Edwin Harris "Ned" Colbert (September 28, 1905 – November 15, 2001)O'Connor, Anahad

'' The New York Times'', November 25, 2001. was a distinguished American vertebrate paleontologist and prolific researcher and author. Born in Clarinda, Iowa, he grew up in Maryville, Missouri and graduated from Maryville High School. His father was George H. Colbert who was head of the mathematics department at

Northwest Missouri State University Northwest Missouri State University is a public university in Maryville, Missouri. It has an enrollment of about 8,505 students. Founded in 1905 as a teachers college, its campus is based on the design for Forest Park at the 1904 St. Louis Worl ...

and had been at the college since its founding in 1906. He received his A.B. from the University of Nebraska, then his Masters and Ph.D. from Columbia University, finishing in 1935. He married Margaret Matthew, daughter of the eminent paleontologist William Diller Matthew, in 1933. She became a noted artist, illustrator, and sculptor who specialized in visualizing extinct species. The couple had five sons together. The young family moved to

Leonia, New Jersey Leonia is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States census, the borough's population was 8,937,American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

for 40 years, and Professor Emeritus of Vertebrate Paleontology at Columbia University. He was a protégé of Henry Fairfield Osborn, and a foremost authority on the Dinosauria. For his work, ''Siwalik Mammals in the American Museum of Natural History'', Colbert was awarded the Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal from the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

in 1935. He described dozens of new taxa and authored major systematic reviews, including the discovery of more than a dozen complete skeletons of a primitive small Triassic dinosaur, '' Coelophysis'' at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico, in 1947 (one of the largest concentrations of dinosaur deposits ever recorded), publication of their description, and a review of

ceratopsia Ceratopsia or Ceratopia ( or ; Greek: "horned faces") is a group of herbivorous, beaked dinosaurs that thrived in what are now North America, Europe, and Asia, during the Cretaceous Period, although ancestral forms lived earlier, in the Jurassic. ...

n phylogeny. In 1959, he headed an expedition to the Geopark of Paleorrota (Brazil), within Llewellyn Ivor Price.Antônio Isaia, ''Os Fascinantes Caminhos da Paleontologia.'' Editora Pallotti ''(Portuguese)'' His fieldwork in Antarctica in 1969 helped solidify the acceptance of continental drift, by finding a 220-million-year-old fossil of a '' Lystrosaurus''. His popularity and his textbooks on dinosaurs, paleontology, and

stratigraphy Stratigraphy is a branch of geology concerned with the study of rock (geology), rock layers (Stratum, strata) and layering (stratification). It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary rock, sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks. Stratigrap ...

(with

Marshall Kay Marshall Kay (November 10, 1904 – September 4, 1975) was a geologist and professor at Columbia University. He is best known for his studies of the Ordovician of New York, Newfoundland, and Nevada, but his studies were global and he published wid ...

) introduced a new generation of scientists and amateur enthusiasts to the subject. He was the recipient of numerous prizes and awards commemorating his many achievements in the field of science. He became a curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Museum of Northern Arizona in

Flagstaff, Arizona Flagstaff ( ) is a city in, and the county seat of, Coconino County, Arizona, Coconino County in northern Arizona, in the southwestern United States. In 2019, the city's estimated population was 75,038. Flagstaff's combined metropolitan area has ...

in 1970. He died at his home in Flagstaff in 2001.

Works

Colbert wrote more than 20 books and over 400 scientific articles. *1935: ''Siwalik Mammals in the American Museum of Natural History'' *1945: ''The Dinosaur Book: The Ruling Reptiles and Their Relatives'' (repub 1951) *1955: '' Colbert's Evolution of the Vertebrates: A History of the Backboned Animals Through Time'' (four more editions in 1969, 1980, 1991 & 2001; fifth edition with Eli C. Minkoff & Michael Morales) *1961: ''The World of Dinosaurs'', illustrated by

George Geygan George may refer to: People * George (given name) * George (surname) * George (singer), American-Canadian singer George Nozuka, known by the mononym George * George Washington, First President of the United States * George W. Bush, 43rd Presiden ...

(repub in 1977 as ''Dinosaur World'') *1961: ''Dinosaurs: Their Discovery and Their World'' *1965: ''

The Age of Reptiles ''The Age of Reptiles'' is a mural depicting the period of ancient history when reptiles were the dominant creatures on the earth, painted by Rudolph Zallinger. The fresco sits in the Yale Peabody Museum in New Haven, Connecticut, and was comp ...

'', illustrated by Margaret Colbert (repub 1987) *1968: ''Men and Dinosaurs: The Search in Field and Laboratory'' (repub 1971) *1968: ''Millions of Years Ago: Prehistoric Life in North America'', illustrated by Margaret Colbert *1973: ''Wandering Lands and Animals: The Story of Continental Drift and Animal Populations'' (repub 1985) *1977: ''The Year of the Dinosaur'', illustrated by Margaret Colbert *1983: ''Dinosaurs: An Illustrated History''. *1984: ''The Great Dinosaur Hunters and Their Discoveries''. *1989: ''Digging into the Past: An Autobiography''. *1995: ''The Little Dinosaurs of Ghost Ranch''. *1980: ''Fossil-Hunter's Notebook: My Life with Dinosaurs and Other Friends'', w/Elias Colbert.

References

* Ann Brimacombe Elliot, ''Charming the Bones: A Portrait of Margaret Matthew Colbert''. Kent State University Press, 2000. . * Romeu Beltrão, ''Cronologia Histórica de Santa Maria e do extinto município de São Martinho.'' 1787–1933. Vol I. Pallotti, 1958. (''Portuguese'')

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Colbert, Edwin H. 1905 births 2001 deaths University of Nebraska–Lincoln alumni American paleontologists Columbia University faculty American Unitarians Columbia University alumni People associated with the American Museum of Natural History People from Clarinda, Iowa People from Maryville, Missouri People from Leonia, New Jersey People from Flagstaff, Arizona