Science Biography: Mary Anning

   Have you ever heard the tongue twister "She sells sea shells by the sea shore?"  If you have, I'm pretty sure you didn't know it is about a girl who lived in the 1800s named Mary Anning.  Those "sea shells" in the tongue twister were actually fossils that Mary Anning sold in her fossil shop.  That "sea shore" is the rocky coastline of Lyme Regis, England, the town where Mary Anning was born and where she made many important scientific fossil discoveries. 

   Mary Anning's father was a carpenter who added to his income by fossil hunting along Lyme Regis' rocky cliffs and beaches.  When Mary was a few years old, she started going fossil hunting with him.  They found lots of ammonites and plant fossils from the Jurassic period.  Sadly, when Mary was eleven years old, tragedy struck her family.  Her father was out fossil hunting when he slipped and fell off a cliff to the bottom and died.  Mary then took up her father's fossil hunting job to make money for her family.

   A few months after she took on the job, Mary made an extraordinary scientific find - the fossilized remains of a strange creature that no one else had ever seen.  She named the creature ichthyosaur, a name she invented herself.  She sold it to a museum for enough money to feed her family for half a year.  Little did she know that this was only the first of her great finds.

   She bought a store where she could display and sell her fossils.  Mary soon made two more fascinating discoveries:  a plesisaur and a pterodactyl, both of which were new to science.  Because of Mary's amazing fossil finds, many famous scientists came on fossil hunts with her.  One of these people was the man who invented the word dinosaur.  

   Mary Anning would continue her paleontological searches into her forties until she got breast cancer and died.  She was a pioneering woman scientist.  Hardly any women were scientists in the 1800s.  At a time when most women weren't encouraged to get an education, Mary taught herself and helped to establish the field of paleontology.  Sadly, most of her finds ended up in museums and personal collections without Mary getting any of the credit for them, maybe because of her gender and social status.

   If you want to know more about her, I would recommend these books that I read:  Rare Treasure:  Mary Anning and Her Remarkable Discoveries by Don Brown, Mary Anning and the Sea Dragon by Jeannine Atkins, and Chapter Five in the book The Kid Who Named Pluto and the Stories of Other Extraordinary Young People in Science by Marc McCutcheon ("The Curious Girl Who Discovered Sea-Monster Skeletons").  On Google Earth, you can visit Sidmouth Beach near Lyme Regis where Mary Anning explored the rocks.  Here you can find The Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site. Even today, you can still find lots of ammonites and plant fossils on the cliffs and beaches.  Check out this video below!

Mysterious Mysteries!

 In my genre studies in December, I read The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  It is about a detective named Sherlock Holmes who solves mysteries with his assistant Mr. Watson.  My favorite of the mysteries was the Case of the Six Napoleons, which was funny because a man was smashing plaster busts of Napoleon to find a stolen black pearl.  After I finished the book, my mom said my next project would be to try and write my own mystery story.  It took me the entire month of January!  In my mystery that follows, The Case of The Triangular Book, I used detectives, witnesses, a secret, a crime, and one red herring.  It is all about a detective named Alex Sampson, who is asked to find a stolen book.  He finds not only the book, but a surprising secret.  In the process of writing this, I developed a greater respect for the people who are professional mystery writers.  It is challenging to reconstruct a crime and tie up all the loose ends at the conclusion of a mystery!  Hope you enjoy my story! (And thanks to Mom for typing this story up for me!)

The Case of the Triangular Book: Chapter 1: The Case

  Alex Sampson is great at solving mysteries.  Last year, someone stole a gold bracelet from a friend of his.  The thief was very clumsy and left behind a butter knife.  Alex took the knife to the maker and the knife maker said he sold the knife to a man named John Ringhorn.  Alex went to the Ringhorn's house and found the bracelet on his dresser.  Ringhorn was thrown in jail and Alex's friend got her bracelet back.  After that incident, Alex opened the Alex Sampson Detective Agency.  He has had many cases since then, and all were successfully solved.

