the conflict, though the site's causal role in accelerating fossil recovery rates remained pivotal to the period's paleontological output.[29] The concentrated efforts here, fueled by the bluff's geological bounty, shifted American vertebrate paleontology toward systematic, large-scale fieldwork, yielding tons of material that underpinned subsequent taxonomic advancements.[33]Tactics, Sabotage, and Operational Methods
Both Cope and Marsh employed spies to infiltrate and monitor each other's field operations, enabling preemptive actions to secure promising sites.[2][34] Marsh, in particular, bribed quarry managers and workers at sites like Haddonfield, New Jersey, to redirect fossil discoveries exclusively to him, effectively blocking Cope's access.[34][1] Similarly, Cope bribed railroad workers along key routes to gain intelligence on fossil-bearing lands.[35] To deny rivals potential finds, teams under Marsh destroyed uncollected bones at Como Bluff by smashing them, while Cope reportedly dynamited a quarry associated with Marsh to prevent further excavation.[1][2] These sabotage tactics proved effective in maintaining exclusive control over high-yield locations, as rivals lacked time to salvage remaining material amid the rapid pace of operations. Logistically, both paleontologists scaled up expeditions with large crews—Marsh employing up to 60 workers at peak—conducting seasonal digs in remote badlands during summer months to avoid harsh winters.[2] Fossils were protected using plaster jackets for transport via mules, wagons, and rail cars, with proximity to railroads at sites like Como Bluff facilitating swift shipment of bulky specimens eastward.[34] This infrastructure supported handling voluminous hauls, as teams encamped near bone beds to maximize daily extraction. The rivalry's competitive pressure accelerated specimen acquisition beyond what individual efforts might have yielded, resulting in over 130 new vertebrate species described collectively, including dozens of dinosaurs, through intensified field seasons that amassed thousands of fossils overall.[1][2] Such methods, by prioritizing speed and denial, empirically drove higher output rates, with Marsh's teams alone cataloging comparable thousands of items to Cope's 13,000 specimens.[2]Scientific Outputs and Empirical Contributions
Major Fossil Discoveries and Species Descriptions
The Bone Wars prompted the naming of approximately 136 new dinosaur species, with Edward Drinker Cope describing 56 and Othniel Charles Marsh 80, primarily from Late Jurassic and Late Cretaceous formations in the American West such as the Morrison Formation.[36][37] This output included over 25,000 fossil specimens collected, which filled institutions like the Yale Peabody Museum and the American Museum of Natural History with material for study and display.[38] Marsh's contributions encompassed several iconic taxa, including the theropod Allosaurus fragilis named in 1877 from partial skeletons found in Colorado and Wyoming, the sauropod Apatosaurus ajax also designated in 1877 based on vertebrae and limb bones from Colorado, and the plated ornithischian Stegosaurus stenops described that same year from specimens in Colorado exhibiting dorsal plates and tail spikes.[9][39] He further named the long-necked sauropod Diplodocus longus in 1878 from Wyoming remains and the horned dinosaur Triceratops horridus in 1889 from skull and skeletal elements unearthed in Wyoming and South Dakota.[40] Cope's descriptions highlighted sauropods like Camarasaurus supremus in 1877 from a partial skeleton in Wyoming, noted for its shorter neck relative to contemporaries, and early insights into ceratopsians through taxa such as Agathaumas sylvestris in 1872, an incomplete specimen from Montana suggesting frilled dinosaurs with horns.[41] His work also included theropods like Laelaps aquilunguis (later reclassified as Dryptosaurus) in 1866, predating the rivalry's peak but expanded during it with additional material.[2] The rapid pace of discoveries yielded comprehensive faunas, such as the Morrison Formation's assemblage of sauropods, theropods, and ornithischians, but haste contributed to taxonomic issues including synonymies—Brontosaurus excelsus, named by Marsh in 1879, was later deemed a junior synonym of Apatosaurus based on overlapping morphology.[39] Nonetheless, the volume of named species and specimens provided a foundational dataset for subsequent paleontological analysis, despite initial inaccuracies from incomplete preparations.[37]| Scientist | Key Dinosaur Species Named | Year | Formation/Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| Othniel Charles Marsh | Allosaurus fragilis | 1877 | Morrison Formation, Colorado/Wyoming |
| Othniel Charles Marsh | Apatosaurus ajax | 1877 | Morrison Formation, Colorado |
| Othniel Charles Marsh | Stegosaurus stenops | 1877 | Morrison Formation, Colorado |
| Edward Drinker Cope | Camarasaurus supremus | 1877 | Morrison Formation, Wyoming |
| Othniel Charles Marsh | Triceratops horridus | 1889 | Hell Creek Formation, Wyoming/South Dakota |