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National #AskACurator Day was Sept. 15, and it was our fourth year participating! We received a lot of inquiries, and in case you missed it, we’re compiling all of our answers here! Our exhibit developers, archivist, paleontologists, curators, and director of collections jumped in to get you answers about all things curatorial!
Our paleontologists, Dallas Evans (Lead Curator of Natural Science and Paleontology) and William Ripley (Curator of Natural Science and micropaleontologist), were on standby to answer the dino questions digging at our readers’ curiosity...
“What's one cool thing about being a curator that most people don't know?”
You mean other than the amazing attire & secret handshakes? -Dallas
“Have you worked in other parts of the museum?”
Always in the curatorial department – even early on as a museum volunteer! -Dallas
“Do you ever visit your own museum and people watch?”
Absolutely! That’s the best way to see how people interact with the exhibit and each other. -Dallas
“What would your dream dinosaur find be?”
I don't really ever think in terms of a specific dinosaur. I tend to think more in terms of people & places. There are some great researchers I'd love the chance to do fieldwork with & some really exciting geologic formations/sites that would be fun to explore. Although…Pachycephalosaurus are pretty cool. -Dallas
My personal favorite dino is Troodon-little meat eater, about the size of a turkey. I’ve been lucky enough to find quite a few teeth and various skeletal bits like vertebra and foot bones and such. I’m always pretty happy to find ANYTHING Troodon related. -William
What is the most complete dinosaur in the collection at The Children's Museum?
That would be our Gorgosaurus. It's an amazing predatory dinosaur from the Two Medicine Formation of Montana. -Dallas
What’s the largest diamond ever found?
There are some really huge diamonds out there - both cut & uncut. An uncut diamond as large as a baseball was just in the news. It didn't sell at auction. They were disappointed with a high bid of $61 million - they wanted over $70 million. While diamonds are pretty cool, you can save yourself millions of dollars and collect cool minerals yourself. There is a huge variety of sizes, shapes, colors,... You can see some great examples in our ScienceWorks gallery. -Dallas
Don't miss the summary blogs with #AskACurator answers from our director of collections, archivist, curators, and exhibit developers!
