More than 80 million years ago, the area around Luxapalila Creek in East Columbus was covered by an ancient estuary, teeming with prehistoric life.
A public fossil park along the Luxapalila Creek in Propst Park aims to shed some light on that history, offering visitors the chance to uncover fossils firsthand.
On Tuesday, a group of city officials, paleontologists and local fossil enthusiasts received the green light from the city council to move forward with applying for grants to fund the project.
“Highlighting the importance of our geological heritage through the fossil park’s preservation will create lasting educational experiences for future generations while ensuring its ongoing contribution to our community’s economy,” Recreation Director Greg Lewis told the council.
Local historian Rufus Ward first floated the idea of a fossil park along the Luxapalila in 2016 in a column published in The Dispatch, but it never materialized. Interest picked up again in 2022 when bones of two new dinosaurs, called ornithomimosaurs, were found along the Luxapalila.
“They turned out to be from a rare ostrich-mimicking dinosaur,” Ward said.
George Phillips, paleontology curator at the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science, said the fossils found at the site go far beyond only dinosaur bones. The sediments at the creek date back about 80 million years ago to the Cretaceous Period, but the area looked a lot different then, Phillips said.
“In these sediments and in the fossils associated with them, we envision an estuary behind a barrier island complex,” Phillips said. “So just within the stretch of Luxapalila Creek, from its mouth we have buried barrier island environments, and then at Propst Park, we have the estuary environments.”
The result, Phillips said, is a deposit full of fossils from different types of environments. Fossils found at the creek include everything from shark teeth to shells, crabs, reptile bones and plant remains.
“Most people can go down there right now and just scratch at the banks and find something,” Phillips said.
Planning and development
City Grant Writer and Administrator Susan Wilder expects the project to cost roughly $500,000 in total. The group has already received $2,000 from the Billups Garth Foundation to go toward development, and Wilder said she’s preparing to apply for more grants.
If all goes to plan, funds will support making the park more accessible, adding concrete steps where the terrain can be hard to navigate.
There will also be an education pavilion built, which will cost between $100,000 and $150,000, Wilder estimated.
“Our dream plan is being drawn up by the engineers at Neel-Schaffer,” she said. “We’re going to include our dreams, and if we have to back down from there, we will.”
The fossil park will start in the southeast corner of Propst Park on city property, where the disc golf course meets the creek, and run adjacent to the Luxapalila. North of the disc golf course and up the creek, the best fossil formations for digging are currently located on private land.
Wilder said the city is in negotiations to purchase roughly 34 acres running along both sides of the creek, allowing for the fossil sites and possibly a parking lot on the east side of the creek. The price of the property hasn’t been determined yet, she said.
Wilder said the largest expense will be signage, brochures and other educational materials, along with dinosaur statues. There will also be recreational components, aside from digging for fossils, that visitors can enjoy, she said.
“We intend to have what we’ll call a wilderness trail,” Wilder said. “It will have some signage, like a timeline, as you walk through it (about) how all this formed back then, what it looked like and what kind of animals were in (the area).”
There’s also talk of adding a canoe landing on the creek, though no concrete plans have been made for it yet, she said.
‘The type of project a city loves to have’
The project also has potential to influence tourism in Columbus, Mayor Keith Gaskin said, calling the fossil park “the type of project a city loves to have.”
“It’s something that’s unique and different, and there are a lot of people who enjoy fossil hunting all across the country,” Gaskin told The Dispatch. “So we feel that it could have a big impact on tourism.”
Gaskin believes it could also help the return of Propst Park to its glory days as the city continues $3.4 million worth of updates at the park.
Lewis said the fossil park will draw visitors but also provide another activity for people who are already there.
“It’s a no-brainer that when people come to the park to play ball or when we have tournaments … that’s (something else for visitors to do),” he said. “Walk through the park, and you can dig fossils. … It’s an added amenity.”
Ward said there will be booklets at the park to help diggers identify what they’ve found before they take their fossils home. In the case that someone finds something significant, like a rare dinosaur bone, Phillips said the park will rely on the honor system.
“We hope that anybody that finds something significant would donate it,” he said. “That’s always the goal. Then we would make a reproduction of it and give it to them.”
McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.
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