Importance Score: 70 / 100 🔴
Edelman Fossil Park Opens, Showcasing Prehistoric Past and Present Climate Concerns
Ten years ago, the location of the Edelman Fossil Park & Museum in Mantua, New Jersey, was simply a large excavation site situated behind a Lowe’s. Today, this unlikely locale has transformed into a premier fossil destination, potentially holding one of the world’s most significant fossil troves. Dating back 66 million years, alarmingly close to the dinosaur extinction event, the site represents a prehistoric marine graveyard, a “mass death assemblage” where numerous sea creatures perished and settled onto the seabed of a shallow ocean.
From Quarry to Museum: A Decade-Long Transformation
This former quarry, due to its ancient history as a possible mass extinction burial ground, has been reborn as the Edelman Fossil Park & Museum. Located approximately 20 miles from Philadelphia in Mantua, NJ, the museum recently opened its doors to the public. For Dr. Kenneth Lacovara, a Rowan University paleontology and geology professor and the museum’s executive director, this opening marks the high point of a decade dedicated to realizing this vision.
Innovative Approach to Paleontology
“We are undertaking unprecedented endeavors here that, to my knowledge, have not been implemented in any other museum,” stated Dr. Lacovara, a distinguished paleontologist renowned for discovering Dreadnoughtus, one of the largest dinosaurs on record.
The fossil exhibits at the museum deliver a compelling message championed by Dr. Lacovara: highlighting the parallels between the mass extinction 66 million years ago and the present era of rapid climate change. He emphasizes that current environmental shifts are endangering numerous species, pushing them towards extinction.
“Discover the Past, Protect the Future”: The Museum’s Core Message
The museum’s motto, “Discover the past, protect the future,” encapsulates its central purpose.
“That truly is the driving force behind this institution,” Dr. Lacovara explained. “Urgent action is required, and each day of inaction, or regression, further burdens future generations.”
Unearthing Prehistoric Secrets in Southern New Jersey
For many years, the Inversand Company mined the quarry for marl, a dark greenish sand utilized in water and soil treatment. Stricter environmental regulations rendered the site unprofitable, prompting Inversand to consider closure.
Mantua officials initially hoped for residential and commercial development of the pit. However, the Great Recession halted these aspirations, leaving the quarry as an open pit.
Marl extraction inadvertently revealed prehistoric sediments typical of South Jersey but usually buried deep underground, exceeding 40 feet.
Dr. Lacovara, then affiliated with Drexel University in Philadelphia, began exploring the site. He identified a fossil-rich layer potentially corresponding to the mass extinction event 66 million years ago. Fossils directly from the extinction moment are rare due to the uncommon conditions required for bone preservation.
“This is an event that I, and numerous other paleontologists, have been searching for globally,” Dr. Lacovara noted, mentioning previous searches in southern Patagonia, the Himalayan foothills, and other regions.
“And I located it behind the Lowe’s in New Jersey,” he remarked.
To date, over 100,000 fossils, representing 100 distinct species, have been meticulously excavated and cataloged from the quarry.
Community Engagement and University Partnership
Until the recent pandemic, the site annually hosted a public fossil dig, allowing community members to unearth fossils from sediment layers above the mass extinction stratum.
Rowan University acquired the site in 2015 for nearly $2 million, recruiting Dr. Lacovara – an alumnus of the institution (formerly Glassboro State College) – as dean of its newly established School of Earth and Environment. Rowan embraced Dr. Lacovara’s vision for a museum.
“This institution will serve as a catalyst to inspire young individuals to pursue careers in science,” Rowan University President Ali Houshmand commented during the media tour’s commencement.
Philanthropic Support for a World-Class Destination
Jean and Ric Edelman, founders of a financial advisory firm and fellow Glassboro State alumni, contributed $25 million towards the $75 million museum construction cost.
“We instantly recognized the potential for this to become a world-class attraction,” Mr. Edelman stated.
The museum, overlooking the fossil site, features typical dinosaur museum exhibits. Near the entrance, skeletons of Cretaceous period creatures from the North American East Coast are displayed. A mosasaur, a formidable marine reptile, hangs overhead, and a Dryptosaurus, a T. rex relative, is posed in a menacing stance.
The museum also highlights New Jersey’s pivotal role in early dinosaur discoveries. The first nearly complete dinosaur skeleton, a hadrosaur, was unearthed in a Haddonfield quarry in 1858. Dryptosaurus was the first tyrannosaur discovered, in 1866, close to the museum’s location.
Exploring Earth’s History Through Interactive Galleries
Museum visitors navigate a winding path through three distinct exhibit galleries.
Gallery 1: Deep Time and Dinosaur World
The initial gallery features an introductory film elucidating the immense timescale of Earth’s history.
