Editing Pterosaur (section)

===Expanding research===
[[File:Dimorphodon_reconstruction_Seeley_1901.jpg|thumb|left|Historical reconstruction of ''[[Dimorphodon]]'' as a biped by Seeley]]
In 1828, [[Mary Anning]] found in England the first pterosaur genus outside Germany,{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=28}} named as ''[[Dimorphodon]]'' by [[Richard Owen]], also the first non-pterodactyloid pterosaur known.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=29}} Later in the century, the [[Early Cretaceous]] [[Cambridge Greensand]] produced thousands of pterosaur fossils, that however, were of poor quality, consisting mostly of strongly eroded fragments.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=33}} Nevertheless, based on these, numerous genera and species would be named.{{sfn|Witton|2013|p=7}} Many were described by [[Harry Govier Seeley]], at the time the main English expert on the subject, who also wrote the first pterosaur book, ''Ornithosauria'',<ref>Seeley, H.G., 1870, ''Ornithosauria – an elementary study of the bones of Pterodactyles'', Cambridge University Press</ref> and in 1901 the first popular book,{{sfn|Witton|2013|p=7}} ''Dragons of the Air''. Seeley thought that pterosaurs were warm-blooded and dynamic creatures, closely related to birds.<ref>Seeley, H.G., 1901, ''Dragons of the Air: An account of extinct flying reptiles'', Londen: Methuen</ref> Earlier, the evolutionist [[St. George Jackson Mivart]] had suggested pterosaurs were the direct ancestors of birds.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Mivart | first1 = G | year = 1881 | title = A popular account of chamaeleons | journal = Nature | volume = 24 | issue = 615 | pages = 309–38 | doi = 10.1038/024335f0 | bibcode = 1881Natur..24..335. | s2cid = 30819954 }}</ref> Owen opposed the views of both men, seeing pterosaurs as cold-blooded "true" reptiles.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=35}}

In the US, [[Othniel Charles Marsh]] in 1870 discovered ''Pteranodon'' in the [[Niobrara Chalk]], then the largest known pterosaur,{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=35}} the first toothless one and the first from America.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=36}} These layers too rendered thousands of fossils,{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=36}} also including relatively complete skeletons that were three-dimensionally preserved instead of being strongly compressed as with the Solnhofen specimens. This led to a much better understanding of many anatomical details,{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=36}} such as the hollow nature of the bones.
[[File:Rhamphorhynchus_reconstruction_Riou_1863.jpg|thumb|Early reconstruction of ''[[Rhamphorhynchus]]'']]
Meanwhile, finds from the Solnhofen had continued, accounting for the majority of complete high-quality specimens discovered.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=31}} They allowed to identify most new basal taxa, such as ''[[Rhamphorhynchus]]'', ''[[Scaphognathus]]'' and ''[[Dorygnathus]]''.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|p=31}} This material gave birth to a German school of pterosaur research, which saw flying reptiles as the warm-blooded, furry and active Mesozoic counterparts of modern bats and birds.{{sfn|Wellnhofer|1991|pp=37–38}} In 1882, Marsh and [[Karl Alfred Zittel]] published studies about the wing membranes of specimens of ''Rhamphorhynchus''.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Marsh | first1 = O.C. | year = 1882 | title = The wings of Pterodactyles | journal = American Journal of Science | volume = 3 | issue = 16| page = 223 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Zittel | first1 = K.A. | year = 1882 | title = Über Flugsaurier aus dem lithografischen Schiefer Bayerns | journal = Palaeontographica | volume = 29 | pages = 47–80 }}</ref> German studies continued well into the 1930s, describing new species such as ''[[Anurognathus]]''. In 1927, [[Ferdinand Broili]] discovered hair follicles in pterosaur skin,<ref>Broili, F., 1927, "Ein Ramphorhynchus mit Spuren von Haarbedeckung", ''Sitzungsberichte der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften'' p. 49-67</ref> and [[paleoneurology|paleoneurologist]] [[Tilly Edinger]] determined that the brains of pterosaurs more resembled those of birds than modern cold-blooded reptiles.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Edinger | first1 = T | year = 1927 | title = Das Gehirn der Pterosaurier | url = http://bigcat.fhsu.edu/biology/cbennett/bib-arch-pter/Edinger-1927.pdf | journal = [[Zeitschrift für Anatomie und Entwicklungsgeschichte]] | volume = 83 | issue = 1/3 | pages = 105–12 | doi = 10.1007/bf02117933 | s2cid = 19084773 | access-date = 2019-10-27 | archive-date = 2020-07-28 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200728093840/http://bigcat.fhsu.edu/biology/cbennett/bib-arch-pter/Edinger-1927.pdf | url-status = dead }}</ref>

In contrast, English and American paleontologists by the middle of the twentieth century largely lost interest in pterosaurs. They saw them as failed evolutionary experiments, cold-blooded and scaly, that hardly could fly, the larger species only able to glide, being forced to climb trees or throw themselves from cliffs to achieve a take-off. In 1914, for the first-time pterosaur aerodynamics were quantitatively analysed, by [[Ernest Hanbury Hankin]] and [[David Meredith Seares Watson]], but they interpreted ''Pteranodon'' as a pure glider.<ref>Hankin E.H. & Watson D.S.M.; "On the Flight of Pterodactyls", ''The Aeronautical Journal'', October 1914, pp. 324–35</ref> Little research was done on the group during the 1940s and 1950s.{{sfn|Witton|2013|p=7}}