New academic words 8

She Sells Seashells

1. The day started like any other for 12-year-old Mary Anning and her older brother, Joseph. The siblings were walking along the English shore in Lyme Regis trying to find “curiosities” to sell. They had done this for as long as they could remember. The shores here were a place where fossils of ancient creatures abounded, and the Anning family made money selling their finds to both scientists and tourists.
2. On this particular day in 1811, Mary and Joseph made a significant discovery. They looked up along the cliffs of the shore and saw something unusual exposed because of recent erosion from heavy rain. From where they stood, the object looked sort of like a crocodile’s head. The bony skull piqued their interest and so Mary and Joseph carefully climbed to the specimen and removed the bones from the side of the cliff. When they got home, Mary assessed the situation and realized that they had a singular find—nothing like this had ever been discovered before. Several months later, after another heavy rain, Mary located the rest of the creature’s body and carefully excavated it.
3. What was this creature? It was an ichthyosaur, a dolphin-like extinct marine reptile from the

   Triassic period

   ! The discovery put the Anning family on the map, and Mary became well known in the world of fossils and paleontology. She spent the rest of her life attaining fossils for museums and private collectors. She learned as much as she could about extinct marine creatures, always carefully documenting her finds by drawing diagrams and keeping detailed notes. Despite this, Mary was seldom given credit for her work. Unfortunately, although Mary was well respected by many scientists, it was uncommon for uneducated women in the 1800s to get credit for their scientific work. It wasn’t until after her death that Mary’s work became known to the public. In fact, that famous tongue twister “She sells seashells by the seashore” is about Mary and her discoveries.
4. If you ever happen to visit a British museum today and look at marine fossils from the Triassic period, just remember that you’re most likely examining some of Mary’s contributions to the field of paleontology.