JEFFREY T. LAITMAN*Associate Editor, The Anatomical RecordLocust Walk at the University of Pennsylvania isamongst the most beautiful college streets in America.As I strolled there a few weeks back with Peter Dodson,the Guest Editor of this Special Issue and one of thegreat professors of that venerable institution, I could nothelp but imbibe the energy of the students around usmixed with the sweetness of the late spring air. As I hadsince we first met at Yale around our Anatomy dissect-ing table in the fall of 1973, I listened attentively toPeter, enraptured by his energetic wealth of knowledge.As anyone who has taken anatomy knows, you alwaysremember your dissection tablemates, and Peter isindeed memorable. At the time we met, I was a trem-bling, beginning graduate student and Peter an alreadywizened warrior finalizing his dissertation. As heshowed me how to correctly load the scalpels (andalways helped me with the band-aids I would need whenI missed) he would wax eloquently about ceratopsiandinosaurs, interpreting fossil remains, and reconstruct-ing phylogenies all interspersed with our more mundanedaily chores around the cadaver. He was both a rolemodel and a mentor, and I appreciatively followed along.Now, as then, I followed his lead, and that led to areddish building just off the Walk known as The WistarInstitute of Anatomy. ‘‘Why are we stopping here?’’ Iasked, a little perturbed, an ever-compulsive New Yorkereager to get to our work, the precious trove of manu-scripts waiting on us in his lab. ‘‘I’d like to see if we canvisit Professor Leidy,’’ Peter answered, ‘‘it would be mostappropriate.’’ ‘‘Wow, Joseph Leidy has a descendant nowat Penn?’’ I asked incredulously. ‘‘No,’’ he answered, ‘‘hisbrain is here.’’As it turned out, while the great Professor’s brain wasindeed in residence, we had not made an ‘‘appointment’’and so he (it?) could not receive us, we were dulyinformed by the guardian who came to explain. AlthoughPeter implored that we were his academic ‘‘relatives’’and I chimed in to suggest he (it?) would be pleased tosee us (I should have been quiet as this didn’t help; wegot a stern and odd look), she was adamant that wewould need to make an official request much further inadvance. The Professor did not receive ‘‘drop in’’ visitors.Although our pilgrimage was not successful on thatday, we are making our plans to return, and will requestan appointment appropriately far in advance (just aswell, as I’d like to be better dressed than I was to meetThe Professor.) But, you may ask, why the visit in thefirst place, why was the brain of this man preserved,and who was Joseph Leidy, anyway, and what were histies to anatomy, dinosaurs, or this Special Issue,‘‘Unearthing the Anatomy of Dinosaurs: New insightsinto their Functional Morphology and Paleobiology’’(Dodson, 2009a)? All this needs a little explaining.In our world today, dinosaurs are again kings of theplanet, at least in terms of which beasties fascinate thepublic. Who amongst us did not as a child have a plasticT-Rex or Brontosaurus (I know, I know, it’s the wrongname now, but Apatosaurus just won’t work for anyonewho doesn’t live in a museum)? Whenever I work at theAmerican Museum of Natural History here in New York,I have to push through the throngs of school childrenclamoring to see our assortment of Jurassic meat-eatersand Cretaceous vegetarians with names they gleefullytry to pronounce with a combination of amazement andjoy. If one looks carefully, one can even see how differentpersonality types radiate to different dinosaurs: theaggressive kids run to Tyrannosaurus; the mischievousones love Velociraptor; the thoughtful ones ponder thehorned dinosaurs; the kids with the pocket-protectorslove the odd-looking duck-billed hadrosaurs; the vegeta-rians, gentle souls, and chubby kids, make a direct pathto the brontos (I loved the brontos; indeed, my first timebeing ejected from the museum was due to climbing onone.) Dinosaurs are part of our 21st century culture, asalive today as when they thumped across the earth mil-lennia ago.It is a little difficult to fathom a world in which dino-saurs were not part of our imagination. They are, how-ever, actually a relatively recent part of our vernacular.Indeed, the ‘‘Dinosauria’’ (meaning ‘‘terrible lizards’’)were only first named as such in 1842 by the great Brit-ish anatomist and paleontologist Richard Owen (1842).He included in this the few extinct ‘‘reptile-like’’ fossilsthat had been found previously, notably the ReverendWilliam Buckland’s Megalosauraus (arguably, the first‘‘dinosaur’’ discovered in 1824) and the remains of Igua-nodon and Hyaeosaurus, described by Gideon Mantrellin 1825 and 1833 (Buckland, 1824; Mantrell, 1825; seeDodson, 2009b, for discussion). So, with the insight andwisdom of the great anatomist Owen, dinosaurs tooktheir first thunderous steps. A little over a decade later
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Jun 30, 2012
María Alejandra Acosta Vergara 
