The Joe Webb Peoples Fossil Collection
At Wesleyan University
Wesleyan’s remarkable series of fossils casts includes two large specimens of ferocious predatorial reptiles- Plesiosaurus and Ichthyosaurus. The fossil casts were in a dishearteningly deplorable state when they were rediscovered, crated in the Penthouse of Exley. The casts were put in crates when the Wesleyan Museum closed in 1957. We did not know where they were stored, but they were moved … Read more
Long thought to be marine dinosaurs, Plesiosaurs and Ichthyosaurs were once formidable apex predators in the Mesozoic. Living in oceans at the same time when the dinosaurs were roaming the land, these magnificent beasts are now iconic displays in many major museums, showing these animals as representatives of this golden age of the giants, some 228 to … Read more
Four millions years is a blink of an eye in terms of evolutionary time. Our collection houses 5600 specimens of fossil seashells from Sarasota County, Florida, from over 460 species. These fossils are found not along the coast of Florida as one might expect, but buried in sediments far inland. After 4 million years since their … Read more
On the Fourth Floor of the Wesleyan Exley Science center is the Joe Webb Peoples Museum, named after the late Professor Joe Webb Peoples, who was chair of the Geology department (now named Earth and Environmental Sciences), from 1935 until his retirement in 1975. He was highly influential in the establishment of Dinosaur State Park when dinosaur … Read more