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About Sue Hendrickson:
Until her discovery of an intact skeleton of T. Rex, Sue Hendrickson was hardly a household name among paleontologists--in fact, she wasn't (and isn't) a full-time paleontologist at all, but a diver, adventurer, and collector of insects encased in amber. In 1990, Hendrickson participated in a fossil expedition in South Dakota led by the Black Hills Institute of Geologic Research. Away from the rest of the team, she discovered a trail of small bones that led to the T. Rex skeleton, catapulting her to instant fame.
After this, the story becomes much more complicated. The T. Rex was excavated by the Black Hills Institute, but the U.S. government (prompted by Maurice Williams, the owner of the property on which Tyrannosaurus Sue was found) took it into custody, and when ownership was finally awarded to Williams he put the skeleton up for auction. In 1997, Tyrannosaurus Sue was bought by the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago for a little over $8 million. (Happily, the museum later invited Hendrickson to give a lecture about her adventures.)
