Yorkshire Philosophical Society

Event Information

“Mary Anning Comes to the Yorkshire Museum”

Dr Sarah King,  Curator of Natural Science, The Yorkshire Museum. (York Museums Trust).

Although Mary Anning (1799-1847) never visited Yorkshire, she would have been at home here. The famous palaeontologist was working during a golden age for geology and palaeontology, and had many friends amongst the more well-known names of the day. The same package of rocks outcrops on the North Yorkshire Coast as does in her home town of Lyme Regis, and she would have recognised many of the fossils being found here. This talk will look at the early history of the Yorkshire Museum and the parallels and overlaps with Anning’s work 300 miles away.

This lecture is part of the programme around the “Mary Anning Rocks” exhibition in the Jurassic galleries which will include a striking maquette of the famous fossil hunter courtesy of the “Mary Anning Rocks Charity”. The exhibition runs from the 14th July to 20th September.

2.30pm in the Tempest Anderson Lecture Theatre in the Yorkshire Museum

Member’s report

Dr Sarah King’s lecture was introduced by Paul Hildreth, Vice-President of Yorkshire Geological Society.

Dr King began with a brief biography of Mary Anning, “The Greatest Fossilist the world ever knew”. Coming from humble origins in Lyme Regis, by the age of twelve the young Mary was already collecting fossils, or “curiosities” as they were known at the time, to clean and sell to the growing number of visitors who were being attracted to the town and its interesting coastline. Mary Anning, born in 1799, lost her father Richard Anning, a local carpenter, at an early age and she and her brother Joseph made a little money for their widowed mother by finding and later by reconstructing the fossilised remains of larger creatures from the cliffs. Mary was self-taught but she started to gain a reputation among the well-known geologists of the day, including William Buckland and his wife Mary, William Conybeare, Henry de la Beche, Colonel Thomas Birch and Sir Roderick and Lady Charlotte Murchison, all of whom had close connections with the founding and early years of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society.

In 1811-12 Mary discovered the skull and part of the skeleton of an Ichthyosaurus and in 1823 found the first complete Plesiosaur and made a drawing of it. The idea of flying dinosaurs was new to science. Mary had become a very talented illustrator of her finds, having taught herself anatomy by dissecting dead animals. The fossil Plesiosaur was transported by sea to the Geological Society of London. Later Mary Anning could honestly say “I am well known throughout the whole of Europe.”

Despite Mary’s reputation among palaeontologists of the day, Dr King reminded us of the difficulties facing those without social connections and particularly women, to become accepted in intellectual circles; Mary’s discoveries were bought and distributed by men and for many years after her death in 1847, she was forgotten. The reason for bringing the Mary Anning Exhibition to York was to engage young people and to emphasise the Yorkshire coast’s own wealth of fossil material. It features the maquette for the statue of Mary Anning that has recently been erected in Lyme Regis, showing her striding along, her dog at her side. The statue has been funded by public subscription following the campaign initiated by the eleven-year-old Evie Swire and her mother Anya Pearson, who thought that Mary deserved such recognition in her hometown. If we wish to find out more about Mary Anning’s fascinating life story, Dr King recommended the new study of her by Thomas Sharpe, Mary Anning, the Fossil Woman, available on Amazon for £15.

Sarah Sheils