Stanley John Olsen
Encyclopedia
Stanley John Olsen was an American vertebrate paleontologist and one of the founding figures of zooarchaeology
in the United States. Olsen was also recognized as an historical archaeologist and scholar of United States military insignia, especially buttons of the American Colonial through Civil War periods. He was the father of John W. Olsen
.
to John Mons Olsen (of Bergen, Norway) and Louise Marquardt (of Akron), the second of two sons.
After his graduation from high school in 1938, Olsen worked as a tool and die maker
at the National Rubber Machinery Company in Akron until his marriage to Eleanor Louise Vinez in 1942. He subsequently enlisted in the United States Navy, achieving the rank of Machinist
Mate First Class while serving aboard the USS Mertz, Bunker Hill and Wyoming, and at naval bases on the U.S. East Coast and at Mare Island Navy Yard, California during the Second World War.
at Harvard University. Olsen’s technical work as a preparator quickly evolved into his assignment as one of Professor Romer’s two principal field supervisors. This opportunity led Olsen to the eastern coast of Canada where he prospected for Devonian
fish fossils in Newfoundland and to the southeastern and western U.S. where he collected Tertiary
fossils in Florida, Wyoming, and Montana and Permian
and Triassic
vertebrates in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah.
Herman Gunter’s 1956 invitation to join the staff of the Florida Geological Survey in Tallahassee as State Vertebrate Paleontologist signaled the beginning of Olsen’s scholarly career.
One of Olsen’s first tasks was reopening excavations at the Thomas Farm site
in Gilchrist County, Florida. The Thomas Farm locality, discovered in 1931, has produced the best known early Miocene
terrestrial vertebrate fauna east of the Rocky Mountains. This unique site records predator-prey interactions of the coyote-like Metatomarctus
and the ancestral horse, Parahippus
, as well as a host of other species, on the margins of an 18 million year-old wooded sinkhole and cave complex. Tens of thousands of fossils have been uncovered during more than 70 years of research at the site, ranging from frogs and bats to rhinoceroses and bears. Olsen’s work on the Thomas Farm Caninae (dog-like carnivores, including Metatomarctus
and the bear-dog, Amphicyon
, and their kin) in the late 1950s and early 1960s is regarded as foundational for subsequent studies of those and related species. Olsen’s analysis of the Thomas Farm carnivores not only established him as a vertebrate paleontologist, but also put him in contact with like-minded scholars the world over, including China, where he nurtured contacts that ultimately came to fruition during his many research trips there beginning in 1976.
In 1963, the renowned ornithologist Pierce Brodkorb
honored Olsen’s work by naming the first fossil stork described from the Tertiary of North America after him. The holotype of the ciconiid, Propelargus olseni, is a partial left tarsometatarsus
discovered by Olsen in August 1961 in Middle Hemingfordian Torreya Formation deposits near Tallahassee and is now in the Florida Museum of Natural History’s Pierce Brodkorb Ornithology Collection (catalog number 8504).
During his tenure at the Florida Geological Survey, Olsen helped pioneer the use of both SCUBA
and helmeted diving equipment to explore the rich underwater fossil deposits of central and north Florida’s rivers and springs. His work with colleagues in the Ichetucknee, Aucilla, and Wacissa rivers and in Wakulla Springs
is especially well known because remains of mammoths and mastodons were found in association with bone and stone artifacts of human manufacture.
His familiarity with SCUBA and a developing interest in the archaeology of the Colonial period U.S. led to Olsen’s appointment by Governor Ferris Bryant as Director of Florida’s Marine Salvage Committee in 1964. The natural conflicts between scientific inquiry and economic gain were poised to play out in 1960s Florida on a massive scale. The Gulf and Atlantic coasts’ abundant shipwrecks were only beginning to be recognized as a resource for both scientific study and financial exploitation and the Salvage Committee’s challenge was to initiate accommodation between these two potentially antithetical goals. Olsen’s work on the Salvage Committee was tangentially responsible for kindling his interest in Colonial European exploitation of domestic animals, a research focus that proved lifelong and best exemplified by his innovative analysis of faunal remains recovered from the Spanish ship Nuestra Señora de Atocha.
