Appleton cabinet, interior, west end, by Lovell, J

The Hitchcock Ichnological Cabinet is a collection of fossil footmarks assembled between 1836 and 1865 by

Edward Hitchcock Edward Hitchcock (May 24, 1793 – February 27, 1864) was an American geologist and the third President of Amherst College (1845–1854). Life Born to poor parents, he attended newly founded Deerfield Academy, where he was later principal, ...

(1793–1864), noted American

geologist A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually study geology, earth science, or geophysics, althou ...

, state geologist of

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

, United States, and President of

Amherst College Amherst College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Amherst, Massachusetts. Founded in 1821 as an attempt to relocate Williams College by its then-president Zephaniah Swift Moore, Amherst is the third oldest institution of higher educatio ...

. He was one of the first experts in fossil tracks. A footmark impression in stone is a

petrosomatoglyph A petrosomatoglyph is a supposed image of parts of a human or animal body in rock. They occur all over the world, often functioning as an important form of symbolism, used in religious and secular ceremonies, such as the crowning of kings. Some a ...

. Begun when the science of ichnology (the study of tracks) was in its infancy, and the word dinosaur had not been coined yet, the collection was made chiefly from the fossils of the

Connecticut River The Connecticut River is the longest river in the New England region of the United States, flowing roughly southward for through four states. It rises 300 yards (270 m) south of the U.S. border with Quebec, Canada, and discharges at Long Island ...

Valley (

Connecticut River Valley trackways The Connecticut River Valley trackways are the fossilised footprints of a number of Early Jurassic dinosaurs or other archosauromorphs from the sandstone beds of Massachusetts and Connecticut. The finding has the distinction of being among the firs ...

). By 1875 this collection consisted of 21,773 tracks representing 120

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

. It is the world's largest collection of dinosaur tracks. Starting in 1855, the collection was located in the lower level of Appleton Cabinet on the Amherst College campus. It has subsequently been twice relocated, and can now be found in the Amherst College Museum of Natural History. Htichcocks ichnology cabinet 1858 Plate 4 Fig 1

Htichcocks ichnology cabinet 1858 Plate 4 Fig 1

References

External links

Emma C. Rainforth
researcher on Hitchcock collection

Beneski Museum of Natural History
1865 establishments in Massachusetts Amherst College Trace fossils Collections of museums in the United States {{trace-fossil-stub

See also

References

Further reading

External links