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 Where is it?
This small, but fascinating museum is in the Van Riet Lowe Building on the East Campus of the University of the Witwatersrand. For enquiries about the Bernard Price Institute and the Museum, you can call (011) 717-6682.
What is on display?
The museum shows fossils from the main areas of palaeontological research in which the Institute specialises, including early mammals, dinosaurs and the earliest tortoise from Africa, as well as a large variety of exquisite fossils plants. The museum also features several life-size reconstructions of fossils that are very popular with visiting school groups.
Visitors can also arrange to visit a 'live' fossil preparation laboratory, and watch the technicians busy with the painstaking process of preparing fossils.
The Institute Director, Professor Bruce Rubidge, is currently leading a project to establish a small field museum and fossil trail just outside Nieu Bethesda, a small village situated close to Graaff-Reinet in Eastern Cape Province. The interpretation centre will be next to the fossil-rich bed of the Gats River, where many specimens of 250 million year old Karoo fossils are exposed. It will also be in close proximity to the famous Owl House Museum. The interpretation centre, which will operate with involvement from the local community, should open to the public by the end of 2005.
More information
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