While on the staff of the F.G.S., Olsen also began to publish his widely distributed and highly respected comparative osteological manuals for archaeologists. These monographs of the Peabody Museum at Harvard signaled his conscious movement away from a focus on Tertiary
paleontological assemblages toward Quaternary
and Holocene
bone accumulations associated with archaeological sites. Under Barbara Lawrence’s influence during his frequent research trips to Harvard in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Olsen began to work more and more closely with archaeologists in their then fledgling attempts to incorporate the analysis and interpretation of animal remains from anthropogenic deposits into the body of traditional archaeological literature.
In 1968, Olsen accepted Hale G. Smith’s invitation to join the faculty of the Department of Anthropology at Florida State University
where he established one of the first zooarchaeology teaching laboratories in the country (along with those at Harvard University, the University of Tennessee, the Field Museum in Chicago, and the University of Florida). Olsen’s transition from the mainly research-oriented environments of museums and the Florida Geological Survey to a broader spectrum academic career is especially noteworthy because he accomplished that feat holding only a high school diploma. Olsen joined the Florida State faculty as a tenured associate professor and was promoted to Full Professor in 1972.
In 1973, Olsen accepted the concurrent positions of Professor of Anthropology at the University of Arizona
and Curator of Zooarchaeology in the Arizona State Museum
in Tucson, which he held until his retirement in 1997.
While in Arizona, Olsen focused his work on elucidating evidence for the domestication of a number of vertebrate species, especially the dog, camel, and yak.
During his half-century professional career, Olsen conducted paleontological and zooarchaeological fieldwork in the U.S., Canada, Colombia, Belize, China, Tibet, India, Italy, Cyprus, and Nepal and worked extensively with museum collections in Great Britain, Russia, Egypt, and Sweden as well as the United States.
The Arizona State Museum’s comparative vertebrate skeletal collections are housed in the Stanley J. Olsen Laboratory of Zooarchaeology, and the Stanley J. Olsen Zooarchaeology Endowment Fund was created at the University of Arizona in 2004 to recognize his contributions to the field.
, the Society for American Archaeology
, the Society of the Sigma Xi
, the Society of Mammalogists, and the American Society of Systematic Zoologists. He was a Fellow of both the Explorers Club and the Company of Military Historians. He served as the 26th President of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology
in 1965-1966 and was elected an Honorary Member in 1996 (the 50th anniversary of his joining the Society) in recognition of Olsen’s distinguished contributions to the discipline of vertebrate paleontology.
Zooarchaeology
Zooarchaeology, also known as Archaeozoology, is the study of animal remains from archaeological sites. The remains consist primarily of the hard parts of the body such as bones, teeth, and shells...
in the United States. Olsen was also recognized as an historical archaeologist and scholar of United States military insignia, especially buttons of the American Colonial through Civil War periods. He was the father of John W. Olsen
John W. Olsen
John W. Olsen, Ph.D. is an American archaeologist specializing in the early Stone Age prehistory and Pleistocene paleoecology of eastern Eurasia. Olsen is Regents’ Professor of Anthropology and Executive Director of the Je Tsongkhapa Endowment for Central and Inner Asian Archaeology at the...
.
Early Life & Military Service
Stanley Olsen was born in Akron, OhioAkron, Ohio
Akron , is the fifth largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Summit County. It is located in the Great Lakes region approximately south of Lake Erie along the Little Cuyahoga River. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 199,110. The Akron Metropolitan...
to John Mons Olsen (of Bergen, Norway) and Louise Marquardt (of Akron), the second of two sons.
After his graduation from high school in 1938, Olsen worked as a tool and die maker
Tool and die maker
Tool and die makers are workers in the manufacturing industry who make jigs, fixtures, dies, molds, machine tools, cutting tools , gauges, and other tools used in manufacturing processes...
at the National Rubber Machinery Company in Akron until his marriage to Eleanor Louise Vinez in 1942. He subsequently enlisted in the United States Navy, achieving the rank of Machinist
Machinist
A machinist is a person who uses machine tools to make or modify parts, primarily metal parts, a process known as machining. This is accomplished by using machine tools to cut away excess material much as a woodcarver cuts away excess wood to produce his work. In addition to metal, the parts may...