   I have known Alex for many years.  He is very humorous.  He can be so funny that I lose track of what I am doing.  We hadn't been on a good case in awhile.  Our last case had been about finding some stolen flower bulbs.  It turned out that the bulbs were two cabinets over from where the man had left them.  Then we got lucky.  The owners of Fare Well Estate came to the Alex Sampson Detective Agency.  They looked very worried about something.  The Sarquets had never had anyone break into Fare Well because they had the highest of high security in all of Virginia.

   Alex looked up from behind the desk where he was sitting and said, "What a lovely surprise!  Not in a million years would I have expected to see such wonderful clients.  I would be honored to assist you.  What case do you need me to solve?"   Ms. Sarquet was the first to speak.  "Last night, I awoke to find that someone was sticking a knife in our lock to our private library.  I sleepily tried to pinch myself and I must have missed because I didn't feel a thing.  Very tired, I went back to sleep."  Mr. Sarquet added, "I awoke about an hour later to a loud crash coming from our library.  My wife Lura here was already sitting on the bed.  We clambered out and rushed to the library.  One of the book shelves was overturned and shattered, books littered the floor,and there was no glass in one panel of the skylight.  The knife she told you about earlier was near the entrance, and a man with a triangular book poking out of his backpack was disappearing through the skylight.  I suddenly realized that the book that the man had stolen was an heirloom that had been passed down through the family for generations.  The book was called The Castle Under the House.  Can you come over tomorrow to investigate?"

   "Should my assistant Harrison and I come over at 11:00 tomorrow morning?"  Alex asked.  "Yes, that would be perfect.  Hampton and I will meet you at the house at 11:00.  Remember, Fare Well is at the top of Glen Hill.  Bye!,"  Lura Sarquet said as she and her husband, Hampton, left.  "Harrison, why don't we get some sleep?  It's very late," Alex said to me.  "Okay," I said. "Bye!"

   The next day we drove our car out to Fare Well and rang the door bell.  We entered and the Sarquest ushered us to the library where we examined the damage.  It was as they told us:  books and things everywhere.  We put on some gloves, cleared a table, and got to work.  We picked up the knife and laid it on the table cautiously.  The knife was gorgeous. The hilt was gold and the blade was ruby.  It was more a dagger than a knife.  We dusted the dagger with dust that sticks to fingerprints.  There were none.  The robber must have used gloves.  To my astonishment, Alex picked  it up and swung it at a book on the floor.  The book sliced cleanly in half.  Then he threw it at the stone wall.  The blade went right into the wall and stuck there.  Then Alex swung the flat side of the knife right at the table.  The ruby dagger gave a slight ping and showed no sign of damage at all.  "Harrison," Alex said to me, "Hold onto this.  There's something very odd going on.  Next let's check out that skylight."

   We were on the roof in no time, examining the skylight.  The dagger was in my pocket, wrapped in paper so that it didn't poke me.  Alex had gloves on his hands as he put his head into the hole and kept himself from falling by holding onto the glass.  I walked to the edge of the roof and was looking at the pool near the side of the house two stories below.  It was a very hot summer day and I was starting to think about walking down to the pool to go for a swim.  Suddenly Alex yelled, "Oh my gosh!  This glass was melted!"  I turned to face him, but suddenly Alex lost his grip on the glass and fell head first through the hole. I started to run towards the hole, but I tripped on a triangular object and sent it skidding through the hole with Alex.  I fell backwards off the roof.  I plummeted toward the brick patio and toward my grave...

