Mary Anning
Discoverer of multiple dinosaur species
Mary Anning was from Dorset in
England and had very limited
education. She grew up collecting
seashells that she would then
clean and sell at local markets.
Her father often took her to ‘fossil
hunting’ expeditions since fossil
collecting was in vogue during the
late 18th and early 19th century.
The first major discovery was the
unearthing of a 4 foot ichthyosaur
skull, when Mary was just 12. In
later years, Mary continued to sell
fossils in order to support herself
and often had to risk her life through landslides to collect fossils.
However, her reputation grew as she continued to excavate
important finds and on 10th December 1823, she found the first
complete Plesiosaurus, and in 1828 the first British example of
the flying reptiles known as pterosaurs. Despite her limited
education, she voraciously read up on scientific literature and
often, laboriously hand-copied papers borrowed from others.
Surprisingly, she was also able to dissect modern animals to gain
a better understanding of the anatomy of some of the fossils with
which she was working. In 1826, she managed to save enough
money to open her own shop called Anning's Fossil Depot that
was regularly fr