Paleobotany Division, Yale Peabody Museum

The Yale Peabody Museum’s paleobotany collection numbers over 150,000 specimens, with 4,200 of these type and illustrated specimens. The collection is worldwide in scope, with approximately 75% of the collection from North America and the other 25% from the Arctic, Australia, Central American, Europe, Israel, Pakistan, Lebanon, South America and the West Indies. Tracing its roots back to the early 19th century, this collection is one of the most historically significant in the United States. Included among its riches are plant fossils from the opening of the American West, from the Wilkes Expedition of 1838–1842 described by James Dwight Dana, Triassic and late Cretaceous floras from New York, New Jersey and southern New England; and the world’s largest assemblage of cycadeoids.