The Great Fossil Enigma: The Search for the Conodont Animal

Table of Contents

Contents List of Illustrations · xi Preface & Acknowledgments · xiii Prelude: The Impossible Animal · 1 1 · The Road to El Dorado · 4 The fossil is found–the search begins–Pander’s chicks–a friend of Murchison–Pander sees teeth and imagines fishes–others see trilobites, sea cucumbers–Owen sees anything but fish–Harley sees crustaceans–Moore in paleontological ecstasy–the fossil arrives in Cincinnati–Newberry sees fish–Grinnell misses Custer’s Last Stand–Ulrich denies the fish and sees a worm–Hinde proves the fish–Smith’s surprise–Huxley’s encouragement–Zittel and Rohon murder the fish and see a worm. 2 · A Beacon in the Blackness · 34 Oil enters the American soul–fossils take on economic importance–microfossils take center stage–scientific worth of conodonts recognized–the black shales problem –godlike Ulrich vs. Kindle–Bryant’s fishes–Hibbard’s washing machine–Ulrich and Bassler’s proof of method–Stauffer’s chance discovery–Gunnell’s vision of the future–Chalmer Cooper the disciple–Branson and Mehl’s big campaign–Huddle’s accidental beginnings–an index discovered–Icriodus the ideal–Cooper’s cellophane fossils–contamination–Ellison’s logic. 3 · The Animal with Three Heads · 58 The fight for biological paleontology begins–Croneis’s influence–the geography of thinking–Macfarlane’s conodont oil theory–giant conodonts–Kirk finds bone– Gunnell’s imaginings–Eichenberg’s novel idea–Schmidt’s assemblage–Stadtmüller’s influence–Scott finds oil, earthquake and assemblage, and worm–Jones finds assemblages and Denham thinks of sex–Ulrich and Bassler in denial–Loomis and Pilsbry see snails–Demanet finds the fish–Cullison’s remarkable jaw. 4. Another Fine Mess · 80 Looking inside the fossil–chemistry like bone–Stauffer loses his teeth–Hass sees extraordinary detail–knowing the animal becomes impossible–more Ellison logic–Scott attempts to convince skeptics–Du Bois sees flesh–Germany plays catch up–Beckmann adopts German fish–Schmidt stuck in the past–Rhodes makes the assemblage a reality –a fine mess. 5. Outlaws · 96 A chaos of names–the rights of nuts and bolts–Croneis’s military order–the problematic Commission–Rhodes’s duel with Sinclair–Lange’s revolutionary worm teeth–Sylvester Bradley and Moore’s parataxa–the solution to illegality is to change the law–the Treatise–Moore spells trouble–Arkell’s ammonites join the cause–arguments get political–the plan is thrown out–Moore explains how to ignore the problem. 6. Spring · 116 Postwar optimism and the fifties generation–Rhodes’s overview of the problem and the future–Müller’s war–Gross’s influence–Cooper pioneers acids–acids take hold and the conodont world is turned on its head–Beckmann’s technique–Gross finishes off the dying fish–Schindewolf rises to power–the magic mountain–Müller in the Devonian–Beckmann reveals the German future–the rush for glory begins–Ziegler starts his meteoric rise–Müller escapes to the Carnic Alps–Walliser’s energy–Lindström the schoolboy geologist–Sweet changes track and meets Bergström. 7. Diary of a Fossil Fruit Fly · 138 A fossil’s evolution–Simpson’s evolution–naive evolution–Haldane and Dobzhansky–New Paleontology–the problem of species–Müller’s evolving fossils –Helms’s evolutionary details–fruit flies–Ziegler’s universal timescale–Ziegler begins global campaign–a little setback–the conodont becomes mainstream–the Pander Society formed–Müller’s Cambrian exotica–Youngquist’s Triassic proofs–the Cretaceous seems possible–Japanese Jurassic fossils–Mosher reveals fantasies–Gould and Eldridge deny conodonts’ evolutionary journey–Klapper and Johnson enter the fray–conodont workers march on regardless. 8. Fears of Civil War · 160 Ziegler’s mountain–Rhodes begins to construct the skeleton–Huckreide and Walliser do the same–Bergström and Sweet see skeletons too–Lindström’s symmetry transitions –Rexroad and Nicoll’s fused fossils–Bergström and Sweet take a stand–Schopf and Webers join them–Ziegler’s world explodes–Lange’s critical fossils–Pollock’s clusters–Lane’s symmetry–Kohut’s numbers–arguing with Ziegler in Ohio–fears of fractricide–the Marburg peace accord–learning to speak a new language–Parataxa reappear–the “troublesome” Melville–Aldridge’s diplomacy–Sweet’s magnificent letter–Melville’s astonishment–the turncoats. 9. The Promised Land · 182 The promise of ecology–conodonts are like God–Rexroad’s provinces–Lindström’s honeymoon and Rosetta Stone–Sweet’s great campaign–Bergström’s Swedish American fossils–Bergström and Sweet’s animal migrations–Schopf’s models–Glenister and Klapper’s Canning Basin–Druce in...