The weather is beautiful and Penn Dixie’s fossils are waiting for you to uncover them!
It’s the moment that you’ve been waiting for — Penn Dixie reopens this weekend!
We’ll be there from 9-5 pm Saturday April 23 and 10-5 pm Sunday April 24. Get your shovels, rock hammers, boots, and safety googles ready for some serious fossil collecting. If you can’t make it this weekend — no sweat. We’ll be open every weekend — same hours — until June 13, when we open seven days a week. General admission for adults is $9; children $7.
In honor of Earth Day, admission on April 23 is FREE for those who volunteer for a few hours to help clean and beautify Penn Dixie. Here’s what we’re planning:
Cleaning and organizing our massive storage locker
Interested in visiting on off-days? You can book a group tour, or sign up for a membership to visit anytime. For group tours, please book at least two weeks in advance to guarantee a time. Our June schedule is nearly full but we do have a few dates left in May. Don’t delay!
Trilobites, brachiopods, horn corals, crinoids, and many other fossils have been exposed by the winter elements and are ready to be discovered.
Dr. Stokes teaching geology with the UA Science: Sky School on Mt. Lemmon in Tucson, AZ.
Press Release – April 15, 2016
Hamburg, NY — The Hamburg Natural History Society (HNHS) is pleased to announce several new partnerships and programs created under the guidance of first-year Penn Dixie Executive Director Phil Stokes, PhD. “Penn Dixie’s fossils are known throughout the world, and our annual visitors reflect broad international demographics,” Dr. Stokes said. “However, I’m looking forward to building a stronger presence in the region and, in particular, strengthening our connection to the cultural community.”
Since his tenure began in November, Dr. Stokes has reached out to several local organizations. “The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts were at the top of my list,” he said. “Both groups have excellent leadership and are invested in youth services in western New York.” In conjunction with the scouts, Penn Dixie will be offering a new program, Scouting Rocks!, on Saturday May 28. The program is free for any scout — boy or girl — in uniform. The program will provide scouts an opportunity to collect fossils, view sunspots, hike nature trails, and learn about rocketry from Moog scientists.
Penn Dixie looks to build partnerships with local schools as well. Having previously worked with a mix of public and charter schools in several cities, Stokes was keen to approach potential partners to create expanded all-day science inquiry programs at Penn Dixie. The first school that he reached out to, Tapestry Charter, was very eager to add new opportunities for their students. “Tapestry has a focus on experiential learning and the faculty are very enthusiastic about developing hands-on science programs at Penn Dixie,” Stokes said. And, most recently, Penn Dixie collaborated with the Franciscan Sisters of St. Joseph to create an interfaith Earth Day program based on Pope Francis’s encyclical about water and climate change.
But, all of this doesn’t mean that Penn Dixie is moving away from its core mission. “We’re not changing what we do; we’re changing how we do it,” Stokes revealed. Penn Dixie will continue to offer its most popular programs: summer day camps, the Miss Buffalo Nature Cruise, Earth Science Day, and several others. Registration for this year’s signature fossil collecting event, Dig with the Experts on May 21, has already exceeded 2015 levels — with one month to spare!
Stokes credits Penn Dixie’s improved online presence for this trend. “We designed a new website and started accepting online sales, and the door blew in.” he said. “It’s always fun to see a grandparent taking out a membership at 2 am. We love it.” Penn Dixie’s fossils continue to attract visitors from large distances. Groups from Canada, Ukraine, Pennsylvania, and Ohio are already scheduled to visit this year. Stokes described how whole families of fossil enthusiasts call or email about Penn Dixie. “My favorite call so far was from a mom from New York City,” Stokes explained. “She wanted to bring her kids to Penn Dixie to collect for two days, stay in the nearest hotel in Hamburg — and visit Niagara Falls.”
Established in 1993, the HNHS is steeped in the culture of Buffalo “Penn Dixie has been a positive part of our community for generations,” says Jamie Decker, Sr. Marketing Director for the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce. “Phil brings fresh ideas and an enthusiastic strategy to build upon the history and grow the Site for future generations to learn and enjoy.” With this is mind, Penn Dixie has its eyes on more partnerships with cultural organizations, schools, and for added foundation and corporate support. “Penn Dixie is a global geological treasure and I want everyone to know about us,” Stokes declares.
Dr. Stokes received his PhD in Geosciences from the University of Arizona as well as MS and BS degrees in Geology from SUNY Buffalo. He has worked on four National Science Foundation programs — most notably working to improve the recruitment and retention of underrepresented populations — and has taught science — informally and formally — at the K-12 and college levels in Tucson, Arizona.
Penn Dixie’s new Geological Treasure Bags are available at the site or online.
Looking for an easy — and environmentally friendly — way to gather your fossils while you’re collecting at Penn Dixie? Want a really unique shopping back for your next trip to the store? Look no further, friend!
Penn Dixie now offers reusable Geological Treasure Bags! The bags are a bit smaller than the standard reusable shopping bag and feature our famous Phacops rana trilobite on the front. Bags can be purchased at the site for $2 or through our online store for $2 plus shipping and handling.
“Where else would you rather be than right here, right now?” – A brachiopod talking to other brachiopods about our bags.
As Barbara O’Brien from the Buffalo News pointed out, “you don’t usually think of Earth Day as a cause for religious observance.” Yet, there we were at Penn Dixie — on a chilly Saturday in April — hosting an interfaith ceremony to honor water, our planet’s unique and occasionally overlooked natural resource.
The program was comprised of prayers, discussions of the water and conservation themes, and tours of Penn Dixie’s nature trails and fossil quarry. Perhaps expectedly, we talked about geological history and how Earth’s water has been recycled across eons by countless organisms, including trilobites. Today, our water is threatened by overpopulation and contamination — a threat which affects biodiversity in ecosystems as well as the underprivledged people of the world. Still, we are encouraged by positive attitudes and the williningness of humanity to act as one to develop innovative and effective solutions.
Jarrett Steffen from Buffalo Niagara Riverkeeper discusses cleanup of local waterways.Phil Stokes from Penn Dixie provides opening remarks.Our Earth Day Gathering guests arrive at Penn Dixie.Sharon and Jenna Trembath from Great Lakes Beach Sweep and Jarrett Steffen from Buffalo Niagara Riverkeeper discuss clean water with our guests.
Our new website debuted a little over one month ago, and we’ve already had traffic from around the world!
Besides our home turf of the USA, we’ve seen web visitors from Canada, Japan, Brazil, The UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, France, and India.
Do these folks come to Penn Dixie? Absolutely! We’re welcoming a group from Ukraine later this year, and we are really excited to host our friends from Canada and around the U.S. for Dig with the Experts on May 21. Oh, and we may soon be resporting interesting and exciting news regarding some friends from one of the other countries on this list.
We’ll post a full web traffic report later this year.
