Mount Saint Peter
Around 1765 the skull of a "Mosasaurus" was discovered here in a limestone quarry, one of the first recognised reptile fossils, which was later acquired by the Teylers Museum in Haarlem. A more famous "Mosasaurus" fossil was found between 1770 and 1774 but was confiscated by the French in 1794 and is now in the Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle in Paris. Later dinosaur remains were discovered here as well, belonging to "Betasuchus" and "Orthomerus", as well as turtles and fossils of smaller creatures of the sea.
Paleontology in Connecticut
In 1818, Solomon Ellsworth Jr. was blasting a well in East Windsor and uncovered some fossil bones about 18 feet under the surface of the rock. These are the first scientifically verified dinosaur bones discovered in North America. Two years later, Nathan Smith reported the fossils Ellsworth discovered to the "American Journal of Science", interpreting the fossils as human remains. In 1823 Professor Edward Hitchcock published research on Connecticut's fossil plants. In 1848 he wrote about the local tracks. By 1858, 38 different dinosaur track-bearing quarries were known in Connecticut but few additional finds would be made until the 1960s.