Quinton Judson Stephenson (1920-1997) was a trapper, naturalist, and self-taught artist from Garysburg, North Carolina. He is known for his "Occoneechee Trapper's Lodge" (or "Trapper's Lodge Museum"), a natural history museum and art environment in Garysburg.
Q. J. Stephenson was born in 1920 in Garysburg, North Carolina. The son of a traveling salesman, Stephenson grew up in the lean years of the Great Depression, trapping muskrat, mink, and raccoons in the woods and selling their pelts to Sears & Roebuck. In his teenage years, he would travel to northern California with the Civilian Conservation Corps, an experience that he would later credit with his interest in and love of nature. When he returned home, he operated a crane with a dragline, which led to the unexpected discovery of fossils, petrified wood, Civil War artifacts, and other relics from the North Carolina environment. Through the donation of some of these objects, Stephenson developed a relationship with the Smithsonian Institution. [1]
In the 1950s, out of concern that younger generations were not properly learning traditional naturalist and trapping methods, Stephenson began an artistic endeavor that spanned 50 years of production and manifested itself in the Occoneechee Trapper's Lodge and his self-termed "Prehistoric Art."
In 1997, Stephenson died in Garysburg. [2]
The Occoneechee Trapper's Lodge is a natural history museum and art environment created by Stephenson to illustrate local natural history features and impart his own personal philosophies and knowledge. The construction process involved the gradual accretion of sculptures, fossils, shells, petrified wood, and other found objects, which adorned a small cement and wood building on his property. Stephenson covered much of the external surface of the building with cast cement plates, each embellished with mosaics of natural particulates and imprinted with written philosophies, histories, lessons, and didactic labels. Some of these plates are hung from brackets on the walls, while others are embedded directly into the cement foundation which spills out into the surrounding landscape. Cypress knees are affixed to the overhanging ledges and jut up from the surrounding grounds, resembling stalagmites and stalactites in a cave. The interior of the lodge is also encrusted with similar panels and assemblages, although more vibrant and untouched by the external elements. [3]
In the 1970s, Stephenson began producing "Prehistoric Art," creating fantastic creatures from his imagination out of cement and found objects. He would position these sculptures in and around the Trapper's Lodge to amuse himself and visitors. [2]
In addition to the lodge building, Stephenson constructed other smaller works on the property in the same creative method and style. These include a windmill, table and bench, bell, and planter.
Pieces made by Stephenson and fragments from the environment have made their way into several public and private collections, one notable example being the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
As of 2016, the Occoneechee Trapper's Lodge still exists on Stephenson's property in Garysburg. [1] However, natural and man-made destruction has led to noticeable degradation and loss of the environment.
Timeline of paleontology
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.
Spencer Fullerton Baird was an American naturalist, ornithologist, ichthyologist, herpetologist, and museum curator. Baird was the first curator to be named at the Smithsonian Institution. He eventually served as assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian from 1850 to 1878, and as Secretary from 1878 until 1887. He was dedicated to expanding the natural history collections of the Smithsonian which he increased from 6,000 specimens in 1850 to over 2 million by the time of his death. He also served as the U.S. Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries from 1871 to 1887 and published over 1,000 works during his lifetime.
Petrified wood, also known as petrified tree, is the name given to a special type of fossilized wood, the fossilized remains of terrestrial vegetation. Petrifaction is the result of a tree or tree-like plants having been replaced by stone via a mineralization process that often includes permineralization and replacement. The organic materials making up cell walls have been replicated with minerals. In some instances, the original structure of the stem tissue may be partially retained. Unlike other plant fossils, which are typically impressions or compressions, petrified wood is a three-dimensional representation of the original organic material.
In geology, petrifaction or petrification is the process by which organic material becomes a fossil through the replacement of the original material and the filling of the original pore spaces with minerals. Petrified wood typifies this process, but all organisms, from bacteria to vertebrates, can become petrified. Petrifaction takes place through a combination of two similar processes: permineralization and replacement. These processes create replicas of the original specimen that are similar down to the microscopic level.
Florentino Ameghino was an Argentine naturalist, paleontologist, anthropologist and zoologist, whose fossil discoveries on the Argentine Pampas, especially on Patagonia, rank with those made in the western United States during the late 19th century. Along with his two brothers – Carlos and Juan – Florentino Ameghino was one of the most important founding figures in South American paleontology.
Deborah Kay Butterfield is an American sculptor. Along with her artist-husband John Buck, she divides her time between a farm in Bozeman, Montana, and studio space in Hawaii. She is known for her sculptures of horses made from found objects, like metal, and especially pieces of wood.
Roger Brown was an American artist and painter. Often associated with the Chicago Imagist groups, he was internationally known for his distinctive painting style and shrewd social commentaries on politics, religion, and art.
The history of paleontology traces the history of the effort to understand the history of life on Earth by studying the fossil record left behind by living organisms. Since it is concerned with understanding living organisms of the past, paleontology can be considered to be a field of biology, but its historical development has been closely tied to geology and the effort to understand the history of Earth itself.
