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this magnificent specimen with the public. Mr Griffin brings a strong sense of civic re- sponsibility, a deep love of and support for science, and an understanding of the power of museums, including ours, to inspire won- der and spur innovation.’ However, not all scientists welcomed
Griffin’s loan or billionaires’ entry into the dinosaur market more widely. Stuart Sumida, the president of the Socie-
ty of Vertebrate Paleontology and a profes- sor of vertebrate biology at California State University San Bernardino, was one of dozens of palaeontologists to write publicly to the AMNH expressing their unease at the museum’s acceptance of Apex on a tempo- rary loan. ‘The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology
(SVP) strongly opposes the AMNH’s plans for the privately owned stegosaurus speci- men known as Apex,’ wrote Sumida. ‘It sets a dangerous precedent by legitimizing pri- vate ownership of vertebrate fossils and may incentivize future sales of similar fos- sils by increasing their perceived market value. This has occurred previously: aſter the Tyrannosaurus rex specimen Baby Bob was publicly displayed and studied at the
Sotheby’s expert Cassandra Hatton (top) and auctioneer Phyllis Kao (above) helped the price for the Ceratosaurus nasicornis climb to $30.5 million
this fetching $30 million was a stunner. Who has that kind of money to spend on a dino- saur? Certainly not any museums or educa- tional institutions. ‘While I’m pleased that the buyer might loan the skeleton to a museum to be put on display, at this point it is just a vague sugges- tion. The buyer is still anonymous. My fear is that this skeleton will disappear into the ether, into the mansion of an oligarch or a bank vault to accumulate value as just an- other investment in the portfolio of a hedge fund, and not see the light of day until it’s auctioned again, or maybe never at all.’ Brusatte, 41, who is originally from Illi-
nois but has lived in Edinburgh since 2013, says he understood why the Mountain America Museum of Ancient Life, a small private museum in Utah that owned the cer- atosaurus, decided to sell it in order to raise funds, but he fears it could set a dangerous precedent. ‘Museum, university, science, and educa-
University of Kansas, its scientific and public value were exploited to drive up its sale price.’
T
MY FEAR IS THAT THIS SKELETON WILL DISAPPEAR INTO THE ETHER, INTO THE MANSION OF AN OLIGARCH OR A BANK VAULT
he private sale of dinosaur fossils, he argued, had leſt museums unable to compete on price and therefore ‘un- dermines their mission to preserve Earth’s history and limits access for researchers and the public alike’. In the US and the UK, fossils are generally
the property of the landowner, and it is legal for them to be sold privately. Oſten land- owners in areas with high density of fossils sell licences to fossil hunters to access their land. However, in many other countries in- cluding China, Mongolia, Australia, Brazil and Argentina, it is illegal to export fossils. Steve Brusatte, professor of palaeontolo-
gy and evolution at the University of Edin- burgh, says the rapid march of billionaires into the dinosaur fossil market was a threat to science. ‘When I saw the price tag [of the Sotheby’s ceratosaurus] the number shocked me,’ he tells Spear’s. ‘I love dino- saurs as much as anyone, but a skeleton like
tional budgets in America are being oblite- rated at the moment by a hostile govern- ment, and if one of the consequences is museums seeing their collections and ex- hibits as assets to keep the bills paid, then we are in very dangerous territory for sci- ence and education,’ he says. ‘Bottom line: a world where dinosaur skeletons can fetch tens of millions of dollars within a few min- utes at auctions is not a world where dino- saurs will long be accessible to educate and inspire everyone. They will become play- things for the über-wealthy, and in many ways already are.’ However, others in the industry say the
money generated by private sales enhances scientific research and encourages excava- tion of new dinosaur fossils that might oth- erwise have been lost to the sands of time. ‘Let’s not make it about dinosaurs, but any
other kind of object,’ says Hatton. ‘You have a group of people who are mad that it’s not being given to them for free. I think we can all agree that’s a little weird, right? ‘The truth of the matter is, in the United
States, whoever owns the land owns the dinosaur. It takes time and resources to excavate these, and if they’re not excavated they’re lost to erosion. So I like to turn that question around and say, “OK, would you prefer that this dinosaur is lost to everyone? Because it will be if commercial palaeontol- ogists aren’t excavating them, because you guys aren’t.”’
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