The American Museum Journal 
ne AA ASLAY Me 24 
Vou. VIII JANUARY, 1908 No. 1 
ALLOSAURUS, A CARNIVOROUS DINOSAUR, AND ITS PREY. 
NE of the latest additions to the Collection of Fossil Vertebrates 
‘is the mounted skeleton of Allosaurus, the great Carnivorous 
Dinosaur of the Jurassic Period, now on exhibition in the 
Dinosaur Hall. Although smaller than its huge contemporary Bronto- 
saurus, this animal is of gigantic proportions, being 34 feet 2 inches 
in length, and 8 feet 3 inches high. The group forms one of the 
most remarkable and attractive features of the hall. 
This rare and finely preserved skeleton was collected by Mr. F. F. 
Hubbell in October, 1879, in the Como Bluffs near Medicine Bow, 
Wyoming, the richest locality in America for dinosaur skeletons, and 
is a part of the great collection of fossil reptiles, amphibians and fishes 
gathered together by the late Professor EK. D. Cope, and presented to 
the American Museum in 1899 by President Jesup. 
Shortly after the Centennial Exposition, it had been planned that 
Professor Cope’s collection of fossils should form part of a great public 
museum in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia, the city undertaking the cost 
of preparing and exhibiting the specimens, an arrangement similar to 
that existing between the American Museum and the City of New York. 
The plan however fell through, and the greater part of this magnificent 
collection remained in storage in the basement of Memorial Hall in 
Fairmount Park, for the next twenty years. From time to time Pro- 
fessor Cope removed parts of the collection to his private museum in 
Pine Street, for purposes of study and scientific description. He seems, 
however, to have had no idea of the perfection and value of this specimen. 
In 1899, when the collection was purchased from his executors by Mr. 
Jesup, the writer went to Philadelphia, under the instructions of Pro- 
fessor Osborn, Curator of Fossil Vertebrates, to superintend the packing 
and removal to the American Museum. At that time the collection made 
by Hubbell in 1879 was still in Memorial Hall, and the boxes were 
3 