Walton Ford is an American artist who makes paintings and prints in the style of naturalist illustrations, often depicting extinct species. Each of his paintings is a meticulous, realistic study in flora and fauna, and is filled with symbols, clues, and jokes referencing texts ranging from colonial literature, to folktales, to travel guides. The paintings are complex allegorical narratives that critique the history of colonialism, industrialism, politics, natural science, and humanity's effect on the environment.
The Anniston Museum of Natural History is a museum in Lagarde Park, Anniston, Alabama, exhibiting more than 2,000 natural history items on permanent display, including minerals, fossils, and rare animals in open dioramas.
Gregory Warmack, better known as Mr. Imagination, was an American outsider artist. He worked in a variety of forms and his work often made use of sandstone and bottlecaps and other repurposed materials.
Paleontology in North Carolina refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the U. S. state of North Carolina. Fossils are common in North Carolina. According to author Rufus Johnson, "almost every major river and creek east of Interstate 95 has exposures where fossils can be found". The fossil record of North Carolina spans from Eocambrian remains that are 600 million years old, to the Pleistocene 10,000 years ago.
Paleontology in South Dakota refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the U.S. state of South Dakota. South Dakota is an excellent source of fossils as finds have been widespread throughout the state. During the early Paleozoic era South Dakota was submerged by a shallow sea that would come to be home to creatures like brachiopods, cephalopods, corals, and ostracoderms. Local sea levels rose and fall during the Carboniferous and the sea left completely during the Permian. During the Triassic, the state became a coastal plain, but by the Jurassic it was under a sea where ammonites lived. Cretaceous South Dakota was also covered by a sea that was home to mosasaurs. The sea remained in place after the start of the Cenozoic before giving way to a terrestrial mammal fauna including the camel Poebrotherium, three-toed horses, rhinoceroses, saber-toothed cat, and titanotheres. During the Ice Age glaciers entered the state, which was home to mammoths and mastodons. Local Native Americans interpreted fossils as the remains of the water monster Unktehi and used bits of Baculites shells in magic rituals to summon buffalo herds. Local fossils came to the attention of formally trained scientists with the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The Cretaceous horned dinosaur Triceratops horridus is the South Dakota state fossil.
Paleontology in New Mexico refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the U.S. state of New Mexico. The fossil record of New Mexico is exceptionally complete and spans almost the entire stratigraphic column. More than 3,300 different kinds of fossil organisms have been found in the state. Of these more than 700 of these were new to science and more than 100 of those were type species for new genera. During the early Paleozoic, southern and western New Mexico were submerged by a warm shallow sea that would come to be home to creatures including brachiopods, bryozoans, cartilaginous fishes, corals, graptolites, nautiloids, placoderms, and trilobites. During the Ordovician the state was home to algal reefs up to 300 feet high. During the Carboniferous, a richly vegetated island chain emerged from the local sea. Coral reefs formed in the state's seas while terrestrial regions of the state dried and were home to sand dunes. Local wildlife included Edaphosaurus, Ophiacodon, and Sphenacodon.
Paleontology in Arizona refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the U.S. state of Arizona. The fossil record of Arizona dates to the Precambrian. During the Precambrian, Arizona was home to a shallow sea which was home to jellyfish and stromatolite-forming bacteria. This sea was still in place during the Cambrian period of the Paleozoic era and was home to brachiopods and trilobites, but it withdrew during the Ordovician and Silurian. The sea returned during the Devonian and was home to brachiopods, corals, and fishes. Sea levels began to rise and fall during the Carboniferous, leaving most of the state a richly vegetated coastal plain during the low spells. During the Permian, Arizona was richly vegetated but was submerged by seawater late in the period.
Paleontology in the United States refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the United States. Paleontologists have found that at the start of the Paleozoic era, what is now "North" America was actually in the southern hemisphere. Marine life flourished in the country's many seas. Later the seas were largely replaced by swamps, home to amphibians and early reptiles. When the continents had assembled into Pangaea drier conditions prevailed. The evolutionary precursors to mammals dominated the country until a mass extinction event ended their reign.
The Lemmon Petrified Wood Park & Museum is a roadside attraction located off U.S. 12 in Lemmon, South Dakota, which features large outdoor sculptures created out of Mesozoic petrified wood. It was created in 1933 by Ole Quammen, a former mayor of Lemmon. Besides the outdoor park, the site has a museum, also built out of petrified wood, which hosts smaller collections of fossils. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977 as the Lemmon Petrified Park; when dedicated, it claimed to be the largest petrified wood park in the world. The park and museum, which do not charge admission, are open during the summer months between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
Vernon Burwell (1916–1990) was an African-American sculptor known for his painted cement sculptures of animals and busts of historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln, Sojourner Truth, and Martin Luther King Jr.
The Old Trapper's Lodge is a California Folk Art display started in 1951 in the United States. It was designated a California Historical Landmark on March 25, 1985. The Old Trapper's Lodge art work is located in Los Angeles Pierce College's Cleveland Park at 6201 Winnetka Avenue in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles in Los Angeles County. The folk art is a life-size sculpture made by John Ehn (1897-1981), a self-taught artist who loved Old West culture. Ehn used his family as models and turned them into life-size outsider art Old West characters.
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