Marshall P. Felch, a farmer and Civil War veteran who lived in Cañon City excavating Jurassic dinosaurs for Othniel C. Marsh during the Guilded Age of Paleontology. This image was provided by his great-grandchildren.

Urgency, One Fragment at a Time

The Story of Marshall P. Felch and His Dinosaur Quarry

Introduction

Marshall P. Felch is best known for his days digging in a quarry near his farm in Garden Park just north of Cañon City, in roughly south-central Colorado, from 1877 to 1888. He worked for Othniel C. Marsh, the now infamous paleontologist who lived and worked at Yale University at the Peabody Museum in New Haven, Connecticut. Marsh is most noted for his feud with the paleontologist Edward Drinker Cope in "The Great Bone Wars" during "The Guilded Age" of the late 1800's (Jaffe, 2000).

Years after Felch's death his daughter, Sarah, donated to Earl Douglas of the United States Geological Survey letters he had received over the years in correspondence with Marsh. As luck would have it, Marsh, too, had saved all his letters from Felch. The richness of the letters documents a rare glimpse into the lives of both men living at a time of great change and exploration. However, the letters best describe life in the western frontier of the United States, which are so intimately captured and preserved through Felch himself. Aside from the dialect and colloquialisms of the times, Felch conveys an almost modern quality. In his letters to Marsh he holds back little. An honest, hard working, interested, and fair man, Felch attempts to balance the perils of financial uncertainty, unmerciful weather extremes, ill health, his family's well-being, and an ever growing naturalist within him. Surely, there could not have been such time allowed for contemplating how strange and beautiful the Jurassic dinosaurs and organisms were in the middle of frontier America! But there was, and we are arguably the better for it. How else were people drawn to the American West, if not through notions of freedom, exploration, a little elbow room, and discovery? A pragmatist would have never made it passed Kansas. It is the juxtaposition of all the pressures of frontier life against the discovery and excavation of dinosaurs that makes Felch's story what it is, and it happened in Cañon City.

Amanda Felch. She was a Civil War army nurse before marrying Felch and moving to Colorado. This image was provided by M.P. Felch's great-grandchildren.

The marriage certificate of Mr. and Mrs. Marshall P. Felch-Boston, Massachusetts. This image was provided by M.P. Felch's great-grandchildren.

Sarah Ellen Felch, the oldest child of Marshall and Amanda, would sometimes help out her father by drawing fossils for Othniel C. Marsh. She was the first to find fossils in the Felch Quarry. This image was provided by her grandchildren.

The Man in Time and Space

The fourth of ten children, Marshall P. Felch was born in Lowell, Massachusetts on June 20, 1834. He lived in Chelmsford, Massachusetts around the age of two, and then Oxford, New Hampshire around the age of seven. Eventually, he moved on to Vermont where he married his first wife Carrie M. Eastman in Bradford on January 27, 1859. She died only 14 months later on April 27, 1860 in West Fairlee, Vermont. They had a daughter whose name to this day is not known. Ultimately, the daughter was raised by another unknown family, and Felch joined the Union in the Civil War as a full hospital steward on August 29, 1861. His tour of duty was with the H Company 4th Vermont Infantry, Unit # 3032. He reenlisted on February 15, 1864 and was finally discharged on July 13, 1865. In 1867 he married Amanda M. Colburn in Boston, Massachusetts before they left for Denver, Colorado. (See Felch Family Tree.)

On July 29, 1868 their first child, daughter Sarah Ellen Felch, was born. Census records show that the family lived in Montezuma, Colorado for a time in 1870 where it is presumed their second child, son Edward Ned Felch was born. Finally, the family came to reside in Cañon City, Colorado a year later in 1871. Their third and last child, Webster E. Felch, was born at this time (Ancestry.com).

Although it is not clear when, Felch's younger brother Henry and Henry's wife Kate Bradish also traveled to Colorado. Henry and Kate had a daughter, Claribell, on October 15, 1872 in Cañon City, a year after it is known that Felch's own family had arrived.

Living in Cañon City

Once in Cañon City, the Felch family started to farm. At the time, vegetable farming was doing well in a small valley north of the town known as Garden Park (see below surficial geology map intended for Evanoff and Carpenter, 1998). The Park's produce served coal miners to the south and gold miners to the north. Later, at the turn of the 20th century, the valley would be less worthwhile to farm as mining went bust and poor growing seasons became more common (Johnson, et al., 1981).

Surficial geology map with Felch Quarry designation in the Garden Park area of Canon City, Colorado created by Emmett Evanoff of University of Colorado, Boulder and Ken Carpenter of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Felch Quarries are noted in relation to the rest of the fossiliferous geographic area.

