Continental trace fossils and museum exhibits - Geological Curators ...

• How a museum displays such material. Singletracks are more readily displayed than rockpavements with trackways preserved over theirsurface. The latter can provide a spectaculardisplay and several museums have gone downthis road, e.g., Hunterian Museum, Royal ScottishMuseum (now Museum of Scotland), DORCMand NHM. In the latter case, trackways are stored/displayed outside the Palaeontology Building. Inany display situation, good lighting is essential,with low light raking the surface of the slab toshow off the moulds or casts of the tracks to besteffect; trackways going in a variety of directionspresent their own problems!ResponsibilitiesWith the discovery of trackway sites comes aresponsibility to record and, if appropriate, publishaccounts of them, bringing the discoveries to wideraudiences. The data from such sites must not be lost.Writing up a site for publication is time consuming,but such activity falls within the remit of scholarship,a quality espoused by Johnson (2005), whocommented that there is a need to redress the balancein museums between ‘edutaining’ and the ‘in-depthunderstanding of collections’. The responsible pursuitof scholarship is a great opportunity to forge linkswith local, regional and even national learnedsocieties, universities and other museums.The big plusesMy experience in Dorset has shown that there are anumber of very valuable spin-offs from the discoveryof dinosaur tracks.• Networking. The forging of strong or strongerlinks with the local quarrying community andwith statutory/non statutory organisations, etc.,can bring on-going benefits at many levels, e.g.,being alerted to rediscoveries, new discoveries,early warnings of new excavations, publicity foryour museum (see below), access to sites andsupport when in the field.• Scientific potential. This may include thepublication of papers, new research and theattraction of experts to your museum, benefitingthe discovery and existing collections. There isalso the potential for day symposia andconferences.• Display potential. Though challenging (Figures4-6), as has already been noted, trackways canprovide the basis for displays. These have thepotential to be spectacular, allowingreconstruction of habitats and the animals which-230-lived in them, and providing an opportunity forvisitors to make the connection between an extinctanimal and something which actually lived – andleft the evidence.• Potential for a PR goldmine. Dinosaurs havealways the potential to capture the interest of thepress. What follows is a summary of the ‘mediacircus’attracted by the Townsend Road discoveryin 1981, happening as it did in that period of thesummer when Parliament was in recess, and whathad become known as the ‘Scilly Season’, despitea change of occupancy at No.10, was in fullswing! The story broke on Thursday 20 th Augustwith an article in the SwanageTimes, by whichtime we had been on site for approximately 4weeks. The author of that article, a local journalist,Andrew Wyllie, was what I think in the trade iscalled a ‘stringer’ and a very effective one at that.His story was widely circulated. BBC Radio wasquick to enter the arena along with BBC Southern(TV) (Figure 7). Interviews were carried on RadioSolent, Radio 4 (The World Tonight) and SouthernTelevision’s ‘Nationwide’. The main earlyevening Radio 4 news (18.00 – 18.30) mentionedthe discovery as had an earlier bulletin during theafternoon. Independent Television also gavecoverage at this early stage. An active interestthroughout was taken by 2 Counties Radio withseveral broadcasts. Later, Radio 2 carried a liveinterview on the John Dunn Show, MondaySeptember 14 th . Reports indicated that Eiretelevision gave coverage and that the New Zealandpress also carried a note. Reports are known tohave appeared in Australia and Canada. Localand national press coverage was good, though theaccuracy of some of the reports left much to bedesired; ‘Builder digs up giant lizard fight’ and‘Dinosaurs’ graveyard discovered’ were two ofthe more entertaining ones in nationals! The Times,Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, Daily Express andlatterly The Sunday Times all carried articles. Inmost cases the DORCM and/or the Dorset NaturalHistory & Archaeological Society (DNH&AS),which owned and ran the museum, werementioned. Similar publicity continued duringthe lifting of the site and the transport of thepavement back to Dorchester. Purchasing suchpublicity, much of a high profile nature, wouldhave cost a small fortune and was way outside theDORCM’s pocket. Dr David Norman, who visitedthe site while on holiday, recorded an interviewfor BBC’s ‘The Living World’ which wasbroadcast on 30 th August and repeated on 3 rdSeptember. This demonstrates nicely the potentialfor involving researchers in such discoveries.