I like dinosaurs. A lot. Their bones were what first inspired me to start asking questions about the past and, many years later, set me on a path of professionally puzzling over prehistory. But I can’t give all the credit to fantastic saurians.

Mammals have always been part of my ancient education, even when they were shadows of the Cenozoic that I overlooked in favor of Apatosaurus and company. Plastic effigies of Uintatherium were stashed inside plastic bags of scaly monsters I got from the supermarket toy aisle, elephants trussed up as shaggy mammoths tromped through the movies I’d stay up late to watch, and no museum visit was complete without stopping to gaze at the bizarre