The La Brea Tar Pits is an active paleontological research site in urban Los Angeles. Hancock Park was formed around a group of tar pits where natural asphalt has seeped up from the ground for tens of thousands of years. Over many centuries, the bones of trapped animals have been preserved. The George C. Page Museum is dedicated to researching the tar pits and displaying specimens from the animals that died there. La Brea Tar Pits is a registered National Natural Landmark.
The dire wolf is an extinct canine. It is one of the most famous prehistoric carnivores in North America, along with its extinct competitor Smilodon. The dire wolf lived in the Americas and eastern Asia during the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene epochs. The species was named in 1858, four years after the first specimen had been found. Two subspecies are recognized: Aenocyon dirus guildayi and Aenocyon dirus dirus. The largest collection of its fossils has been obtained from the Rancho La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles.
Baldwin Hills is a neighborhood within the South Los Angeles region of Los Angeles, California. It is often referred to as the Black Beverly Hills.
Grus is a genus of large birds in the crane family.
Rancho La Brea was a 4,439-acre (17.96 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Los Angeles County, California, given in 1828 to Antonio Jose Rocha and Nemisio Dominguez by José Antonio Carrillo, the alcalde of Los Angeles. Rancho La Brea consisted of one square league of land of what is now Wilshire's Miracle Mile, Hollywood, and parts of West Hollywood. The grant included the famous La Brea Tar Pits.
Hancock Park is a city park in the Miracle Mile section of the Mid-Wilshire neighborhood in Los Angeles, California.
La Brea Avenue is a prominent north-south thoroughfare in the City of Los Angeles and in Los Angeles County, California.
Teratornis was a genus of huge North American birds of prey—the best-known of the teratorns—of which, two species are known to have existed: Teratornis merriami and Teratornis woodburnensis. A large number of fossil and subfossil bones, representing more than 100 individuals, have been found in locations in California, Oregon, southern Nevada, Arizona, and Florida, though most are from the Californian La Brea Tar Pits. All remains except one Early Pleistocene partial skeleton from the Leisey Shell Pit near Charlotte Harbor, Florida date from the Late Pleistocene, with the youngest remains dating from the Pleistocene–Holocene boundary.
Henry Hancock was a Harvard trained lawyer and a land surveyor working in California in the 1850s. He was the owner of Rancho La Brea, which included the La Brea Tar Pits.
The Californian turkey is an extinct species of turkey that lived during the Pleistocene and Early Holocene epochs in California. It has been estimated that the Californian turkey went extinct about 10,000 years ago.
George Allan Hancock was the owner of the Rancho La Brea Oil Company. He inherited Rancho La Brea, including the La Brea Tar Pits which he donated to Los Angeles County. He also developed Hancock Park, Los Angeles. He was vice president of the Los Angeles Hibernian Bank, treasurer of the Los Angeles Symphony Association, and president of the Automobile Association of Southern California. He owned the Santa Maria Valley Railroad, established Rosemary Farm, and developed the Santa Maria Ice and Cold Storage Plant.
The Baldwin Hills are a low mountain range surrounded by and rising above the Los Angeles Basin plain in central Los Angeles County, California. The Pacific Ocean is to the west, the Santa Monica Mountains to the north, Downtown Los Angeles to the northeast, and the Palos Verdes Hills to the south - with all easily viewed from the Baldwin Hills.
Rancho La Ciénega ó Paso de la Tijera was a 4,219-acre (17.07 km2) Mexican land grant in present day Los Angeles County, California given in 1843 by Governor Manuel Micheltorena to Vicente Sánchez. "La Cienega" is derived from the Spanish word ciénega, which means swamp or marshland and refers to the natural springs and wetlands in the area between Beverly Hills and Park La Brea and the Baldwin Hills range.
La Brea Woman is a human whose remains were found in the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, California. The remains, first discovered in the pits in 1914, are the partial skeleton of a woman. At around 18–25 years of age at death, she has been dated at 10,220–10,250 years BP. These are the only human remains to have ever been discovered at the La Brea Tar Pits.
Oraristix brea, the La Brea owl, is an extinct owl reported from the Upper Pleistocene asphalt deposits of the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, California. It was first described in 1933 by Hildegarde Howard as Strix brea, but this extinct owl was recently placed into its own genus by Campbell and Bocheński (2010). The La Brea owl has also been found in the Upper Pleistocene asphalt deposits of Carpinteria, California. Oraristrix brea is interpreted as more terrestrial in habits than forest owls because, compared to North American species of Bubo and Strix, it had longer legs relative to its wingspan.
William Warren Orcutt was a petroleum geologist who is considered a pioneer in the development of oil production in California, and the use of geology in the oil industry. He is also known for his contributions to paleontology, which brought the fossils of the La Brea Tar Pits to the attention of the scientific community.
Hildegarde Howard was an American pioneer in paleornithology, mentored by the famous ornithologist, Joseph Grinnell, at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology (MVZ) and in avian paleontology. She was well known for her discoveries in the La Brea Tar Pits, among them the Rancho La Brea eagles. She also discovered and described Pleistocene flightless waterfowl at the prehistoric Ballona wetlands of coastal Los Angeles County at Playa del Rey. In 1953, Howard became the third woman to be awarded the Brewster Medal. She was also the first woman president of the Southern California Academy of Sciences. Hildegarde, throughout her career wrote 150 papers.
Baldwin Hills/Crenshaw is a neighborhood in the south region of the city of Los Angeles. It is divided between the upscale, principally home-owning Baldwin Hills residential district to the south and a more concentrated apartment area to the north, just south of Jefferson Boulevard. A commercial corridor along Crenshaw Boulevard includes Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, Marlton Square and Crenshaw Boulevard.
A list of prehistoric and extinct species whose fossils have been found in the La Brea Tar Pits, located in present-day Hancock Park, a city park on the Miracle Mile section of the Mid-Wilshire district in Los Angeles, California.
Chester Stock was an American paleontologist who specialized in the Pleistocene mammalian fauna of the Rancho La Brea tar pits. He served as a professor of geology at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena.