This change in the productivity of the valley is due to and considered part of the regions climatic variability. Floods were a real obstacle for Garden Park residents in the late 1800's (6/27/1886 Felch Letter). But in time these wetter days would disappear and come back again from time to time. Graphs 1 and 2 provide a glimpse into weather trends. Graph 1 illustrates a monthly average precipitation across 49 years from 1931 to 1980, and 24 years from 1940 to 1967 from the Colorado Climate Center and the U.S. Weather Bureau, respectively. These two examples indicate that the finer resolution of the Weather Bureau's data follows closely with the longer and more broadly defined monthly averages of the Climate Center's data. Graph 2 is a graph of the monthly average temperatures from 1940 to 1967 from the U.S. Weather Bureau. As shown, May and August are the wettest months averaging close to only two inches of rain, while the warmest months are June, July, and August, as would be expected. Unfortunately, well documented climate records are poor for the dates when Marshall P. Felch worked in the quarry. They are mostly preserved in his letters to Marsh. Below is a graph made by Johnson, et al. (1981), that illustrates mean annual precipitation counts from 1888 to 1978. These records indicate the variability in rain fall for the Cañon City area across almost 100 years.

Figure 1. Average precipitation in inches for the Cañon City area. Data gathered by the Colorado Climate Center (1931-1980 data) and the U.S. Weather Bureau (1940-1967 data). The dotted line represents the U.S. Weather Bureau's shorter interval of time within the Colorado Climate Center's numbers. Data provided by Royal Gorge Regional Museum and History Center.

Figure 2. Average monthly temperatures in Cañon City, Colorado for the years 1940 to 1967. Data was gathered by the U.S. Weather Bureau. Data provided by Royal Gorge Regional Museum and History Center.

Johnson, et al. graph of mean annual precipitation from 1888 to 1978. Graph provided by Royal Gorge Regional Museum and History Center.

At this point in his story, Felch is 38. Throughout this and later time, the U.S. was experiencing unprecedented growth and change. Aside from the Civil War itself, other historical aspects of society and industry were changing. One example is the abolition of slavery in 1865 at the end of the Civil War. Another historical point is the first sent message by telegraph in 1844 (the year Henry, Felch's brother, was born). In a few years from the time Claribell (Henry's daughter) was born Elisha Gray and Alexander Graham Bell would be rushing their telephone designs to the patent office (1876). Throughout western civilization, history was being made. The year Felch married Carrie M. Eastman, Charles Darwin published his first edition of the now infamous "The Origin of Species." This period throughout Felch's life is also the time when the post-impressionist painter Vincent Willem van Gogh lived (1853-1890), and the time that eventually saw the construction of the Eiffel Tower (1889), and the Brooklyn Bridge (1870-1883).

The Quarry

The Felch Quarry sits at the edge of a small precipice over a gulch that leads into Four Mile Creek, the main drainage for Garden Park. The fossils were excavated out of hard sandstone that ironically, upon digging them out, would crumble. Felch recognized later that all the fossils came out of a zone of sandstone he called "the old river bed" (Felch 10/16/1887 letter to Marsh). At the quarry's height of production there were storage sheds for fossils and supplies, a furnace, an outhouse, and a forge. Today, the wall of the quarry is covered with sediments that have slid down its face.

Fossils were first discovered by Felch's daughter, Sarah, but they were later circulated and made known to others (such as the town doctor and O.C. Marsh) through his brother, Henry. By 1877, Benjamin Franklin Mudge per order of O.C. Marsh, was in Garden Park digging in the floor of the quarry with Felch and Cañon City resident Walter Weld (Evanoff and Carpenter, 1994). As a side note, Walter Weld would later take out a claim on the quarry to the great annoyance of Felch (Felch 2/13/1885 letter to Marsh). It was after Mudge and Felch encountered the difficult process of excavating the fossils that Mudge asked for assistance. Marsh sent Samuel W. Williston to help (Evanoff and Carpenter, 1994). Together, Mudge, Felch, and Williston uncovered the first retrievable fossils to send to Marsh back in New Haven, Connecticut.

Felch Quarry nearing the end of its heyday in the summer of 1888. Note the channel in-filling in the cliff wall just below the buildings. It was in a similar bed of sandstone, over towards the wall of the quarry (to the left), that many of the best fossils were recovered from. Also, if you look closely at the image on the left you can see a circled figure standing there. It is not known if this is Felch, but chances are probably very good that it is. Photographer unknown. Image provided by Garden Park Paleontology Society.

The Felch Quarry today. The channel in-filling can still be seen, but the quarry itself has had sediments slide down its face along with having vegetation reclaiming the floor of the quarry. Photo by Donna Engard. Image provided by Garden Park Paleontology Society.

