Despite snowy weather Saturday, Gray Fossil Site partnered with Hands On! Discovery Center to hold their annual Darwin Day celebration in honor of Charles Darwin’s upcoming 211th birthday Feb. 12. as a celebration of science and natural history.
“It’s something that’s celebrated across the world – Darwin Day in particular,” said Blaine Schubert, executive director of the Center of Paleontology and Gray Fossil Site. “And so, we use it as an opportunity to get the public out here, to learn who he was what he thought and also just sort of a broader introduction to fossils and the fossil record.”
To commemorate the 19th Century naturalist famous for his theory of natural selection, the site held family-friendly, hands-on activities from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. free to the public.
Event partners such as Bays Mountain and Steele Creek brought wildlife such as snakes and insects from their parks, and the Western North Carolina Nature Center had 3D prints of animals in their region as well as casts of past and present red panda skulls. The Mars Hill University Entomology Department showcased an array of insects including live hissing cockroaches from Madagascar.
Several activities were run by faculty and students from ETSU’s geosciences and biological sciences programs, which included hands-on activities for children about Darwin’s finches and spider behavior.
ETSU’s anthropology department displayed an array of pre-human skulls, and graduate students of ETSU’s Center of Excellence in Paleontology had a table with developed fossil casts of both prehistoric and modern animals, allowing visitors to see the comparisons between the two.
ETSU paleontology graduate student Julian Conley, who first got involved with Gray Fossil Site two years ago as an undergraduate volunteer, noted the importance of having hands-on activities at the event.
“I would say that probably all of us had some experience like this, or multiple, as children, so it’s really important for us to be able to give that back,” Conley said. “Especially being able to handle the objects like this rather than just looking at them and being able to interact with someone face-to-face who’s telling you about them. Being able to touch them and interact with them more hands-on definitely makes for a better experience than just coming here to look at the fossils by yourself.”
ETSU senior and anthropology student Ashe Loreille helped with a fossil casting station where visitors could make their own fossil cast, paint it and take it home. As someone interested in working with old artifacts, she said the activity was helpful to her because learning how to recast objects is an important task in the field of archaeology. Just as much as she enjoyed learning, however, she also enjoyed teaching the visitors.
“It’s really fun,” Loreille said. “I’m really enjoying it. I like teaching other people about dinosaurs and things because they’re always fascinated by it; and you just see their faces light up, and they’re like, ‘Oh, I want to do that,’ and you show them something new they can do with their life.”
ETSU junior Emily Willis, who attended the event with other members of ETSU’s Secular Humanist Alliance, called the activities “amazing” and “very informative.” She also said she was impressed with the site’s ability to gather people from different areas of specialization together for one event.
“We like to understand how humans have evolved,” Willis said. “So, Darwin day, I thought that was super cool to come and just experience this; and I’ve never been to Gray Fossil Site, so I thought why not come on a day where they’ve got extra stuff and learn all about the stuff around here in humans.”
The event concluded with a talk at 3:30 p.m. by Dr. James T. Costa of Western Carolina University entitled “DIY Experimenting with the Darwins: A Guide to Darwin-inspired Experiments for Home and School,” which was geared toward adults and older children.
Costa began his presentation thanking attendees for “bracing the elements,” referring to the snow. During the presentation, Costa discussed ideas from his book “Darwin’s Backyard: How Small Experiments Led to a Big Theory,” which focuses on experiments Darwin did in his own home and backyard, as well as ways people can recreate those experiments at home or in the classroom.
Costa also discussed elements of Darwin’s home life he said people may not be aware of. The presentation was a part of the event Schubert said was focused on humanizing Darwin, aiming to show Darwin not just as a scientist, but also as a husband, father and friend.
“I wanted to sort of tell a story about the other side of Charles Darwin that I think is lost oftentimes because Darwin comes down to us culturally as a kind of iconic figure, but also as an unrealistic, almost cardboard cut-out figure.”
Gray’s Darwin Day event will be followed by a presentation called “Bring Sabertooths to Life: A Case Study in Paleontological Reconstruction” by Basler Chair of Excellence chairholder and world-renowned paleoartist Mauricio Antón in Ball Hall Auditorium on Darwin’s actual birthday Wednesday at 7 p.m.
