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National Museum of Natural History
Fossils

Fossils from the Eocene epoch——some 70,000,000 years ago——were added to the paleobiology collections in the National Museum of Natural History in October 1978. Among 327 specimens in this outstanding collection amassed by H. J. Kirby Siber, a Swiss collector, are both vertebrates and invertebrates as well as plants. Most of the specimens, including fossil birds (which are extremely rare), fish, insects, and plants, are from the Green River Formation in Wyoming and Colorado. There are, in addition, two fossil birds and a bat from Messel, Germany. These specimens are unparalleled in Natural History's paleobiology collections, and their acquisition provides an extraordinary research resource.

[[image - black & white photograph of a dragonfly fossil]]

[[image - black & white photograph of a plant fossil]]

[[image - black & white photograph of a fish fossil]]