During special ceremonies Tuesday at ETSU’s Gray Fossil Site, ground was broken for a new combination research, museum and visitors center that will be “Sharing a Fossil Find with Ages to Come.”
“The center, which is projected to open in the fall of 2006, will include storage space for the growing fossil collection, a preparation lab, a museum, an education center, and a workshop for display construction and assembly of the fossils,” said ETSU President Dr. Paul E. Stanton Jr.
“Our excitement about the fossil site and the new center is unwavering as we see not only the limitless educational opportunities yet to come but also the potential for significant economic benefits regionally and statewide.”
The concept for a visitors center, to be located off Interstate 26 at the site on Tennessee Highway 75, had its foundation in an $8 million federal grant – the largest in ETSU history – through the Tennessee Department of Transportation. That grant came to ETSU in September 2002.
The university expanded the original visitors center idea to incorporate all of the elements for the multi-functional Center of Excellence in Paleontology.
The unique Gray Fossil Site, considered one of the nation’s richest Miocene Epoch finds with an estimated age of between 4.5 million and 7 million years, already draws scholars, researchers, schoolchildren and community volunteers who are keenly interested in the rich site and eager to assist in uncovering still more fossilized remains.
ETSU also offers undergraduate courses in geology as well as graduate programming in the geosciences – all associated with the new center.
In addition, participants in the ETSU Governor’s School for Tennessee Heritage, held each summer for top high school students from across the state, are actively involved in the dig.
The most recent fossil finds at the site include a rhino herd – or a teleoceras herd. The short-legged rhino became extinct in North America around 4.5 million years ago, according to Dr. Steven Wallace, ETSU paleontologist in charge of the dig.
He also said the ancient watering hole or sinkhole has little by little revealed fossil evidence of tapirs, short-faced bears, alligators, frogs, turtles, mastodon, saber-toothed cats and plant and pollen residue as well as one species of “advanced” weasel (a badger) and a red panda species, neither of which had ever been recorded in scientific literature.
Wallace was lead author of an article on the two new species, which appeared in a recent issue of the prestigious journal Nature, accompanied by drawings he had made of both animals.

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