Who Discovered the First Dinosaur Bone?

They are a group of reptiles that have lived on the earth for about 245 million years. It is being said that approximately 700 known species of dinosaurs got extinct. They were huge with long teeth and sharp claws. In fact, some dinosaurs could even fly.

All the credit goes to the scientists, but the question is, how do they know all of it? The answer is that dinosaurs left a lot behind to know about them. There are bones and even their bodily material or structure, which tells a lot about them.

The exact answer is still not there as when the first bone was found. Various people in ancient times found their bones, but they had no idea what was it. As per researchers, Robert Plot discovered the first bone in 1677, although he thought it was the bone of a giant human.

In 1819, a professor of geology at Oxford University, William Buckland, did some research, and then he identified for that first time that it was a dinosaur fossil. It was late in 1824 that he finished his study and named them. He said that it was the bone of a larger version of the modern reptile.

Still, the bone was a mystery, and not much was known about them. Their name was still unknown, but then a British Scientist named Richard Owen started his research on it. He saw the fossils of dinosaurs in 1841. He saw a chunk of the spine that he compared to an ancient reptile similar to it called iguana.

He began the research and comparing the two, and then he found that their fossils were very similar, and these creatures are not alive in today’s world. He gave them the name dinosaur, which means terrible lizards.

Then the study on dinosaurs began in 1842 as research teams were created to get more knowledge on them. At that time, two American Scientists, Othniel Marsh and Edward Cope were wealthy and competitive who made teams and headed towards the Rocky Mountains for further research.

It is being said that there was a person named Barnum Brown who started his career in 1897 at the American National Museum of National History. He became one of the most profound dinosaur hunters of the late 19th and 20th century. He made many discoveries, and some of them are displayed even in the museum, including the first specimens of Tyrannosaurus rex ever found.