Smithsonian National Museum Of Natural History

The history of the skeleton known to Montanans as the "Wankel T rex," to the Smithsonian as the "Nation's T rex" and to scientists as "MOR555," has three parts. The first we know little about - researchers can't even tell whether that hatchling was a girl or a boy. The second part was 24 billion days of stony silence. But the third ... that's where...

When the new fossil hall at the National Museum of Natural History opens next June, it will show off hundreds of the Smithsonian's finest prehistoric specimens, including the newly acquired star of the Late Cretaceous show, "The Nation's T. rex."

After the end of the last ice age, as sea levels rose, glaciers receded and global average temperatures soared as much as 7 degrees Celsius, the Earth's ecosystems were utterly transformed.

Ray Stanford, a wiry 79-year-old with a slight Texas twang, passes me an oblong piece of reddish rock. He found it in a stream bed years ago, not far from an impression of a hatchling armored dinosaur now on display at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.

Indian-Americans are doctors, engineers, motel owners, taxi drivers and spelling bee champs - just a few takeaways from a new exhibition at the Smithsonian.

The history of the skeleton known to Montanans as the "Wankel T rex," to the Smithsonian as the "Nation's T rex" and to scientists as "MOR555," has three parts. The first we know little about - researchers can't even tell whether that hatchling was a girl or a boy. The second part was 24 billion days of stony silence. But the third ... that's where...

When the new fossil hall at the National Museum of Natural History opens next June, it will show off hundreds of the Smithsonian's finest prehistoric specimens, including the newly acquired star of the Late Cretaceous show, "The Nation's T. rex."

After the end of the last ice age, as sea levels rose, glaciers receded and global average temperatures soared as much as 7 degrees Celsius, the Earth's ecosystems were utterly transformed.

Ray Stanford, a wiry 79-year-old with a slight Texas twang, passes me an oblong piece of reddish rock. He found it in a stream bed years ago, not far from an impression of a hatchling armored dinosaur now on display at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.

Indian-Americans are doctors, engineers, motel owners, taxi drivers and spelling bee champs - just a few takeaways from a new exhibition at the Smithsonian.