MCZ Lunchtime Seminar

Of Monsters and Maniacs: How the MCZ Got its Mascot

Scott Johnston
Vertebrate Paleontology Technician and Preparator
Museum of Comparative Zoology

100 million years ago, the life of a giant, reptilian, sea monster ended as it gently settled to the bottom of warm inland sea.  As those millions of years passed, this great leviathan's bones turned to rock, the sea receded, the land rose and became what is now Eastern Australia. And in the 1920s, this beast was rediscovered by a rancher attending his flock.

How did a Cretaceous Australian plesiosaur become the logo of a museum in Massachusetts? Dive in to the sometimes harrowing, often humorous history of our iconic Kronosaurus and the colorful characters who made it what it is today.