New Jersey, Montana, Pennsylvania, 1900-1902

File — Box: 5, Volume: 17

Identifier: II

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

Douglass attended Princeton University, collected specimens in Montana, and in May 1902 was employed by the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh.

26 October 1900--"They [Princeton] have a fine collection of modern skeletons one of the best if not the best in America, so I am trying to make good use of my opportunities in this line."
30 October 1900--"Day before yesterday was my birthday but I forgot all about it until the next day. Only to think 38 ys old and still living. It seems as though I have lived an awful while. It seems almost like hundreds of years. And what a strange life it has been, at least it seems so to me. Here I am in the neighborhood of 40 and still struggling to get an education. The riches that every boy thinks will be his before this age has not yet appeared. About all I possess are books, bones and team wagon . I am about where I ought to have been 15 years ago .... But I am still a student because that is all that satisfies me."
11 May 1901--"My Pearl is faithful and kind and true and affectionate. It is settled between us that we are to share each others fate but she wants to go to school another year and I want a good position. Probably shall return to Princeton but to think of being separated so far from her more than another year makes my heart faint but seems that it must be. I want to get a position in Montana."
24 September 1901--"The 19 of Aug. . . . While going along the hill and slowly ascending I saw a piece of fossil tooth. ... I looked around and found another piece and then a smaller one that nearly made the tooth complete. 'That looks like a mammal tooth,' thought I. 'Is it possible that there is any reptile that has a tooth like that?' I was not a sufficiently expert paleontologist to be certain but looking around I saw a little premolar that settled the thing forever. I had found mammal remains. It was one of those discoveries that make a paleontologist happy. I examined the shale carefully and systematically and found more fragments .... I had found mammals in strata that I thought was way back in the Creta[ceous] or border time between the Creta[ceous] and Tertiary." [This discovery by Douglass determined the geological age of the Fort Union formation, which had been in dispute for forty years.]
23 December 1901--"I started to write something for the newspapers [']The Hist, of a Donosaur,' with sketches . I am so anxious to get out the paper .... I spend nearly all my time on that. I think I will have something like 30 new species. I have described about 30."
9 January 1902--"Prof Scott and Mr. Farr were looking at the Lower Eocene things. Prof. Scott said they were very interesting .... He wishes me to publish a notice of the finding of fossils here, and to send the set of leaves ... to the U. S. Geol. Sur. for determination so we can fix the thing and if possible settled the age of the Ft. Union beds."
4 February 1902--"After Prof Scott requested me to send a notice of the discovery of [illegible] mammal from Mont. to science, .... I went to work, got immensely interested got book after book and read and read the discoveries concerning the Laramie and Ft Union Beds. Went to New York to compare and identify the fossils, and then to Philadelphia to look up literature then came back and read again came to conclusion after conclusion independently and then found other men had come to the same conclusions or had suggested the same ideas before."
13 March 1902--"Today I recd a letter [wanting] . . . to know if I would engage with the Carnegie Museum as Asst Curator. I have spoken to Prof Scott, Farr and my friend Miller and they all think it is the thing for me. I think it is the only thing now. I [would] rather be a prof. in a Univ in the west perhaps or a state Geol. yet this will allow me to devote my time more exclusively to my favorite work. I had been just a little blue about my immediate future for the last few days. This makes things look brighter or will if I get it?"

Dates

1900-1902

Language of Materials

From the Collection: Collection materials are in English.

Conditions Governing Access

Twenty-four hour advanced notice encouraged. Materials must be used on-site. Access to parts of this collection may be restricted under provisions of state or federal law.