The Docent's New Bug Lady

By Chuck Milam -
From President Carolyn:

LoL!  Yes, that's what I am, all right.  I'm not sure if Austin or Lindsay told you already, but three of us volunteers at IP got fossil insects named after us!  Soldier Beetles, to be exact, from the Oligocene (25-20 m.y.o.).

A couple of years ago I helped Lindsay and Erica out with their fossil insect collection; it included photographing some 80 year old docs, data entry and annotating online photos.  I even did some German translations from original journal articles.  That project ended last year, but an Italian Invert Paleontologist was doing his own research using the same collection.  He worked with Lindsay to gather info on our specimens, looked at online data and photos, and was able to come up with some new species.  Lindsay got equal credit on his published paper.  He wanted to further thank the NHM and IP, and asked for the names of some volunteers.  Lindsay sent him three; myself, Lidia Lustig and David Bradbury.

Lo and behold, when the paper was published, three of the new species were named after us!  Rhagonycha (Rhagonycha) carolynae is my namesake beetle.  How about that?  Ha, ha.  Lindsay even wrote up some short but nice things to say about us for the etymology sections of the paper.  Mine says:

            "Named after Carolyn Weiss, a dedicated volunteer of the NHMLA with an admirable passion for museum collections, science, and outreach." 

That was really nice, and a wonderful surprise.  Lindsay and Austin framed copies of the relevant pages with photos of the fossil beetles for us.  It's an amazing and awesome honor, having a creature, whether living or long gone, named after you.  Something I'll treasure.

Regards

Carolynae




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