246 



University of California Publications in Geology [Vol. 12 



Excepting the fishes described by Agassiz, very few vertebrate 

 remains were discovered outside the region of eastern Oregon during 

 the period of pioneer work under the government and state surveys. 

 A few references were made to occurrence of fishes and cetaceans, 

 and a small series of fragmentary specimens of land mammals col- 

 lected by the Geological Survey of California from middle Tertiary 

 to Pleistocene strata in the Sierra region of California was described 

 by Joseph Leidy. Also a few fragmentary vertebrate remains were 

 obtained near the region of Tulare Lake on the western border of 

 the San Joaquin Valley, from beds near Livermore, and at other 

 scattered localities. These collections included fragmentary material 

 representing rhinoceros, two or more extinct horses, tapir, elothere, 

 camel, bison, elephant, mastodon, great wolf, and lion. The most 

 important of these descriptions of collections obtained in California 

 is the assembling of data from all sources hy Leidy in J. D. Whitney's 

 great work on the gold-bearing gravels of the Sierra Nevada, published 

 in 1879. 



In 1868, Leich' published the first description of a West Coast or 

 Great Basin Llesozoic reptile. His material consisted of several very 

 fragmentary specimens from the middle Triassic of Nevada. No other 

 paper in the field of reptilian palaeontology of the region appeared 

 until 1895. 



By far the most important contributions to our knowledge of the 

 history of vertebrates in this West Coast region in the pioneer period 

 are those originating in 1861 with the studies of Thomas Condon on 

 the mammal faunas of the John Day region of Oregon. A small collec- 

 tion of the fossil specimens collected by Condon was obtained by Leidy 

 and described in 1870. Following a period of ten years of exploration 

 by Condon, Professor 0. C. Marsh of Yale visited the John Day region 

 in 1S71, and began a series of explorations, resulting in the publica- 

 tion, between 1873 and 1894, of a series of seven or eight papers 

 relating to the remarkable Tertiary faunas discovered. 



In 1878, E. D. Cope began systematic collecting in the John Day 

 region, with parties under the direction of J. L. Wortman and C. H. 

 Sternberg. In over thirty publications issued between 1878 and 

 1889, Cope presented results of his important studies covering nearly 

 the whole range of the Oligocene, Miocene, and Pliocene faunas of 

 eastern Oregon and marking an important epoch in the development 

 of American palaeontology. 



