King of the Dinosaur Hunters: The Life of John Bell Hatcher and the Discoveries That Shaped Paleontology

While it’s true that John Bell Hatcher (1861–1904) was one of the 19th century’s most prolific fossil hunters, this deeply flawed biography by Dingus (Barnum Brown: The Man Who Discovered Tyrannosaurus Rex, coauthor), an American Museum of Natural History research associate, does little to reveal his subject’s humanity or mystique. Although Dingus provides excruciating detail about the many fossils Hatcher collected throughout western North America and shipped back to Yale, Princeton, and the Carnegie Museum beginning in 1884, virtually no information is presented about any other collector, so the reader lacks any context to judge Hatcher’s record. Much of the material presented arises from Hatcher’s letters to his employers, dealing with mundane matters like salaries and reimbursements for himself and his assistants and conveying little of the excitement of scientific discovery. Remarkably few personal facts appear—it isn’t until a full year after the fact that Dingus reveals Hatcher was married, and not until the penultimate chapter that he had seven children, three of whom died before the age of four. The book does give paleontology enthusiasts a sense of the challenges involved in 19th-century fossil hunting, at least in Hatcher’s case, but leaves them with little insight into the man himself. [em](Dec.) [/em]