PGH Book #8: Bone Wars

Like any kid who grew up in the 80s and 90s, dinosaurs were an essential part of my life. I remember receiving books about dinosaurs for Christmas and spending hours looking at the pictures of these awesome monsters that were once real. After seeing Jurassic Park in the theater, I would put my brother and his friend from down the street in a wheelbarrow and run them around the backyard pretending they were on their own Jurassic Park tour. It was great fun, especially when I would dump them out of the wheelbarrow and tell them to run from the hungry T-Rex. Seeing Dinosaur Hall at the Carnegie Museum for the first time as a kid was incredible. There aren't too many moments in your life when your jaw drops like the first time you see dinosaur skeleton. (Well, for me, at least.)

My love of dinosaurs continues today. (So much so that I am planning on buying a T-Rex costume for Halloween this year.) (Oh, and will probably have to buy this for my dopey-looking fat black cat.) When I searched for a Pittsburgh-related book that had to do with dinosaurs and found Bone Wars: The Excavation of Andrew Carnegie's Dinosaur, I was happily surprised! But, I guess I shouldn't have been considering I now walk past dinosaurs daily on my way into work. We are a dinosaur city! How lucky for me!

"Disco Dino" lives right outside of my new office building.

But, I have to be honest. I did not finish this book. About halfway in I got so confused by all the archeology terminology I didn't know and then there were ten or fifteen different main people and they were alway changing places and connections and... Well, I just had to put it down for good before I go to the end. There was this excellent quote that I made note of, and will always remember:

[Regarding the purchasing of a complete dinosaur skeleton to be displayed in Carnegie's museum in Pittsburgh for the people of the city to view and enjoy.]

"My lord--can't you buy this for Pittsburgh--try," Carnegie scrawled along the margin of the modest New York Post story. "Wyoming State University isn't rich--get an offer--hurry AC."

Determined he was, and it earned Carnegie a collection of dinosaurs that is unrivaled by anyone else in the world. 

As self-imposed punishment for failing to finish Bone Wars (which, I'm sorry, but so many times I have almost written or said "Boner Wars"), here are some pictures of a typical almost-thirty-year-old's apartment: