Gordon Hirschi and I spent a great afternoon Monday with Sonya Popelka of Dinosaur National Monument, learning about the Carnegie Horses. Over 15 years, beginning in 1909, they carried 350 tons of dinosaur bones, wrapped in plaster, from what is now the national monument to railroad sidings 60 miles away so they could be shipped to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, Pa.
Skidding dinosaur bones from Carnegie Quarry at Dinosaur National Monument. Photo courtesy of National Park Service.
The bones were recovered by Earl Douglass, the man who discovered the great paleontological find near Jensen, Utah, and helped establish Dinosaur National Monument.
Colorado Plateau Horseman’s Hall of Fame will be honoring the Carnegie Horses at our second annual induction ceremony, July 14, during the Mesa County Fair. And I will be writing a history column about the horses, probably for July 4.
