Restoration of Oklahoma Museum of Natural History Vertebrate Paleontology Collection, Phase II

俄克拉何马州自然历史博物馆的古脊椎动物收藏包括3万多件标本，主要来自美国南部平原。该收藏是一个重要的脊椎动物化石区域储存库，在美国同类收藏中排名第15位。大部分藏品是在20世纪30年代和40年代在博物馆第一任馆长J. Willis Stovall的指导下收集的。1953年他去世后，这些藏品被忽视，年久失修，但通过1986年任命为馆长的理查德·奇费利博士的努力，这些藏品已恢复到高水平的活动。大约四分之一的藏品已被修复，编目，重组，并转移到现代存储柜。奇菲利博士建议对这些藏品进行另一个阶段的修复，在此期间，新生代的化石（主要是哺乳动物）也将得到高水平的管理。拟议的藏书改善项目将挽救一个重要的研究藏书，并将使来访的调查人员和通过贷款很容易地获得它。诸如此类的自然历史收藏是研究进化、生物地理学和全球变化的重要资源。这些收藏的持续增长和改进将使许多代的研究人员受益。

The Vertebrate Paleontology collection of the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History includes more that 30,000 specimens, collected primarily from the southern plains of the U.S. The collection is an important regional repository for fossil vertebrates, and ranks 15th among U.S. collections of its type. Most of the collection was amassed during the 1930s and 1940s under the direction of J. Willis Stovall, first Director of the Museum. Following his death in 1953 the collection was neglected and fell into disrepair, but through the efforts of Dr. Richard Cifelli, appointed as Curator in 1986, the collection has been restored to a high level of activity. Approximately one-fourth of the collection has been restored, cataloged, reorganized, and transferred to modern storage cabinets. Dr. Cifelli proposes another phase in the collection's restoration, during which fossils of Cenozoic age (mostly mammals) will also be brought to a high level of curation. The proposed collection improvement project will salvage an important research collection, and will make it easily accessible to visiting investigators and through loans. Natural history collections such as this are essential resources for research on evolution, biogeography, and global change. Continued growth and improvement of these collections will benefit many generations of researchers.