Paleontology has always been a hot topic at the moment, and we often see news of scientists discovering a new fossil.
Every discovery is not easy, and every fossil is precious, but you know what? In the 19th century, when paleontology was rapidly evolving, two scientists had a profound impact on paleontology.
They made great contributions to paleontology (they discovered and named hundreds of species, and the students they cultivated during the "Great War" were passed down from generation to generation, and are still the mainstay of the paleontological community), but they have also caused great damage to many paleontological fossils.
Today we will talk about the famous "fossil war" in history.
Friendship before the Great War
Othniel Charles Marsh was born in 1831 on a family farm in New York. Marsh showed a keen interest in science from an early age, and with the encouragement and patronage of his banker uncle George Peabody, he studied at the private high school Phillips College and Yale University, and went to Germany for graduate school.
Othéneur Charles Marsh, image credit wikipedia
Edward Drinker Cope, nine years younger than Marsh, was born into a wealthy penn family. Loved natural history from an early age and studied at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia.
At the age of 18, Kopp studied under paleontologist Joseph Reddy and published his first academic paper. Three years later, at the age of 21, Kopp became a member of the Academy of Sciences. In 1863, in order to escape the American Civil War, Kopp was sent to Germany by his father to study.
Edward Drick Kopp, image credit Wikipedia
In Germany, Marsh became acquainted with Kopp. At that time, Western Europe was at the forefront of paleontological research, and various theories were developing rapidly. Marsh supported Darwin's theory of evolution, while Kopp insisted on a ramack-like theory of evolution. Although the two did not agree with each other academically, they maintained a harmonious friendship.
In 1864, after Marsh and Kopp returned to China, they returned to Yale University and the Academy of Natural Sciences to continue their paleontological research, and continued their friendship, and the two also named each other new species, which seemed to have a good relationship.
However, this friendship is not indestructible.
The initial rift
The twist took place in 1868 when Kopp invited Marsh to visit a fossil excavation site in New Jersey, where the wealthy Kopp did not excavate the fossils himself, but hired miners to do the work.
The invitation was originally out of friendship between the two, but Marsh secretly bribed the miners behind Kopp's back, asking the miners to send the new fossils they found directly to the Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale University, where Marsh is located.
This incident was the beginning of their rupture.
That same year, Kopp discovered and named Flakeosaurus. This is an important discovery of Kopp. But in restoring the skeleton, Kopp misjudged the long neck and tail of the floretosaur, causing the skull to be placed at the end of the tail.
Reconstruction of Cope's erroneous skeleton, courtesy of The American Philosophical Society
Corp's reconstructed skeleton image, courtesy of The American Philosophical Society
The error was discovered during a visit by a paleontologist to the Academy of Natural Sciences. In 1870, Reddy, a popular science teacher, pointed out Kopp's mistake at a regular meeting of the Academy of Natural Sciences.
This mistake dealt a big blow to Kopp's reputation. He issued a correction statement and even tried at one point to buy back all the academic journals that printed the erroneous paper.
Just as the effects of this incident were dissipating, Marsh mentioned Copp's mistake again in The American Naturalist. This greatly annoyed Copp. Marsh argues that his pointing out that the wrongdoings stimulated Kopp's vanity, and they have been fierce rivals ever since.
After this incident, the two criticized and smeared each other as soon as they had the opportunity.
Fossil warfare
In the U.S. Geological Survey's race for director, the two openly sided with different candidates, and their personal feud escalated into factional struggle. In the 1870s, with the discovery of a large number of fossils in the western United States, the fossil war between Marsh and Kopp officially began.
Fossil Wars, image from Adam Miller
When Marsh receives the news of the discovery of the fossil, he will spend a lot of money to block the news, so that he can reach the discovery site before Kopp, and even release the wrong fossil discovery news to mislead Kopp. In order to understand the progress of the other party's research, Marsh also hired spies to track Kopp.
At the same time, Kopp also tried to fight back. At the fossil excavation of the Como Cliff in Wyoming, Marsh took the lead and managed to forbid Koppo's men from approaching the excavation site. Kopp hires "fossil hunters" to steal fossils from Marsh, and uses Marsh's dissatisfaction with the salary to bribe them to secretly hand over the fossils to him.
In order to compete for the fossil excavation site, the miners hired by the two will attack each other with stones and even threaten each other with guns. During the white-hot phase, they also instructed hired workers to go to each other to destroy, smash or even blow up the other party's fossils.
In addition to the excavation site, Kopp also opened up a "second battlefield" in academic journals. In 1877, Kopp acquired the academic journal American Naturalists and turned it into his own "showground."
In 1877 and 1878 alone, Kopp published 76 academic papers, which is just the tip of the iceberg of the 1400 papers published in his lifetime (Kopp was also one of the most published scholars in history).
Despite Kopp's numerous questions, Marsh found a much higher number of new species. A total of 86 new species were found in Marsh, compared to 56 in Kopp.
In 1882, Marsh became the chief paleontologist of the newly formed United States Geological Survey through his connections and a series of operations in Washington, D.C. This gave Marsh a lot of federal money as well as power. He began cutting off Kopp's government funding and isolating Kopp. Publishing papers and excavating fossils requires a lot of money.
Feeling that the academic path would be blocked by insufficient funds, Kopp tried to fill the funding needs by mining silver, but this in turn cost Kopp everything. In the end, Kopp was forced to mortgage his lab and separated from his wife and children, leaving only a large pile of fossils around him.
Marsh pursued Kopp and claimed to confiscate Kopp's fossils because they had been excavated with federal funds. But Copp had enough evidence to prove that he was out of his own pocket. This incident made Kopp determined to shake out Marsh's black material and bring down Marsh.
After Kopp sent several whistleblower letters, Marsh was removed from office and had most of his earnings confiscated for improper dealing and academic misconduct.
In 1897, at the age of 56, Copp died of illness. Two years later, Marsh, 67, died of pneumonia. Both ended up almost falling, which was a pity.
This is the famous "fossil war" in history, and the scientific process is not necessarily a beautiful story, but these negative stories also teach people the importance of healthy competition.