GREAT FOSSIL COLLECTIONS IN THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA FROM THE LATE PALEOZOIC AND PLEISTOCENE OF WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA, EASTERN OHIO, NORTHERN WEST VIRGINIA, AND WESTERN MARYLAND

The Late Paleozoic bedrock of western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, northern West Virginia, and eastern Maryland are noted for having a diverse fossil assemblage of invertebrates, vertebrates, and ichnogenera. In addition, vertebrate fossils and a fossil soil horizon from the late Wisconsian Stage of the Pleistocene Epoch are prominent in the collections of the Section of Invertebrate Paleontology and Section of Vertebrate Paleontology of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History (CMNH) in Pittsburgh. Since 1835, more than 84 publications have described new primary types and figured invertebrate taxon, a diverse vertebrate collection of tetrapods and fish remains, three ichnogenera that includes two trackways and vertebrate footprints, and a single paleosol. Of the 84 publications, the faunas are represented by 12 publications from the late Devonian, nine from the late Mississippian, 56 from the Pennsylvanian, five from the early Permian, and two from the Pleistocene Wisconsian Stage. There are two Pennsylvanian age holotype fossils on exhibition in the CMNH’s Benedum Hall of Geology, the eurypterid Palmichnium kosinskiorum collected from Elk County, Pennsylvania, and the amphibian Fedexia striegeli, collected from Moon Twp., Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. A review of some of the reports of the fossil fauna from the region include: North America’s first described Pennsylvanian marine invertebrates, in 1835; vertebrates from the Pennsylvanian Pittsburgh redbeds, in 1907; Pleistocene vertebrates, in 1908; a giant eurypterid trackway, collected in 1948; fossil fishes from the Pennsylvanian Duquesne limestone, in 1970; Ophiuroid from the Conemaugh Group, in 1978; Appalachian Carboniferous Trilobites, in 1988; the Mississippian brachiopod, Phyricodothyris, in 2008; the articulated skull of the Pennsylvanian amphibian Fedexia, in 2011; late Mississippian Loyalhanna marine fauna, in 2022; and a paleosol and mastodon remains from a Wisconsian bog, in 2022.