A Visit to the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History

One of the things that my husband and I enjoy doing is to visit natural history museums whenever we visit a new city. Knowing that Norman, Oklahoma is a relatively small city with a relatively small natural history museum, we were very pleasantly surprised by the quality and quantity of the museum's exhibits. Founded in 1899, the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History houses over six million artifacts and natural history specimens in its collections.

At the entrance to the Hall of Ancient Life is the skeleton of an Allosaurus fragilis. On display are many different species of Trilobites, as well as other invertebrate animals. Two dioramas of Permian Period (280 to 230 million years ago) reptiles include skeletons of Cotylarhynchus, Eryops, Edaphosaurus, and Dimetrodon, as well as the Permian amphibians Trimerorhachis, and Diplocaulus.

The centerpiece exhibit, "The Clash of the Titans," depicts the struggle between an Apatosaurus and Saurophaganax, with an Archaeopteryx and a small triconodont mammal nearby. Around the corner is the skeleton of a Pentaceratops, the largest specimen of this species. Deinonychus makes a lunch of a young Tenontosaurus, while its mother and siblings flee.

A diorama of the late Cretaceous Period (140 to 65 millions years ago) includes the swimming and flying skeletons of the early bird Hesperornis, the turtle Protostega, a Pteranodon, and the marine reptiles Xiphactinus, and Platecarpus.

More recent animals include the large early bird Diatryma, the skull of the brontothere Brontops, and skeletons of Merycoicodon, Gomphotherium, and a Columbian mammoth. A Smilodon leaps toward the carcass of a Bison latifrons in competition with the short-faced bear Arctodus.

Visitors can take the "dinovator" upstairs to overlook the Apatosaurus and Saurophaganax and to visit the Hall of Natural Wonders. The Hall of Natural Wonders contains dioramas which demonstrate the diversity of Oklahoma's ecology and wildlife from the eastern forests to the mixed-grass prairie to the buttes of Black Mesa. In addition to the Hall of Ancient Life and the Hall of Natural Wonders, visitors can also explore the Native American and Special Exhibitions Gallery, the Gallery of World Cultures, the Hall of the People of Oklahoma, and the Discovery Room, as well as lunch at the Redbud Cafe.

There are plenty of hands-on exhibits to excite young children and lots of volunteer docents to answer questions and to show some of the collections that are normally kept under wraps. The museum is well worth spending a morning or afternoon, or even an entire day's visit.

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