Chapter 2: Secret Ways

  SPLASH!  I missed the patio by inches and landed in the deep end of the pool, which I guessed must be at least fifteen feet deep.  I was surprised to be alive.  I resurfaced to find Alex reading a triangular book. Hooray, I thought, Alex is alive!  He was reading the same book I tripped on.  There is something strange about the book.  Well, lots can be strange about a triangular book.  The name, though, is odd...The Castle Under The House, I whisper.  Then it hits me.  The name....it's the stolen book!  But how did Alex survive, I wondered.  "Don't worry, Harrison.  I landed on the couch.  Did you go feet first into the water?," Alex asked.  "Y-y-yes.  T-t-that pool is v-very, very c-c-cold!," I replied.  "Let's go talk to the Sarquets and get out of this odd place," Alex said.  "There's a towel over there.  Why don't you dry off?"

   "How does your search go, Alex?," Ms. Sarquet asked in the hall.  "I see your assistant went for a swim."  "You know that hole in the skylight?  Someone blow torched that hole,"  Alex stated.  "Really? That glass should be indestructible," Ms. Sarquet said as Alex started to lean on the wall.  "He - and I'm certain it's a he - didn't just push out the glass in the..."  Alex didn't finish because suddenly the wall he was leaning on opened and he fell through a crack.  That was followed by the breaking of wooden steps and loud whacks and thuds.  Then the noise stopped, accompanied by an "Ow!  Why was that sliding wall there?" "Oh, are you alright?," Ms. Sarquet worriedly asked.  "I didn't know that passageway was even there!"

   "I'm alright, Ms. Sarquet," Alex answered.  Mr. Sarquet joined us as we entered the secret passageway cautiously.  The Sarquets and I occasionally picked up a piece of broken step and tossed it over the edge of the stairs to see how far down we had to go.  Very far.  The only light was behind us, coming from the secret passage entrance into Fare Well.  It was almost gone by the time we reached the hundredth step (yes, I was counting).  Suddenly, Alex's joking voice was right in front of me.  "Welcome!  You have reached the ground floor!  Watch your step.  There is lots of junk down here."  It was so dark that I couldn't see a thing.  Then Alex announced, "When I was in the library, I picked up this flashlight."  This was followed by lots of banging and clicking from what I guessed was the flashlight.  "Turn on, you stupid thing!," Alex yelled as he hit it on the railing.  "Turn on, dang it!  Why won't you turn on?  There we go."  We were blinded by a sudden light.

   Alex then said, "I found The Castle Under the House book and I read some of it.  It mentioned a Fare Well Castle that sank into the ground and then was covered up with sediment to form a hill.  Glen Hill.  then, in the past two centuries, someone built a house on that hill:  Fare Well Estate.  Now, there is a rumor that the castle contained gold, lots of gold.  I read this as well.  From my knowledge, I remember that the last owners died by poison as they ate dinner.  You did that, if I am correct, Mr. and Ms. Sarquet, so that you could buy this house and get to the castle.  That door over there probably leads to it.  Looks like someone has been here already."

   Alex pointed calmly to toward a door that had been cut from its hinges that I hadn't noticed until now.  "Yes, we did. Alex, you are very, very smart.  You would probably want us to come with you to the police and turn ourselves in, but you'll never get that chance, Alex.  Good-bye," Mr. Sarquet said as he took out a pistol and loaded it.  "Good-bye."  Then there was a bang, and Alex fell to the ground.

Chapter 3: The Culprits

  I grabbed Alex's flashlight and ran through the doorway.  It led to what I guessed was the dining hall of the castle.  It was magnificent, with gold plates, tables, chairs, forks, spoons, knives, and goblets, but something was wrong.  Parts of the tables and chairs had been chipped away and some of the plates and goblets were missing.  I had just spotted someone taking a fork when another shot was fired.  A third shot was fired and imbedded itself in the wooden beam three inches from my head.

