History of Paleontology through Letters

This digital archive offers a unique window into the history of paleontology through historic correspondence, scientific postcards, and original postal ephemera. Before the advent of digital communication, international postal networks served as the primary means by which pioneering geologists, paleontologists, and naturalists exchanged empirical observations, debated taxonomic classifications, and announced new fossil discoveries.
The collection brings together significant primary-source documents from many of the discipline’s most influential figures, including Richard Owen, Othniel Charles Marsh, and William Buckland. Organized geographically, the archive highlights the international intellectual networks that fostered scientific collaboration and helped shape the foundations of modern paleontology and the geosciences during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
By preserving and contextualizing these original documents, the archive provides valuable insight into the development of scientific ideas, the circulation of knowledge, and the personal relationships that connected researchers across national boundaries.

Australia

Letter from Australian paleontologist Curt Teichert to Professor R. Krausel, mailed in 1951

Austria

Postcard of Dr. Gustav von Arthaber from the Paleontological Institute of Vienna University to Jean Miquel in Barroubio (France), mailed in 1899

Belgium

Natural History Museum of Belgium (1947) to Mrs. Racovitza, widow of Emil Racovitza (Racovita)

France

Letter from Scottish paleontologist Thomas Davidson to French paleontologist Gustave de Lorière, mailed in 1852

Germany

Letter to Franz Unger (Bavaria, 1845)	Reply card of the Zoological Museum of Berlin (German Empire, 1912)	Postcard of Professor Ernst Stromer to Jacques Lechevalier, a scientific publisher in Paris (Bavaria, 1912)
Postcard sent by Wilhelm von Branca from Munich to the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin (Weimar Republic, 1920)

Great Britain

Alexander Nasmyth to William Buckland (1838)	Richard Owen to George Ransome (1849)	Ernest Westlake to his father Thomas Westlake (1874)
Invitation of the British Association for the Advancement of Science to meeting in Glasgow (1876)	Letter from the Geological Society in London to the British Museum (1876)	Richard Owen to Sir Henry Barkly (1876)
Telegram posted by Alphonse MILNE EDWARDS to Sir Richard OWEN in 1889	Letter posted from India to Professor E Ray Lankester, the Natural History Museum in London, in 1899

USA

Erasmus Crawford to Othniel Marsh (1870), Yale College, New Jersey	Museum of Paleontology, Berkeley (1935) to Professor Stehlin, NHM Basel in Switzerland	The Paleontological Society, Princeton, New Jersey (1936) to Dr. Rudolf Richter (Germany)