("Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards")

[fiefoe]

By page 60, when I was still have trouble telling the two rival paleontologists apart -- despite their different facial hair, I knew this book was not to be. I might as well do my own searches on Edward Drinker Cope, Othniel Charles Marsh and their 'Bone Wars' and the coolest lizard ever. At least Jim Ottaviani can pick a good subject.

I did go through the 'Fact or Fiction' section at the end of the book. So, facts:

• James Gordon Bennett, Jr. took naked midnight rides on his carriage.
• Thomas Jefferson assumed giant animals (the Megalonyx", for example) still roamed the U.S. Interior. This is pre-Louisiana purchase.
• Trying to establish scientific precedence and assign Latin names via Morse code caused Cope a great deal of trouble.
• The rival collectors threw rocks at each other.
  
• The American Naturalist eventually made special rules for Cope and Marsh, charging them for each page they published in hopes of reducing their attacks on each other.
  
• At his peak of fame (ca. 1925) Charles. R. Knight had more square feet of canvas and more pictures in the American Museum of 0í Natural History than any other artist in any other museum in the world.