The tragic fate of the man who discovered Dinosaurs
For many people born after 1920, the existence of dinosaurs is a fact. People of our “modern age” do not raise too much doubt about the fact that 300 million years ago, enormous reptile-like beings roamed a world devoid of humans. That the Tyrannosaurus Rex and the Brontosaurus existed is as natural to us as the sun rising or the rain falling from the clouds.
Stop for a moment, think and consider how completely bizarre this might sound to someone born in, say, 1720. At that time the only information people had about primitive animals came mostly from the Bible or the classical works of Greek or Roman writers. And all these sources spoke of lions, tigers, bears and many other types of animals mostly still alive. It seemed logical to think that if tigers existed in ancient times, then they had always existed. If you could go back to the 18th Century and suddenly tell them that in the distant past giant, lizard-like creatures the size of a city bus populated the earth, you would most likely have been burned at the stake for witchcraft ... and we can't blame them.
At that time, most of the fossils with which people were familiar belonged to ancient marine creatures similar to fish or bivalves (molluscs whose shell consists of two parts). And the thing that boggled minds in the 18th Century was why these fossils turned up in the middle of an English countryside or on a mountaintop in the heart of France.
Different schools of thought developed around “gentleman scientists” who investigated the matter more deeply. These searches continued without too much fanfare for some time, but the whole world went crazy in 1811, when a young, uneducated girl, named Mary Anning, found the remains of an Ichthyosaur in Dorset, on the English coast. But instead of shedding light on the existence of dinosaurs, Anning's fossil only brought more darkness. Since the fossil resembled a giant crocodile, the question was not posed as “what was this prehistoric beast?” but rather “what are the bones of a huge crocodile doing in England?”
It took a humble provincial doctor from Sussex, called Gideon Algernon Mantell, to realize that these fossils were not the bones of some mutated or “out of place” animals, but those of genuine species of antiquity. A very remarkable thing, if you think about it. Many fossils look like old stones or strange sticks. And even today it is quite easy for someone to mistake the bones of a bear that died 100 years ago from those of a dinosaur that died 300 million years earlier.
Mantell was a doctor who devoted virtually every moment of his free time to annotating and cataloging fossils. In 1820 he found giant bones, bones so large that they inspired him to write a book about them (titled “The Fossils of South Downs”). Shortly before completing it, however, his thinking had taken the big step forward. During a house call as a doctor, he had brought his wife with him who, while waiting for her husband, while he visited the patient, had taken the opportunity to take a walk in the surrounding area. Her attention was drawn to some strange rocks in a pile of rubble and, thinking they might be fossils, she took them back to his husband. Gideon hypothesized that they were teeth (correct), and that they came from a herbivorous reptile (correct) from the Cretaceous period (correct) that must have been several meters long (also correct). All this must have sounded rather daring to say, considering that no one had ever done it.
And it is at this point that Mantell's entire fortune collapses. Because of his highly controversial discoveries, he was advised to avoid publishing an article about them by fossil hunter and friend William Buckland. Buckland advised Martell to gather more evidence and draw his own conclusions before sending the material to the Royal Society. This gave Martell time to send the teeth to noted French anatomist Georges Cuvier, who quickly declared that the teeth were from a hippopotamus (Cuvier claimed he actually said this after a long night of revelry; the following day he apologized and later declared that the teeth were of “unknown origin.” Unfortunately, this crucial reproof by Cuvier was never communicated in England, where Martell was unfairly ridiculed.)
After that, things only got worse for Martell. It appears that the real reason William Buckland had begged Martelle to use caution was not to allow him to gather more information, but to allow Buckland time to publish his own article in which he drew fully on Martell's findings and described "his" discovery: the Megalosaurus. At this point Martell was not only ridiculed, but had also been betrayed by a fellow researcher.
But things just got worse for poor Gideon. By this time he was so obsessed with finding fossils that he had abandoned medical practice, quickly falling into deep economic difficulty. Since his house was now submerged in fossils, he decided to transform it into a museum. Sadly, he soon realized that charging people to see fossils was ruining his reputation as a “gentleman” and scientist. But, since the museum had now been organized, he decided to open it to the public but without charging them. This would have preserved his social standing ... but the dozens of visitors who came every day destroyed his home further stealing his time from his already abandoned medical practice. Martell quickly went bankrupt, to the point where he was forced to sell his precious fossils to pay off his debts. Although his wife loved him, she was no longer capable of accepting such a situation and so, shortly after the sale of the fossils, she left him, taking the children with her.
Martell's story would be very sad if it ended here, but unfortunately that's not all. Broken and completely alone, Martell moved to London where he encountered the ruthlessness of Richard Owen.
Owen would later go down in history as one of England's best biologists, as well as its first paleontologist. Owen had already done some notable work, but he was best known for having no scruples. He wasn't the type to mind claiming other people's work or removing the names of authors he didn't like. He claimed to have done work that he had not done, he had taken specimens from other researchers and then denied himself, etc. Although a genius on many levels, Owen was completely unethical, and is the only person Charles Darwin said he hated. And, for some reason, he decided to take his anger out on Gideon Martell.
This was facilitated by the latest tragedy that had struck Martell: while crossing Clapham Common with a cart, Martell fell and became entangled in the bridle. He was dragged at full speed by the horses, breaking his spine in several places and leaving him severely handicapped permanently. With Martell unable to defend himself, Owen set out to destroy Martell's reputation. He used his influence with the Royal Society to ensure that Martell's new works were not published. He then systematically took advantage of Martell's work and claimed it as his own, along with credit for the discoveries of dozens of new species that Martell had discovered. In short, Owen did everything he could do exactly as if Martell had never existed.
Poor Gideon could no longer bear all this and on November 10, 1852 he committed suicide with an overdose of opium. But Owen wasn't done with him yet. Virtually the entire scientific community was convinced that Owen was the author of the lukewarm and unworthy obituary on Martell that appeared in the local newspapers.
Not satisfied, Owen arranged for Martell's deformed spine to be removed and shipped to the Royal College of Surgeons of which he was the owner.
Owen's bad actions have somehow backfired on him. He convinced the Royal Society (of which he had now become president) to give him the highest award, the Royal Medal. He was so vain and stupid that he chose for the honor some research originally done by a man called Chanling Pearce. Pearce objected, causing an uproar, and although Owen was allowed to keep his medal, his reputation was disintegrated. He was quickly expelled from the Zoological Society and the Royal Society itself, as well as from the Royal College of Surgeons.
Nonetheless, Martell had to suffer the ultimate indignity. His spinal column, which had been on display for almost 100 years at the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, was destroyed by a German bomb in the Second World War. Today Martell is recognized and remembered for all his genius... but thanks to Richard Owen and a Nazi bomb, he has ceased to exist completely.
