FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Feb. 25, 2013
Contact: Wandra Brooks Green
816-235-1601
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – A vast shallow sea teeming with primitive forms of life…
Kansas City has come a long way since those days – about 300 million years or so – but it’s still a thrill to look back at our geological record from different ages. The Kansas City area was an inland sea in a tropical clime, a swampy lowland, a coastal region, a rainforest and a glacier. All this information is contained in rock and fossil remains that survived the changes until their discovery more than 100 years ago.
These clues to our past and other historic evidence can be seen in an exhibit entitled “Kansas City Millions of Years Ago: What the Rock Record Tells Us.” Housed in the Box Gallery at Commerce Bank, 1000 Walnut Street, the show will open with a reception on Friday, March 1, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Dr. Richard Gentile, professor emeritus at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and curator of the UMKC Geosciences Museum, will be on hand to welcome guests. Gallery hours are 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
The show, running until April 26, consists of local specimens and painted panels illustrating the environments and landscapes whose creatures and vegetation were entombed in Kansas City’s substrata. On Tuesday, April 9th, at the Central Kansas City Public Library, 14 West 10th Street, Dr. Gentile will lecture on interpreting the fossilized evidence that surrounds us. A reception at 6:00 p.m. will precede the 6:30 p.m. program.
Those who visit the Box Gallery on Tuesday, March 12 or Wednesday, March 20, may enjoy a personal tour conducted by Dr. Gentile. Tours begin at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. both days.
Gentile, a UMKC geology professor from 1966 to 1999, is the author of Rocks and Fossils of the Central United States with Special Emphasis on the Greater Kansas City Area, published by the University of Kansas Press. He describes the fossil finds he and others have made when highways are dug, buildings are excavated or river beds shift. As proof of the presence of fossils in our midst, in 1928 a perfectly preserved mastodon molar was uncovered from an excavation on the Country Club Plaza.
For more information, please contact Box Gallery director Robin Trafton by calling 816-760-7885, emailing TheBoxGallery@towerproperties.com or visit the gallery website.
About the University of Missouri-Kansas City
The University of Missouri-Kansas City, one of four University of Missouri campuses, is a public university serving more than 15,000 undergraduate, graduate and professional students, and celebrating its 80th anniversary in 2013. UMKC engages with the community and economy based on a four-part mission: life and health sciences; visual and performing arts; urban issues and education; and a vibrant learning and campus life experience. For more information about UMKC, visit www.umkc.edu. You can also find us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter and watch us on YouTube.
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This information is available to people with speech or hearing impairments by calling Relay Missouri at (800) 735-2966 (TT) or (800) 735-2466 (voice).