George Morton, Henry Beasley and Triassic footprint classification

Abstract

Triassic footprints were found in Warwickshire in 1837 and in Cheshire in 1838. Neither locality yielded any more material remains of the animals that had left the prints. However, in 1842 Richard Owen identified the thin-toed prints from Warwickshire as those of rhynchosaurs, while attributing the hand-like prints from Cheshire to labyrinthodont amphibians. These views held sway throughout the nineteenth century, although neither is now believed correct. A more rational classification of Triassic footprints was initiated in the 1890s by two amateur members of the Liverpool Geological Society - George Morton and Henry Beasley. It was Beasley who, in 1895, made the first serious attempt to classify the footprints, recognising eight different types which he designated by the letters A-H. Two years later, Morton published a not dissimilar classification; he, unlike Beasley, was prepared to attribute scientific names to the footprints. After Morton's death, Beasley produced six reports on footprints for a committee set up by the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1904 to study the Triassic System in Britain. While Beasley never completed the definitive classification of footprints to which he aspired, he and Morton succeeded in introducing system to a study where, previously, there had been only disorder and confusion.