Mate First Class while serving aboard the USS Mertz, Bunker Hill and Wyoming, and at naval bases on the U.S. East Coast and at Mare Island Navy Yard, California during the Second World War.
Career and Scholarly Contributions
Following his Honorable Discharge from the Navy in November 1945, Olsen found employment as a fossil preparator in the vertebrate paleontological laboratory of Alfred Sherwood Romer in the Museum of Comparative ZoologyMuseum of Comparative Zoology
The Museum of Comparative Zoology, full name "The Louis Agassiz Museum of Comparative Zoology", often abbreviated simply to "MCZ", is a zoology museum located on the grounds of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is one of three museums which collectively comprise the Harvard Museum...
at Harvard University. Olsen’s technical work as a preparator quickly evolved into his assignment as one of Professor Romer’s two principal field supervisors. This opportunity led Olsen to the eastern coast of Canada where he prospected for Devonian
Devonian
The Devonian is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic Era spanning from the end of the Silurian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya , to the beginning of the Carboniferous Period, about 359.2 ± 2.5 Mya...
fish fossils in Newfoundland and to the southeastern and western U.S. where he collected Tertiary
Tertiary
The Tertiary is a deprecated term for a geologic period 65 million to 2.6 million years ago. The Tertiary covered the time span between the superseded Secondary period and the Quaternary...
fossils in Florida, Wyoming, and Montana and Permian
Permian
The PermianThe term "Permian" was introduced into geology in 1841 by Sir Sir R. I. Murchison, president of the Geological Society of London, who identified typical strata in extensive Russian explorations undertaken with Edouard de Verneuil; Murchison asserted in 1841 that he named his "Permian...
and Triassic
Triassic
The Triassic is a geologic period and system that extends from about 250 to 200 Mya . As the first period of the Mesozoic Era, the Triassic follows the Permian and is followed by the Jurassic. Both the start and end of the Triassic are marked by major extinction events...
vertebrates in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah.
Herman Gunter’s 1956 invitation to join the staff of the Florida Geological Survey in Tallahassee as State Vertebrate Paleontologist signaled the beginning of Olsen’s scholarly career.
One of Olsen’s first tasks was reopening excavations at the Thomas Farm site
Thomas Farm Site
The Thomas Farm site is an Early Miocene, Hemingfordian assemblage of vertebrate fossils located in Gilchrist County, northern Florida.The Thomas Farm site is one of the richest terrestrial deposits of Miocene vertebrates in the 18 Ma range found in eastern North America according to the Florida...
in Gilchrist County, Florida. The Thomas Farm locality, discovered in 1931, has produced the best known early Miocene
Miocene
The Miocene is a geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about . The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell. Its name comes from the Greek words and and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene...
terrestrial vertebrate fauna east of the Rocky Mountains. This unique site records predator-prey interactions of the coyote-like Metatomarctus
Metatomarctus
Metatomarctus is an extinct genus of Borophaginae and a terrestrial canine which inhabited most of North America during the Early Hemingfordian stage of the Miocene epoch living 23.0—5.3 Mya, existing for approximately -Taxonomy:...
and the ancestral horse, Parahippus
Parahippus
Parahippus is an extinct relative of the modern horse, very similar to Miohippus, but slightly larger, at around tall, at the withers....
, as well as a host of other species, on the margins of an 18 million year-old wooded sinkhole and cave complex. Tens of thousands of fossils have been uncovered during more than 70 years of research at the site, ranging from frogs and bats to rhinoceroses and bears. Olsen’s work on the Thomas Farm Caninae (dog-like carnivores, including Metatomarctus
Metatomarctus
Metatomarctus is an extinct genus of Borophaginae and a terrestrial canine which inhabited most of North America during the Early Hemingfordian stage of the Miocene epoch living 23.0—5.3 Mya, existing for approximately -Taxonomy:...
and the bear-dog, Amphicyon
Amphicyon
Amphicyon is an extinct genus of large carnivorous bone-crushing mammals, known as bear-dogs, of the family Amphicyonidae, subfamily Amphicyoninae, from the Aquitanian Epoch until the Tortonian...
