Bucktail Students Present ‘Hynerpeton” to School Board

By Christopher Miller

BALD EAGLE TOWNSHIP – Students Martin Lewis and Kedda Bissman presented the Hynerpeton bassetti, a 350-million year old fossil, to the school board. The students of Mr. Josh Day’s Ecology class at Bucktail wish to change legislation designating the state fossil.

Martin Lewis spoke to the board about the Hynerpeton.

Representing Bucktail High School are student government and the Bucktail Ecology class who are involved in the Hynerpeton legislation change.

The goal is to change the state fossil to the Hynerpeton bassetti, a 350-million year old fossil that was found in 1993 at the Red Hill Fossil Site outside of Hyner.

The current state fossil is the Trilobite, a bottom-feeding arthropod which is very common in multiple geologic layers and is between 0.5″ and 4″ long and is found in 46 other states and is the state fossil for three other states.

“We want to make PA unique,” Martin said. “Paleontologists Daeschler and Shubin discovered the first fossil of the Hynerpeton bassetti in 1993 which lived in the rivers and wetlands and could have been between two and five feet long. It’s name means creeping monster from Hyner. It thrived in the wetlands of ancient Pennsylvania and North America.”

“The Hynerpeton was only found in one state and that is Pennsylvania,” Martin said.

“We can make this E.P.I.C. for America’s 250th birthday, Kedda Bissman said. “We can educate, preserve, innovate, and celebrate our state and it’s vibrant past.”

Bucktail students hope to bring forth the idea of changing legislation at the state-level in the coming months and understand that this is something that “will take some time.”

Their teacher, Mr. Josh Day, was present at the school board meeting and was proud that his students took care of the presentation and brief comments made by board member Elisabeth Lynch and Superintendent Dr. Frank Redmon.