Representing Earth’s 4.5-billion-year history as a 1,000-page book, human civilization’s 10,000-year span occupies merely the final word on the last page. This “deep time” perspective prepares visitors to understand the unprecedented speed of current climate change.
Life-sized dinosaur recreations, both large and small, populate the gallery. During the warm Late Cretaceous period, higher sea levels turned North America into an archipelago. One exhibit depicts an Astrodon, a large herbivore, overpowering a juvenile Acrocanthosaurus, a carnivore.
“We aim to showcase the raw realities of the dinosaur world,” Dr. Lacovara explained.
Gallery 2: Marine Creatures of Ancient New Jersey
The subsequent gallery showcases marine life from the region’s prehistoric seas, including sea turtles, sharks, and saber-toothed salmon. Ancient New Jersey was approximately 70 feet underwater and 15 to 30 miles offshore. “Everything in this gallery was discovered on this property,” Dr. Lacovara pointed out.
This includes the formidable mosasaurs.
“Statistically, it’s almost certain that a mosasaur of this magnitude inhabited this precise location at some point,” Dr. Lacovara affirmed, indicating a mosasaur recreation.
Gallery 3: Extinction and Hope
Visitors then proceed to the Hall of Extinction and Hope. It illustrates the catastrophic consequences of the asteroid impact in the Gulf of Mexico, triggering the fifth mass extinction event in Earth’s history.
The exhibit then transitions to the present, which many scientists characterize as the sixth mass extinction. Species are struggling to adapt to human-induced planetary changes, including habitat destruction and global warming driven by greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion.
An interactive display charts the dramatic global temperature increase over recent centuries, allowing visitors to compare this trend against potential natural causes such as sunspots, volcanic eruptions, and Earth’s orbital cycles.
“None of these factors adequately explain the temperature variation,” Dr. Lacovara stated.
However, the simultaneous increase in temperature and greenhouse gas concentrations exhibits “an almost perfect correlation,” he added. “Visitors can then draw their own conclusions.”
He emphasized the intention for visitors to analyze the data themselves. “Not everyone will necessarily grasp the connections,” Dr. Lacovara acknowledged, “but our mission is to assist those who are inclined to do so.”
Action and Engagement for a Sustainable Future
The final exhibit station provides information kiosks detailing actions visitors can take to mitigate climate change. “Hope without action is essentially despair,” Dr. Lacovara asserted. “We aim to empower individuals to enact positive change in the world before they depart the museum.”
The article then considers the potential reception of this message in a political climate where climate change denial is present.
Kelly Stoetzel, the museum’s managing director, expressed interest in visitor reactions, particularly from climate change skeptics.
“When visitors engage with the science presented here, can they be persuaded to consider alternative perspectives?” Ms. Stoetzel pondered. “Perhaps.”
Dr. Lacovara’s message remains straightforward: “You cannot cherish what you do not understand. We aspire to foster a love for our remarkable planet, inspiring individuals to take protective measures.”
The museum’s experiential approach allows visitors to engage in paleontological activities. For an additional fee, from May to October, visitors can excavate fossils in quarry sands, keeping their discoveries.
The museum incorporates playful elements, such as elevator music featuring 1950s and 1960s singers like Dean Martin (nicknamed Dino), creating “dino lounge” music.
A sign at the entrance declares: “This facility is smoke-free, weapons-free and asteroid free (for the last 66 million years).”
Dr. Lacovara also highlighted the museum’s bird-safe exterior windows, designed to prevent bird collisions.
“I particularly appreciate its foundation in evolutionary principles,” Dr. Lacovara remarked.
The eyes of early vertebrates possessed four color receptors, including ultraviolet light.
Birds, as dinosaur descendants, retain ultraviolet receptors. They perceive spider web patterns embedded in the museum’s glass, enabling them to fly safely away.
“If you approach at the correct angle, you can discern them,” Dr. Lacovara explained.
Mammals, evolving later, lost ultraviolet vision, becoming nocturnal to avoid dinosaur predation. Ultraviolet light receptors became repurposed for olfaction in mammals, enhancing their sense of smell and taste but sacrificing ultraviolet vision.
“To mammals like us, the glass appears transparent,” Dr. Lacovara noted. “A forklift incident confirmed this when a mammalian driver drove through a pane.”
With the museum now operational, Dr. Lacovara intends to focus on solidifying evidence that the quarry’s “mass death assemblage” resulted from the planet-wide cataclysm following the asteroid strike.
Establishing definitive proof has been challenging due to bioturbation, where sea-bottom burrowing creatures disturbed the sediments. Consequently, the iridium layer, a key extinction marker, is diffused.
“It’s akin to viewing something through frosted glass,” Dr. Lacovara described.
He possesses the necessary data but museum-related responsibilities have delayed completion of research papers.
“This endeavor has been all-consuming,” Dr. Lacovara concluded.