SAMUEL WENDELL WILLISTON 683 
PALEONTOLOGIC WORK IN KANSAS* 
Williston’s paleontologic contributions on the Cretaceous fauna 
of Kansas began in 1879 with a short paper entitled ‘‘Are Birds 
Derived from Dinosaurs,” and included fifty-three communica- 
tions, chiefly to the Kansas Academy of Science, the Kansas Uni- 
versity Quarterly, and the University Geological Survey of Kansas; 
also three volumes on the Cretaceous Fishes in co-operation with 
Alban Stewart; and Paleontology (Upper Cretaceous), Part I, 
Volume IV of the University Geological Survey, which was chiefly 
prepared by Williston with the assistance of his students Adams, 
Case, and McClung, and is a thorough review of the geology and 
marine fauna of the Cretaceous seas, containing the first clear dis- 
tinctions and restorations of the great Kansas mosasaurs, Clidastes, 
Platecarpus, and Tylosaurus. This work became the standard for 
all subsequent researches of Osborn, Wieland, and others on the 
Cretaceous fauna. It contains some admirable restorations of 
mosasaurs and other fossils which may be compared with those 
of Dollo from the Maestrichtian of Belgium. The second part, 
Volume VI of the University Geological Survey, covering the Car- 
boniferous and Cretaceous, published in 1goo, included the Creta- 
ceous fishes alluded: to above, and the Carboniferous invertebrates 
by Joshua W. Beede. 
In 1897 Williston published his first paper on Paleozoic tetra- 
pods, a brief description of ““A New Labyrinthodont from the 
Kansas Carboniferous’; his second was on the “ Coraco-Scapula 
of Eryops Cope” in 1899; but nearly a decade elapsed before the 
Paleozoic reptiles and amphibians became his chief subject. From 
1897 to 1902 he was engaged chiefly upon his series of papers on 
fossil vertebrates of Kansas for the University Geological Survey 
of Kansas. 
Williston concluded his studies of the Cretaceous fauna during 
the early years of his professorship in Chicago, beginning in 1902. 
Thus his work on the Kansas Cretaceous fauna, following the very 
disjointed contributions of Leidy, Marsh, and Cope based on 
™These notes on Williston’s work on fossil reptiles and amphibians have been 
prepared in collaboration with Professor W. K. Gregory, of the American Museum of 
Natural History. 
