Mastodon Molar

Inscriptions

Three fragments of an old paper label: Masto [illeg.] fr. near the [illeg.] given by [illeg.]

Label

In 1739, European explorers in what would become northern Kentucky discovered “elephant bones.” These elephant bones, in reality the fossils of the mammoths and mastodons that were drawn to the salt springs in the area, ultimately gave the site its name of Big Bone Lick. While the bones had long been known by the Indigenous Delaware and Shawnee, they were a source of fascination and curiosity to the colonists and later settlers.

David McClure, a former Dartmouth employee sent as a missionary to the Delaware in Ohio, sent this mastodon molar to Eleazar Wheelock in 1772. By 1791, it had joined what are described as “philosophical apparatus” and “a number of valuable foreign curiosities” on the upper floor of Dartmouth Hall in what could be considered the first museum at Dartmouth. In 1974, Dartmouth sold its natural history collection, including the fossils, to the soon-to-be established Montshire Museum.

From the 2025 exhibition From Mastodon to Mosaic: Building an Academic Art Collection in America, curated by Ashley B. Offill, Curator of Collections

Course History

PSYC 7.03, Why People Believe in Weird Things: Credulity, Science and Pseudoscience in the Study of Human Behavior, John Pfister, Winter 2019

PSYC 7.03, Science and Pseudoscience, John Pfister, Winter 2021

HIST 63.02, Reading Artifacts: The Material Culture of Science, Whitney Barlow Robles, Spring 2021

PSYC 7.03, Science and Pseudoscience, John Pfister, Winter 2022

PSYC 7.03, Science and Pseudoscience, John Pfister, Winter 2022

HIST 63.02, Material Culture of Science, Whitney Robles, Spring 2022

Psychological & Brain Sciences 7.03, Science and Pseudoscience, John Pfister, Winter 2023

History 63.02, Reading Artifacts: The Material Culture of Science, Whitney Barlow Robles, Spring 2023

History 63.02, Reading Artifacts: The Material Culture of Science, Whitney Barlow Robles, Spring 2023

History 10.02, Archival Research, M. Cecillia Gaposchkin, Summer 2023

Psychological & Brain Sciences 7.03 – Why People Believe in Weird Things: Science, Pseudoscience, and Thinking Critically about Human Behavior, John Pfister, Winter 2024

History 10.02, Archival Research and the Production of History, Leslie Butler, Summer 2024

Art History 63.02, Why Are Museums...?, Mary Coffey, Spring 2026

Art History 63.02, Why Are Museums…?, Mary Coffey, Spring 2025

History 10.02, Archival Research, Julia Rabig, Summer 2025

Exhibition History

From Mastadon to Mosaic: Building an Academic Art Collection in America, Ivan Albright Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, June 14, 2025 - Fall 2026

Publication History

Rebecca A. Buck and Jean Allman Gilmore, Collection Conundrums: Solving Collections Management Mysteries, Washington, D.C.: American Association of Museums, 2007, ill. p. 4.

Provenance

Unknown collector, Big Bone Lick, Kentucky, date unknown; presented by Lieutenant Alexander Fowler (unknown -1806), with the 18th (Royal Irish) Regiment of Foot, Fort Pitt, Pennsylvania to Reverend David McClure (1748-1820), September 13, 1772; given to Dartmouth President Eleazar Wheelock (1711-1779), Hanover, New Hampshire, October 26, 1772.

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Subjects