Editing Mary Anning (section)

=== Fossil shop and growing expertise in a risky occupation ===
Anning continued to support herself selling fossils. Her primary stock in trade consisted of invertebrate fossils such as [[ammonite]] and [[belemnoidea|belemnite]] shells, which were common in the area and sold for a few shillings. [[Vertebrate]] fossils, such as ichthyosaur skeletons, sold for more, but were much rarer.<ref name="McGowan14-21">{{Harvnb|McGowan|2001|pp=14–21}}</ref> Collecting them was dangerous winter work. In 1823, an article in ''The Bristol Mirror'' said of her:

{{Quotation|This persevering female has for years gone daily in search of fossil remains of importance at every tide, for many miles under the hanging cliffs at Lyme, whose fallen masses are her immediate object, as they alone contain these valuable relics of a former world, which must be snatched at the moment of their fall, at the continual risk of being crushed by the half suspended fragments they leave behind, or be left to be destroyed by the returning tide:{{spaced ndash}}to her exertions we owe nearly all the fine specimens of Ichthyosauri of the great collections&nbsp;...<ref name="Torrens1995" />}}

The risks of Anning's profession were illustrated when in October 1833 she barely avoided being killed by a landslide that buried her black-and-white terrier, Tray, her constant companion when she went collecting.<ref name="McGowan14-21" /> Anning wrote to a friend, [[Charlotte Murchison]], in November of that year: "Perhaps you will laugh when I say that the death of my old faithful dog has quite upset me, the cliff that fell upon him and killed him in a moment before my eyes, and close to my feet ... it was but a moment between me and the same fate."<ref>{{Harvnb|Goodhue|2004|p=84}}</ref>

As Anning continued to make important finds, her reputation grew. On 10&nbsp;December 1823, she found the first complete ''[[Plesiosaurus]]'', and in 1828 the first British example of the flying reptiles known as [[pterosaur]]s, called a flying dragon when it was displayed at the British Museum, followed by a ''[[Squaloraja]]'' fish skeleton in 1829.<ref name="TorrensODNB" /> Despite her limited education, she read as much of the scientific literature as she could obtain, and often laboriously hand-copied papers borrowed from others. Palaeontologist [[Christopher McGowan]] examined a copy Anning made of an 1824 paper by [[William Conybeare (geologist)|William Conybeare]] on marine reptile fossils and noted that the copy included several pages of her detailed technical illustrations that he was hard-pressed to tell apart from the original.<ref name="McGowan14-21" /> She also dissected modern animals including both fish and [[cuttlefish]] to gain a better understanding of the anatomy of some of the fossils with which she was working. Lady Harriet Silvester, the widow of the former [[Recorder of London|Recorder of the City of London]], visited Lyme in 1824 and described Anning in her diary:
[[File:Mary Anning Plesiosaurus.jpg|thumb|right|upright=.8|alt=Drawing of partially complete skeleton of creature with long thin neck, small skull, and paddles |Letter and drawing from Mary Anning announcing the discovery of a fossil animal now known as ''[[Plesiosaurus dolichodeirus]]'' (specimen NHMUK OR 22656), 26&nbsp;December 1823]]

{{Quotation|The extraordinary thing in this young woman is that she has made herself so thoroughly acquainted with the science that the moment she finds any bones she knows to what tribe they belong. She fixes the bones on a frame with cement and then makes drawings and has them engraved... It is certainly a wonderful instance of divine favour—that this poor, ignorant girl should be so blessed, for by reading and application she has arrived to that degree of knowledge as to be in the habit of writing and talking with professors and other clever men on the subject, and they all acknowledge that she understands more of the science than anyone else in this kingdom.<ref name="UCMP">{{cite web |title=Mary Anning |url=http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/history/anning.html |publisher=University of California Museum of Paleontology |access-date=31 December 2009}}</ref>}}

In 1826, aged 27, Anning managed to save enough money to purchase a house with a glass store-front window for her shop, ''Anning's Fossil Depot''. The business had become important enough that the move was covered in the local paper, which noted that the shop had a fine ichthyosaur skeleton on display. Many geologists and fossil collectors from Europe and America visited her at Lyme, including the geologist [[George William Featherstonhaugh]], who called Anning a "very clever funny Creature."<ref>{{Harvnb|Berkeley|Berkeley|1988|p=66}}</ref> He purchased fossils from Anning for the newly opened [[New York Academy of Sciences|New York Lyceum of Natural History]] in 1827. King [[Frederick Augustus II of Saxony]] visited her shop in 1844 and purchased an ichthyosaur skeleton for his extensive natural history collection.<ref>{{Harvnb|Emling|2009|pp=98–99, 190–191}}</ref> The king's physician and aide, [[Carl Gustav Carus]], wrote in his journal:

{{Quotation|We had alighted from the carriage and were proceeding on foot, when we fell in with a shop in which the most remarkable petrifications and fossil remains—the head of an ''Ichthyosaurus''—beautiful ammonites, etc. were exhibited in the window. We entered and found the small shop and adjoining chamber completely filled with fossil productions of the coast ... I found in the shop a large slab of blackish clay, in which a perfect ''Ichthyosaurus'' of at least six feet, was embedded. This specimen would have been a great acquisition for many of the cabinets of natural history on the Continent, and I consider the price demanded, £15 sterling, as very moderate.<ref name=Carus />}}

Carus asked Anning to write her name and address in his pocketbook for future reference—she wrote it as "Mary Annins"—and when she handed it back to him she told him: "I am well known throughout the whole of Europe".<ref name="Carus">{{multiref|{{Harvnb|Carus|1846|p=197}}|also see {{Harvnb|Gordon|1894|p=115}}}}</ref> As time passed, Anning's confidence in her knowledge grew, and in 1839 she wrote to the ''[[Journal of Natural History|Magazine of Natural History]]'' to question the claim made in an article, that a recently discovered fossil of the prehistoric shark ''[[Hybodus]]'' represented a new genus, as an error since she had discovered the existence of fossil sharks with both straight and hooked teeth many years ago.<ref>{{Harvnb|Emling|2009|p=172}}</ref><ref>{{Citation |last=Anning |first=Mary |title=Extract of a letter from Miss Anning |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=epY5AAAAcAAJ&pg=PA605 |journal=The Magazine of Natural History |volume=3 |page=605 |year=1839 |id={{BHL page|2270489}} |series=N.S. |issue=36}}</ref> The extract from the letter that the magazine printed was the only writing of Anning's published in the scientific literature during her lifetime. Some personal letters written by Anning, such as her correspondence with [[Frances Augusta Bell]], were published while she was alive, however.<ref name="Torrens1995">{{Harvnb|Torrens|1995}}</ref><ref>{{Harvnb|Grant|1825|pp=131–133, 172–173}}</ref>