© 2024 New England Public Media

FCC public inspection files:
WGBYWFCRWNNZWNNUWNNZ-FMWNNI

For assistance accessing our public files, please contact hello@nepm.org or call 413-781-2801.
PBS, NPR and local perspective for western Mass.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Be a dino track explorer in western Mass.

Greenfield: Discovering the first dinosaur tracks in downtown Greenfield

Just a few feet away from this modern-day parking garage in 1835, Dexter Marsh came across the first-ever dinosaur tracks known to science.
Emmett Escamilla
/
Tumble Media
Just a few feet away from this modern-day parking garage in 1835, Dexter Marsh came across the first-ever dinosaur tracks known to science.
Episode

Welcome to Greenfield’s Bank Row, the street where the first dinosaur tracks were discovered! At this stop, you’ll meet Dexter Marsh, a worker who split apart a slab of sidewalk stone to find an unusual footprint. Imagine yourself in Greenfield during the mid-1800s, as you hear about how this moment became part of history and “paved” the way for more dinosaur discovery in the Valley!

Location
42.58694, -72.6005
Near 27 Bank Row St., Greenfield, Massachusetts
Directions

How to Get There

The dinosaur tracks were discovered on Bank Row, right in front of Magpie, the pizza restaurant. You can park anywhere on Bank Row or in the parking garage on Olive Street. The track monument is in the courtyard outside the parking garage. You can see lots of replica eubrontes tracks, as well as dilophosaurus skulls, a mural of the dilophosaurus (the possible eubrontes track-maker), and some plaques telling the story of Dexter Marsh, Edward Hitchcock, and James Deane. If you look carefully, you can still some of their houses!

Transcript

Marshall: Hello, dino track explorers! I’m Marshall.

Lindsay: And I’m Lindsay. Thanks for joining us on this Dino Map Adventure through the Pioneer Valley.

M: We’re the hosts of Tumble Science Podcast for Kids and we’re on a mission to share the incredible dinosaur history right here in the Pioneer Valley. There is so much that scientists have discovered here, and so much left for YOU to discover along with us!

L: This stop will take you back to the historic moment when a worker discovered the first dinosaur tracks known to science.

M: If you haven’t already, pause this audio to listen to our how-to track at the beginning of our dino map before you arrive. They’ll help you be prepared for what you’re about to experience!

M: All right, so where are we heading now?

L: We’re going to Bank Row in Greenfield, where the first dinosaur tracks were discovered. That’s where you’ll find a parking garage with a large dinosaur mural in front of it.

M: Everyone’s favorite dinosaur mural!

L: (Laughs) In front of the garage, there’s a small park celebrating Greenfield’s role in this big discovery. Now, let’s imagine back to a time before people knew what dinosaurs were…

M: Wait? I can’t imagine that time… Like what were the 3-year-olds even into back then?

L: I have no idea! Probably like wooden hoops!

M: Weird!

L: (Laughs) Anyhow, let’s go back to this very spot, in Greenfield, in March 1835, to a time before the word for dinosaurs had even been invented…

L: A worker named Dexter Marsh was laying down slabs of stone for a sidewalk on this very street. Back then, they didn’t use concrete to pave sidewalks. They used thin slabs, or pieces of rock, that had been cut from a quarry. The rocks were made of sandstone, a sedimentary rock that can be easily split into thin layers. When Marsh split one of these slabs apart in Greenfield, he noticed something strange. On one of the slabs, there were marks that looked like turkey feet pressed into the rock. On the matching slab, there was the opposite impression - the tracks were pushed up and out. Marsh didn’t put the slabs into the sidewalk. He was curious about them so he put them aside, and later, showed them to a young doctor in town named James Deane.

Deane was intrigued, and he knew someone else who would be interested in seeing these tracks: the professor and geologist Edward Hitchcock. As soon as Hitchcock saw Marsh’s tracks, he knew they were unlike anything he’d seen before! Hitchcock was fascinated by the tracks and he would spend the rest of his life collecting and studying them — many of them uncovered and sold by Dexter Marsh, who had become a fossil collector. Marsh eventually started his own small fossil museum in his own house, with a collection of over 700 fossils.

L: You can see the tracks that Dexter Marsh found in Greenfield along with specimens from the rest of Hitchock’s collection, on display at the Beneski Museum in Amherst.

M: That’s another stop on the dinosaur map that you should DEFINITELY check out.

L: Yes, it’s a great one — definitely a must-see! When you’re in Greenfield, try to imagine yourself in Dexter Marsh’s Greenfield. The signs in the park will show you what present-day buildings were around in 1835, the year of Marsh’s discovery. Imagine yourself back in Marsh’s time. What would he have seen on the street?

M: Probably fewer cars, probably more horses!

L: That’s for sure.

M: For directions and activities, check out nepm.org/dinomap. Feel free to share your adventure with others, through the hashtag #tumbledinomap!

L: Meet you at your next stop, dino track explorers!

Download the Dino Map Adventure and the Dino Adventure Journal.