, and their kin) in the late 1950s and early 1960s is regarded as foundational for subsequent studies of those and related species. Olsen’s analysis of the Thomas Farm carnivores not only established him as a vertebrate paleontologist, but also put him in contact with like-minded scholars the world over, including China, where he nurtured contacts that ultimately came to fruition during his many research trips there beginning in 1976.
In 1963, the renowned ornithologist Pierce Brodkorb
Pierce Brodkorb
Pierce Brodkorb , also stated as William Pierce Brodkorb, was an American ornithologist and paleontologist....
honored Olsen’s work by naming the first fossil stork described from the Tertiary of North America after him. The holotype of the ciconiid, Propelargus olseni, is a partial left tarsometatarsus
Tarsometatarsus
The tarsometatarsus is a bone that is found in the lower leg of certain tetrapods, namely birds.It is formed from the fusion of several bones found in other types of animals, and homologous to the mammalian tarsal and metatarsal bones...
discovered by Olsen in August 1961 in Middle Hemingfordian Torreya Formation deposits near Tallahassee and is now in the Florida Museum of Natural History’s Pierce Brodkorb Ornithology Collection (catalog number 8504).
During his tenure at the Florida Geological Survey, Olsen helped pioneer the use of both SCUBA
Scuba set
A scuba set is an independent breathing set that provides a scuba diver with the breathing gas necessary to breathe underwater during scuba diving. It is much used for sport diving and some sorts of work diving....
and helmeted diving equipment to explore the rich underwater fossil deposits of central and north Florida’s rivers and springs. His work with colleagues in the Ichetucknee, Aucilla, and Wacissa rivers and in Wakulla Springs
Wakulla Springs
Wakulla Springs is located south of Tallahassee, Florida and east of Crawfordville in Wakulla County, Florida at the crossroads of State Road 61 and State Road 267...
is especially well known because remains of mammoths and mastodons were found in association with bone and stone artifacts of human manufacture.
His familiarity with SCUBA and a developing interest in the archaeology of the Colonial period U.S. led to Olsen’s appointment by Governor Ferris Bryant as Director of Florida’s Marine Salvage Committee in 1964. The natural conflicts between scientific inquiry and economic gain were poised to play out in 1960s Florida on a massive scale. The Gulf and Atlantic coasts’ abundant shipwrecks were only beginning to be recognized as a resource for both scientific study and financial exploitation and the Salvage Committee’s challenge was to initiate accommodation between these two potentially antithetical goals. Olsen’s work on the Salvage Committee was tangentially responsible for kindling his interest in Colonial European exploitation of domestic animals, a research focus that proved lifelong and best exemplified by his innovative analysis of faunal remains recovered from the Spanish ship Nuestra Señora de Atocha.
While on the staff of the F.G.S., Olsen also began to publish his widely distributed and highly respected comparative osteological manuals for archaeologists. These monographs of the Peabody Museum at Harvard signaled his conscious movement away from a focus on Tertiary
Tertiary
The Tertiary is a deprecated term for a geologic period 65 million to 2.6 million years ago. The Tertiary covered the time span between the superseded Secondary period and the Quaternary...
paleontological assemblages toward Quaternary
Quaternary
The Quaternary Period is the most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the ICS. It follows the Neogene Period, spanning 2.588 ± 0.005 million years ago to the present...
and Holocene
Holocene
The Holocene is a geological epoch which began at the end of the Pleistocene and continues to the present. The Holocene is part of the Quaternary period. Its name comes from the Greek words and , meaning "entirely recent"...
bone accumulations associated with archaeological sites. Under Barbara Lawrence’s influence during his frequent research trips to Harvard in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Olsen began to work more and more closely with archaeologists in their then fledgling attempts to incorporate the analysis and interpretation of animal remains from anthropogenic deposits into the body of traditional archaeological literature.
In 1968, Olsen accepted Hale G. Smith’s invitation to join the faculty of the Department of Anthropology at Florida State University
Florida State University
The Florida State University is a space-grant and sea-grant public university located in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is a comprehensive doctoral research university with medical programs and significant research activity as determined by the Carnegie Foundation...
where he established one of the first zooarchaeology teaching laboratories in the country (along with those at Harvard University, the University of Tennessee, the Field Museum in Chicago, and the University of Florida). Olsen’s transition from the mainly research-oriented environments of museums and the Florida Geological Survey to a broader spectrum academic career is especially noteworthy because he accomplished that feat holding only a high school diploma. Olsen joined the Florida State faculty as a tenured associate professor and was promoted to Full Professor in 1972.
