author
Henry Fairfield Osborn
1857–1935
A leading American paleontologist and museum builder, he helped turn fossil discovery into a public spectacle. His career shaped the American Museum of Natural History, though his legacy is also tied to the harmful history of eugenics.
4 Audiobooks
Palæontological Report of the Princeton Scientific Expedition of 1877
by Henry Fairfield Osborn, William Berryman Scott, Francis Speir
Huxley and education Address at the Opening of the College Year, Columbia University, September 28, 1910
by Henry Fairfield Osborn
Men of the Old Stone Age: Their Environment, Life and Art
by Henry Fairfield Osborn
Impressions of great naturalists : reminiscences of Darwin, Huxley, Balfour, Cope and others
by Henry Fairfield Osborn
About the author
Born in 1857, Henry Fairfield Osborn became one of the most influential figures in American paleontology. He taught at Columbia University and spent decades at the American Museum of Natural History, where he helped build its reputation as a major center for research, collecting, and exhibition.
Osborn is often remembered for expanding vertebrate paleontology in the United States and for popularizing fossil mammals and dinosaurs for a wide public audience. As a scientist and administrator, he played a major role in how museums presented natural history in the early 20th century.
His life and work are also part of a more troubling story. Reliable historical sources describe him as a supporter of eugenics, and that aspect of his career is now recognized as an important part of his legacy alongside his scientific achievements.