Happy New Year!  What did you do for New Year’s Eve? Maybe you spent the night at a fancy dinner party inside a giant concrete Iguanodon, surrounded by prominent scientists? That’s exactly what Richard Owen, a paleontologist famous for coining the word Dinosauria, did on 31 December 1853. The party took place at The Crystal Palace at Sydenham, and the Iguanodon was a part of a larger exhibition of dinosaur models sculpted by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins under Owen’s scientific direction. The lavish dinner consisted of eight courses and the whole event was reportedly quite boisterous.

It is not entirely clear whether the scientists spent the night inside of the model itself or rather the mould in which it was made. What is clear though is the fact that Owen’s Iguanodon was not scientifically correct, even given the research available at the time. His rival and the discoverer of the Iguanodon, Gideon Mantell, came to the conclusion that the animal was a reptile of a slender build, not a heavy mammal-like creature Owen believed it to be. Unfortunately for Mantell, Owen was a fame-driven creationist who did not hesitate to steal specimens and research from other scientists, bend data to fit his own agenda, and publish negative reviews of his colleagues’ work behind their back. Plagued by opium addiction he developed after a carriage accident, Mantell was no match for the cunning rival. 

On 10 November 1852, Mantell died of an opium overdose, leaving Owen completely free to prepare the Crystal Palace dinosaur sculptures according to his own vision. The post-mortem showed that Mantell had been suffering from severe scoliosis. A section of his spine was removed from the body stored at the Royal College of Surgeons, where no other but Richard Owen was the conservator at the time. 

Check out Professor Joe Cain’s comprehensive article on the legendary dinner party