Chesapectin jeffersonius Pectin Fossil Shell State Fossil of Virginia

Description

Chesapectin jeffersonius Pectin Fossil Shell State Fossil of Virginia
Chesapectin jeffersonius Pectin Fossil Shell State Fossil of Virginia
Chesapecten jeffersonius
is the state fossil of the State of Virginia
Collected myself on the banks of the James River, Va in 2015
Size 4 1/2 inches across
It is the
fossilized
form of an extinct
scallop
, which lived in the early
Pliocene epoch
between four and five
million
years ago on Virginia's
coastal plain
. In 1687,
Martin Lister
published a drawing of
C. jeffersonius
, making it the first North American fossil to be illustrated in scientific literature.
In 1824,
geologist
John Finch gathered a large collection of
mollusk
fossils, including
Chesapecten jeffersonius
, from the vicinity of
Yorktown, Va
and gave them to scientists at the
Academy of Natural Sciences of Pennsylvania
(ANSP).
Scientist Thomas Say, at ANSP, described the species and named it
Pecten jeffersonius
to honor Thomas Jefferson.
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