Yours for a million bucks — Misty the dinosaur

In the world of collectables there is arguably nothing more exciting than the discovery and acquisition of something very old and very rare. 

English Auctioneer James Rylands, who is married to Bermudian Jen Cox, has been successful on both counts. In the art and antiquities business for three decades now, his latest find is undoubtedly his most important.

“We have a dinosaur — a diplodocus,” says Rylands, who has always loved fossils has sold everything from Siberian cave bears, to Mammouth tusks — and now a wonderful dinosaur named ‘Misty’.

“It’s an amazing story, how she was discovered,” he enthuses. 

While famed paleontologist Raimund Albersdoerfer was excavating a well known dinosaur site in Wyoming, his children announced that they too would like a crack at archeological digs. Albersdoerfer directed them to what he thought was an inconsequential site until several hours later the children came back with reports of something quite profound: Big bones too heavy for them to carry. Amazed at that their improbable find and wondering what else might be there Albersdoerfer named the area ‘Mystery Quarry’ and the dinosaur found there, ‘Mystery’ or ‘Misty’ for short.

Diplodocus lived 150 years ago and was the largest creature to ever walk the earth. It is easily recognizable by the public because of its long neck and tail. Measuring 115 ft with four sturdy legs it was gargantuan. 

‘Misty’ will go on sale  on November 27 at Summers Place Auctions in West Sussex, England.  Rylands, formerly a director of Sotheby’s Auction House, now runs the West Sussex  operation with his business partner  Rupert van der Werff.

Rylands explains what makes Misty so special: “It’s 40% intact; this is a good percentage to have, bearing in mind that if a dino has 60% of its original material, it is deemed complete. The reason the vast majority are so incomplete is that corpses were often scavenged by other dinos. Also, many dinos  died in swamps which later became riverbeds and bones were washed away,” he says.

Full-sized dinosaur skeletons are very rare. “to put it into perspective,” Mr  Rylands says, “the Diplodocus in London’s Natural History Museum is a plaster copy donated by Andrew Carnegie; He donated a composite diplo skeleton made up of two different dinos to the Carnegie Museum of Natural  History in Pittsburgh. He then had six plastercasts made which he gave to various museums around the world. If you Google Diplodocus, you will see a list of museums around the world, the majority of which have replicas.” 

But Rylands has an original. 

Although one of the most massive creatures to have ever roamed our earth, the diplodocus was a vegetarian and never quite gained the cache of its famous carnivorous cousin, Tyrannosauros rex. That might explain why the best preserved T-Rex sold for an astounding $7.6 million in 1997. 

Why T-Rex rules

“T-Rex will always be the king,” says Mr Rylands: “The main reason is that he is everyone’s idea of THE dinosaur and it’s mainly because of his reputation as a ferocious carnivore. Obviously this reputation was enhanced by the movie Jurassic Park.”

Misty is expected to attract bids upwards of a million dollars.

The question is, who will buy her?

“It’s probably going to be someone over in the emerging countries of the Far East where they are creating new museums etc... A shopping mall is also a big possibility,” says Mr Rylands. 

“If it was bought by a private individual for his house, I’d be delighted!”