Dave's Down To Earth Rock Shop and Prehistoric Life Museum

[Nimravis]

Today I took a quick ride to the small suburb of Evanston, right out side of Chicago. This is the home of Dave's Down To Earth Rock Shop and Prehistoric Life Museum. If memory serves me correct, Dave's has been in Evanston for the past 40+ years and it is a family owned business. Dave's recently moved to it's new home on Main Street and if you every get a chance to be in the Chicago area, this is a must see- you will definitely not be disappointed. From the outside, you would not believe that this store has a museum that houses such a great variety of fossil life and the most extensive collection / variety of Mazon Creek fauna that I have ever seen, including 3 Holotype Mazon Creek fossils named after Dave and his parents who found them. 

 

 

 

Here are some overview pictures of the Museum.

 

 

 

Here are some overview of the various displays.

 

 

 

 

[Nimravis]

Here are some larger file size pics of individual fossils.

 

[Bobby Rico]

1 hour ago, Nimravis said:

Today I took a quick ride to the small suburb of Evanston, right out side of Chicago. This is the home of Dave's Down To Earth Rock Shop and Prehistoric Life Museum. If memory serves me correct, Dave's has been in Evanston for the past 40+ years and it is a family owned business. Dave's recently moved to it's new home on Main Street and if you every get a chance to be in the Chicago area,

Paradise. I wish I had known about this last year when I was visiting Sue. 

[Nimravis]

[Nimravis]

Dinosaur :

 

[RJB]

  Amazing how much high quality stuff they have!!!   A very nice rock shop for sure!!! 

 

RB

[Nimravis]

[Nimravis]

Oligocene Mammals:

 

[Nimravis]

Trilobites:

 

[Nimravis]

[Nimravis]

[Nimravis]

[Nimravis]

Here are some other items in the Museum :

 

 

 

[Nimravis]

 

More Trilobites:

 

 

[Nimravis]

Besides the Museum, the shop also sells a variety of minerals, artifacts an of course fossils:

 

 

 

I have not been here in years and I was so happy that I stopped by, I had a great time looking at all of the fossils.

[Macrophyseter]

I've known the online shop for awhile, but I never realized that the online shop is tiny compared to the actual Chicago shop. The museum too looks fascinating, mostly because it seems to house so many small or not-so-big fossils rather than a few skeletons, most of them very rare and even some holotypes, all in a building that looks like someone's home. Must have been great for a fossil collector to own a few holotypes even have a few species named after him too 

[Nimravis]

4 minutes ago, Macrophyseter said:

I've known the online shop for awhile, but I never realized that the online shop is tiny compared to the actual Chicago shop. The museum too looks fascinating, mostly because it seems to house so many small or not-so-big fossils rather than a few skeletons, most of them very rare and even some holotypes, all in a building that looks like someone's home. Must have been great for a fossil collector to own a few holotypes even have a few species named after him too 

(Holotypes) Even better when you actually found them, as they did.

[Wrangellian]

Wow... Some impressive things in there.

I was going to ask, a small time hole in the wall like that is allowed to have holotypes? The people I deal with say the pro's won't describe a new fossil if the specimen doesn't go into a major institution like a State or Provincial museum or Uni. But after browsing the pics, this looks like a pretty major museum in itself!

@Bobby Rico and others who do it - you don't need to hit 'Reply' if your post is going directly beneath the post you're replying to! Esp. when it's picture-heavy (lot more scrolling to do, know what I mean?)

[Bobby Rico]

40 minutes ago, Wrangellian said:

 

Thanks for the advice. Still learning.

[caldigger]

Wow Ralph that certainly looks funnier than a day at Disneyland (actually, I'm sure it is).  I kind of feel sorry for Dave, it must be very expensive to have to employ a full time staff to continuously mop the floors from all the drool. Very nice pictorial tour! I'm thinking a definate "must" for any visits to the Chicago area. Thank you for the post.

[Malcolmt]

Wow... what incredible pictures.... thankyou so much for sharing..... Better than most major museum public collections I've seen....

 

Anything but a small time hole in the wall.. looks like a life time of collecting and sharing what they found....

[wamorris1999]

 what an amazing place! where is it?

[Nimravis]

 

1 hour ago, wamorris1999 said:

 what an amazing place! where is it?

The first suburb North of Chicago- Evanston, Illinois.

2 hours ago, caldigger said:

Wow Ralph that certainly looks funnier than a day at Disneyland (actually, I'm sure it is).  I kind of feel sorry for Dave, it must be very expensive to have to employ a full time staff to continuously mop the floors from all the drool. Very nice pictorial tour! I'm thinking a definate "must" for any visits to the Chicago area. Thank you for the post.

Glad you liked it Doren.

[Nimravis]

1 hour ago, Wrangellian said:

Wow... Some impressive things in there.

I was going to ask, a small time hole in the wall like that is allowed to have holotypes? The people I deal with say the pro's won't describe a new fossil if the specimen doesn't go into a major institution like a State or Provincial museum or Uni. But after browsing the pics, this looks like a pretty major museum in itself!

@Bobby Rico and others who do it - you don't need to hit 'Reply' if your post is going directly beneath the post you're replying to! Esp. when it's picture-heavy (lot more scrolling to do, know what I mean?)

I believe that these were found in the late 60's / early 70's. On a routine basis collectors would bring their finds to The Field Museum and Dr. Eugene Richardson would go through their finds of unusual fauna and sometimes come across new ones. Others like Gordon Baird, Dave Bardack, Rainer Zangerl, Jarmila Kukalova-Peck, etc. would also review these finds at the Field or they were sent to them.

[StevenJD]

Nice photos!  I went in to Dave's today as well.  Awesome Mazon collection for sure.