The Field Museum has added a new fossil to its collection, calling it the museum’s most important fossil acquisition since Sue the T. rex. An Archaeopteryx, it has feathers, hollow bones, a long tail and 50 teeth — and is the earliest known avian dinosaur, a link between dinosaurs and modern birds.
The fossil was unveiled at an event Monday attended by Mayor Brandon Johnson and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle. It will go on display to the public on Tuesday, accompanied by a hologram-like projection showing how the Archaeopteryx would have looked in life.
It’s one of two Archaeopteryx specimens in the United States — and only a dozen others have been found. This fossil was discovered in southern Germany before 1990 and arrived at the museum in 2022. For those wondering if the fossil will be given a name, like Sue (maybe Archie?), the Field says it already has one: All Archaeopteryx specimens are named after the city in which they reside, so this one is called the Chicago Archaeopteryx.
This isn’t the first time an Archaeopteryx (pronounced ar-key-AHP-ter-icks, meaning “ancient wing”) has been on display at the Field Museum. In 1997, the Museum hosted the first exhibit outside of Europe when there were only six such fossils. Now, however, the Field Museum can claim the fossil as part of its permanent collection.
According to a museum statement, the Archaeopteryx lived about 150 million years ago, during the late Jurassic period, much earlier than the T. rex. Rather than being the ancestor of modern birds, it’s part of a group of species that includes birds. Field dinosaur curator Jingmai O’Connor says that it could fly, but not very well.
It will be on view until the Museum’s Dinopalooza event on June 8. Then it will be removed to prepare a permanent, immersive exhibition, due to open in the fall.
This story is updating.