  I dropped the flashlight and ran for the door.  I was almost out when I saw that the fork stealer, Mr. and Ms. Sarquet all had guns and were shooting at each other.  There was a bang and the fork stealer went down.  BANG! BANG!  Both of the Sarquets began shooting at me!  One of the bullets hit the support beam above the door making the doorway collapse and the second bullet hit me in the thigh with a loud ping.  Then I realized that the ruby dagger was in my pocket and the bullet must have hit it!  I took out the dagger and the paper I wrapped it in had shrapnel stuck in it.  I unwrapped the dagger to find it unharmed.  Next I was forced into the stone wall by someone.  The dagger sank into the wall until only the hilt was visible. 

   Then a voice that sounded strangely like Alex's said "Cut the wall, or we'll be stuck here forever with the Sarquets!"  I did as Alex said and, with the dagger, cut easily through the wall and stepped inside.  I turned around to see Alex clambering through the hole behind me.  That voice I had heard was Alex's voice.  "What?  How did you live?" I stammered, but Alex hushed me up.  We started up the stairs behind the wall right about the same time as the castle started to collapse.

   We were running so fast that we were at the top of the steps in no time.  Alex and I dashed out of the house and saw half of the hill start to fall away, taking our car with it. How bad could our luck get?   Suddenly I noticed that Alex was dragging me to the Sarquets' red sports car.  He took The Castle Under the House book out of his inside coat pocket.  "They left their keys in here," he said as he unlocked their car and took the driver's seat and I took the passenger's seat.

   Alex put the car in drive and spun the car around and we headed down the hill.  We drove as the hill crumbled down behind us.  We drove straight for the police station and parked right in front.  Before we entered, Alex began to explain what had happened.  "You probably want an explanation.  The robber took the book and read part of it on the roof, then left it there so it didn't get wet when he jumped into the pool to escape.  Now, before he got on the roof he moved the book shelf into a position to blow torch the surprisingly thin 1/8" thick Crato Glass which the Sarquets invented that cannot be broken - but it has a melting point of 150 degrees F.  Now the man who moved the book shelf had to be strong and the man by the gold table who stole the fork was very strong judging by the size of his muscles and the heavy bag that he was carrying that was full of gold."

   "So Fork Stealer did it!," I exclaimed.  "Go on, continue Alex."  "Okay, Harrison. The Sarquets admitting to the murder of the previous owners of Fare Well was a shock...What have I left out?  Oh yes!  How I so bravely cheated death!  At the same time Mr. Sarquet fired the gun, I tripped on a stone and fell.  You took my flashlight and ran away like a maniac and then the Sarquets followed you.  I got up and ran after you, but you kept running, and I finally ran into you once you stopped near the wall and that's where I rejoined you,"  Alex concluded.

   "Yes.  Hey Alex, what part of The Castle Under the House do you think Fork Stealer read?,"  I asked.  "I believe he read the part about the passageway under the house," he said.  "Now Harrison, we will never know how the Sarquets got the book because when you cut through the wall you also cut through a major support beam that brought down the part of the house that the Sarquets and Fork Stealer were in, likely killing them.  The Sarquets took the answer of where they got the book to their graves."

   "Before I conclude this mystery, I must say that your ruby dagger is enchanted.  Yes, enchanted.  No ordinary dagger could cut through solid stone.  Your dagger must be magical.  There is no other explanation, Harrison.  The fork stealer tried to steal that knife from the Sarquets and used it to break into their library and that's where he found The Castle Under the House book.  He thought it was valuable and could possibly sell it.  He dropped the dagger, the item he came for, to move the book shelf in order to blow torch the glass.  After he made the hole he put the blow torch into his back pack with the book.  He then accidentally knocked over the book shelf, forcing him to jump off the shelf as it fell and through the skylight, unfortunately leaving behind the knife," Alex finished.

   We went inside the police station and I looked out the window to see the ruins of Glen Hill.  I noticed that people were now gathering by the remains and staring and pointing.  To think that I has caused Glen Hill and Fare Well Estate to collapse was crazy, but true.  I had never hurt anyone and now I was responsible for the deaths of two people, Mr. and Ms. Sarquet.  I will have to live with that guilt, but on the bright side, the case was solved successfully.