In 1973, Olsen accepted the concurrent positions of Professor of Anthropology at the University of Arizona
University of Arizona
The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...
and Curator of Zooarchaeology in the Arizona State Museum
Arizona State Museum
The Arizona State Museum , founded in 1893, was originally a repository for the collection and protection of archaeological resources. Today, however, ASM stores artifacts, exhibits them and provides education and research opportunities. It was formed by authority of the Territorial Legislature...
in Tucson, which he held until his retirement in 1997.
While in Arizona, Olsen focused his work on elucidating evidence for the domestication of a number of vertebrate species, especially the dog, camel, and yak.
During his half-century professional career, Olsen conducted paleontological and zooarchaeological fieldwork in the U.S., Canada, Colombia, Belize, China, Tibet, India, Italy, Cyprus, and Nepal and worked extensively with museum collections in Great Britain, Russia, Egypt, and Sweden as well as the United States.
The Arizona State Museum’s comparative vertebrate skeletal collections are housed in the Stanley J. Olsen Laboratory of Zooarchaeology, and the Stanley J. Olsen Zooarchaeology Endowment Fund was created at the University of Arizona in 2004 to recognize his contributions to the field.
Memberships and Scholarly Service
Stanley Olsen was a member of the Society of Vertebrate PaleontologySociety of Vertebrate Paleontology
The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology was founded in 1940 for individuals with an interest in vertebrate paleontology. SVP now has almost 2,000 members. The society's website states that SVP "is organized exclusively for educational and scientific purposes...
, the Society for American Archaeology
Society for American Archaeology
The Society for American Archaeology is the largest organization of professional archaeologists of the Americas in the world. The Society was founded in 1934 and today has over 7000 members. The Society holds an annual conference and publishes the flagship journal of American archaeology,...
, the Society of the Sigma Xi
Sigma Xi
Sigma Xi: The Scientific Research Society is a non-profit honor society which was founded in 1886 at Cornell University by a junior faculty member and a handful of graduate students. Members elect others on the basis of their research achievements or potential...
, the Society of Mammalogists, and the American Society of Systematic Zoologists. He was a Fellow of both the Explorers Club and the Company of Military Historians. He served as the 26th President of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology
Society of Vertebrate Paleontology
The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology was founded in 1940 for individuals with an interest in vertebrate paleontology. SVP now has almost 2,000 members. The society's website states that SVP "is organized exclusively for educational and scientific purposes...
in 1965-1966 and was elected an Honorary Member in 1996 (the 50th anniversary of his joining the Society) in recognition of Olsen’s distinguished contributions to the discipline of vertebrate paleontology.
Selected publications
- 1956 "The Caninae of the Thomas Farm Miocene", Breviora 66: 1-12, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University.
- 1958 "The fossil carnivore Amphicyon intermedius from the Thomas Farm Miocene, Part 1, Skull and Dentition", Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University 116(4): 157-172.
- 1959 "Fossil mammals of Florida", Florida Geological Survey Special Publication Number 6, Tallahassee.
- 1960 "Postcranial skeletal characters of Bison and Bos", Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University 35(4).
- 1964 "Mammal remains from archaeological sites, Part I, Southeastern and Southwestern United States", Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University 56(1).
- 1968 "Fish, amphibian, and reptile remains from archaeological sites, Part I, Southeastern and Southwestern United States", Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University 56(2).
- 1972 "Osteology for the archaeologist, 3, the American mastodon and woolly mammoth", Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University 56(3).
- 1972 "Osteology for the archaeologist, 4, North American birds", Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University 56(4).
- 1985 Origins of the Domestic Dog. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
- 1990 "Fossil ancestry of the yak, its cultural significance, and domestication in Tibet", Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 142: 73-100.
- 1994 "The Asian elephant, Elephas maximus, and Chinese culture", Explorer’s Journal 72(1): 30-35.