This initial dig only lasted for a year when Marsh's men gave up on the quarry due to other quarrying prospects, frustration, and impatience (Evanoff and Carpenter, 1994). The quarry is not made of the softer, chisel and hammer rocks found in Como Bluff, Wyoming. It is hard cemented sandstone that requires a commitment to patience not many people can possess for such a small financial return. Additionally, weather extremes would slow down the progress of pulling the already crumbly and highly weathered fossils from the floor of the quarry in "the old river bed."

Four years later in 1881 Felch and Marsh began correspondence regarding the quarry, and in 1882 Marsh asked Felch if he would like to reopen the quarry to more excavations. Felch said he would work in the quarry, and in 1883 the digging was under way. All in all, over 270 crates of fossils were sent to Marsh at Yale by railroad. Most fossils were disarticulated (meaning the bones were separated from each other) except for a few that were nearly intact. In particular, the species Ceratosaurus nasicornis, Stegosaurus stenops, and Allosaurus fragilis were found almost fully complete.

These images are those of Ceratosaurus nasicornis (left) and Stegosaurus stenops (right). The fossils are two of the most complete specimens to come out of the Felch Quarry. Ceratosaurus nasicornis came out in 1883 and Stegosaurus stenops (aka "Roadkill") in 1885-1886. They are now on display at the Smithsonian. Photographer unknown. Images provided by Garden Park Paleontology Society.

To have this success, Felch had to face flooding which destroyed his crops on numerous occasions, vandalism and trespassing from curious town folk, and near poverty. He had to build the road up to the quarry (alone since his help thought he was more "obliged"), use gun powder to break up the cemented sandstone, and eventually cut out the fossils in large blocks. These would then be taken to the train station where he had to pay then and there to send the heavy, heavy blocks to Marsh in New Haven. Sometimes the fossils would not make it to the Marsh in a timely manner, and the shipments always seemed to cost too much. On February 16, 1884 in a letter to Marsh, Felch regards the Denver & Rio Grande Railway Company in Cañon City as "notoriously a Corporation of Highway Robbers that fleece everyone that comes in their way." From 1883 to 1885, Marsh paid Felch $75.00 a month ($1484.75 in 2005 Consumer Price Index; Williston, 2005); then $85.00 ($1757.17 in 2005 Consumer Price Index; Williston, 2005) from 1886 until the main excavations ended.

After nearly five years of digging in the quarry, Felch began to feel it was "petering out" (Felch 10/16/1887 letter to Marsh). Along with the loss of his second son Webster to peritonitis in 1884, and frequent bouts of near financial disaster, Felch was working himself to death. The local doctor diagnosed him with having a heart lesion, which had been slowing him down with periodic illnesses that were becoming increasingly worse each time they resurfaced. How long could excavations continue while in the company of such uncertainties? Both Felch and Marsh were on the path toward "feeling their ages;" life was nearing its conclusion.

Last Days

The last years of correspondence indicate that times were hard on the Felch family, as Felch struggled to maintain the quarry while trying to obtain an army penchant and good health (Felch 2/10/1891 letter to Marsh). For a whole year (1890) Felch did not write Marsh; blocks of fossils and equipment had been destroyed by a man in an act of reprisal against his son Ned. Felch, as always, in poor health (physically, and now emotionally), felt ashamed of such a tragedy and could not bring himself to tell Marsh for two years.

Felch's remaining days were spent in the Garden Park area after his wife, Amanda, died. Felch died at his Garden Park ranch in 1902.

References

Discover Your Family Story, 1998-2006, Search For Your Ancestors.

Evanoff, E., and Carpenter, K., 1998, History, sedimentology, and taphonomy of Felch quarry 1 and associated sandbodies in the Morrison formation near Garden Park, Fremont county, Colorado, Modern Geology, Vol. 22, pp. 145-169.

Felch, M.P., 1882-1892, in his letters to O.C. Marsh, Special Collections Division, Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City.

Jaffe, M., 2000, The gilded dinosaur: the fossil war between E.D. Cope and O.C. Marsh, and the rise of American science, First Edition, Crown Publishers, New York. 424. ISBN: 0-517-70760-8.

Johnson, W.C., McMaster, R.B., Sorenson, C.J., 1981, Changing rangeland usage in Garden Park, Colorado, Great Plains-Rocky Mountain Geographical Journal, Vol. 9, p. 59-71.

Williston, S.H., 2005, What is the relative value?, Economic History Services.

"From the time the first block of that skeleton was removed ‘till the last was taken out—I saw myself to every move made and every blow struck on it—had platforms made—covered with burlap cloth, to receive all the blocks and fragments as they were removed—placed and replaced them many times in position—made and remade maps and diagrams of all the different groups and blocks, used all the devices I could think of to so locate all the parts and fragments that I got the whole so fixed in my mind it would haunt me in my sleep and as I have said before; think I could put together again by moonlight."

M.P. Felch
January 6, 1885