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An Agenda for Antiquity: Henry Fairfield Osborn & Vertebrate Paleontology at the American Museum of Natural History, 1890-1935 (History of American Science and Technology Series)

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How did we arrive at this point? Why has evolutionary thought so dominated our academic, scientific, mass media and even religious establishments? Henry Morris, Bolton Davidheiser and many others have written on this problem. Several years ago a professor of history at Texas Tech University added another piece to this puzzle. A very important piece. Ronald Rainger had access to the archives of the American Museum of Natural History, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia Universities and other important institutional repositories. The result is a highly researched, readable and very important book.

Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935) had a significant impact on the public's perception and acceptance of evolutionary thought during the first third of the 20th Century. From his work at Princeton and Columbia Universities he developed strategies that bore their greatest fruit when he became curator and president of New York City's American Museum of Natural History (AMNH).

Osborn was a very capable organizer, networker and self-promoter. He took advantage of his high placed social standing and learned from the mistakes of others. Two prominent paleontologists of the previous generation Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Marsh both exhausted their personal fortunes on the expensive business of fossil excavation and preparation. While Osborn used some of his own money, he had a circle of very wealthy friends who contributed significant financial support, to finance museum projects. Osborn organized his departments and personnel effectively to promote his passionate interests in vertebrate paleontology in the realms of ancient mammals (his scientific speciality), dinosaurs or ancient man.

What was Osborn's "agenda for antiquity?" At Princeton in the late 1880s Osborn became a neo-Lamarckian (p. 39) as reflected in his writing. He later developed his own non-Darwinian view of evolution. Osborn advanced a type of theistic evolution, "Any random, discontinuous change, indeed any change that was not fully predictable, was equivalent to chance or accident, events that occurred without reason, plan, or purpose. Such phenomena could have not place in Osborn's interpretation of evolution or in his conception of nature, where everything operated strictly according to law and under the guidance of God"(p. 139). Rainger also comments on Osborn, "For him the laws of evolution demonstrated the presence and handiwork of the creator every bit as much as the Bible. On those grounds he steadfastly opposed William Jennings Bryan and the fundamentalists who claimed that evolution undermined religion" (p. 131).

Osborn was admonished by his parents and other mentors to use his influence for society's betterment. Through the exhibits at the AMNH Osborn advocated his agenda. He believe the modern educational system produced individuals who "had become domesticated and effeminate, characteristics that Osborn, as a part of the male power structure, considered degenerate" (p. 119). Rainger explains, "But for Osborn the immersion in nature was a personal confrontation that led to self-fulfillment. Osborn, perhaps influenced by the views of his good friend [Theodore] Roosevelt, glorified the outdoor study of nature as a transforming experience that could bring social and spiritual redemption"( p. 120).

The museum exhibits especially on the Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon cultures exemplified this "return to nature " ideology. Rainger emphasizes that Osborn's views presented through the museum exhibits advocated the preservation of the "white Anglo-Saxon Protestant" power elite. Osborn was a part of that elite. To buttress this idea the author also explores Osborn's participation in the eugenic and anti-immigration movements. The 1921 International Eugenics Congress was held at the museum. The museum's Hall of Man especially embodied Osborn's ideas. "The Hall of Man was more than an exhibit of paleoanthropological material. It reflected Osborn's belief that only by preserving nature and racial purity, particularly the purity of the English, Scots, and Scandinavians most closely related to the Nordic tribes of Neolithic times, could mankind halt the rapidly accelerating decline toward racial suicide and extinction" (p. 177). Such racist attitudes naturally led Osborn to support the "racial hygiene" policies of Mussolini and Hitler (p. 150). He advocated a program of "positive eugenics" that meant there should be greater reproduction by "the fit." The "fit" being primarily New England Nordic racial stock. He was a powerful supporter of the Immigration Acts of 1921 and 1924 which restricted immigration (p. 149).

Osborn also was involved in developing a theoretical basis for vertebrate paleontology. He did this by mentoring and supporting the work of first rank paleontogists such as William King Gregory and William Diller Matthew. Osborn, through the work of these and other associates, helped lay a biostratigraphy and correlation framework for how the fossil record has been interpreted worldwide (pp. 185-188). It is worth noting that Gregory, Matthew and most other paleontologists disagreed with Osborn's version of evolution. They moved toward a more Darwinian approach (p. 206). That Osborn provided the institutional environment for these men to work is perhaps his most enduring legacy to vertebrate paleontology and evolutionary thought (pp. 242-48).

From the creationist's viewpoint some weaknesses mar Rainger's rich and fascinating research. One, he gives little information concerning Osborn's early rejection and later support of the Piltdown Man hoax(p. 309). He is silent on Osborn's promotion of Nebraska Man. Perhaps more important--was there any childhood acceptance of traditional Christian faith and it's later reject by Osborn? Osborn was raised in a very wealthy, Bible-believing Presbyterian home (p. 25). Later in life he maintained membership in St. George's Episcopal Church (p. 46). How did Osborn cope with the person of Jesus Christ as revealed in the New Testament?

Rainger implies that very early on Osborn accommodated Christianity with evolutionary thinking(pp. 26-27) through the influence of Princeton president, James McCosh. Any real vestiges of Biblical Christianity quickly fell by the wayside in Osborn's mind. His new faith revealed a non-personal God who worked through evolution to accomplish his purposes. This was a tame god that was used to serve Osborn's ends of maintaining the status quo for his moneyed, social and ethnic elite. Osborn dedicated his life to vigorously advocating this new religion.

Osborn's ideas and the ideas of his assistants significantly influenced the public's knowledge of fossils and acceptance of evolution. Indeed it was Osborn's life mission to influence society's decision makers as well as the masses with his evolutionary gospel. It was through his influence that generations of school agers were exposed to the familiar orthogenetic chart of horse evolution (p. 165) and the magnificent paintings by Charles R. Knight (p. 89) that cemented the mythical notion that dinosaurs had ruled the earth for 150 million years. Besides the AMNH exhibits Osborn promoted himself and his agenda unceasingly through a multitude of scientific papers, popular press articles, books, press releases and highly publicized journeys to fossils sites in Europe, Mongolia and elsewhere.

One of the primary tasks of creation science is to present a viable alternative to the ideas that Osborn and his ideological descendants have successfully propagated over the last century.

This book has numerous illustrations, extensive endnotes, bibliography and index.