When people think of prehistoric life, they tend to jump to two behemoth bookends — the towering dinosaurs of the Mesozoic era and then the woolly mammoths of the ice age. But what about the millions of years in between?
The new exhibit “After the Age of Dinosaurs” at the Field Museum shines a spotlight on this oft-overlooked chapter: the Paleocene, the period immediately following the asteroid impact that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs 66 million years ago.
“It’s a really important time in Earth’s history that just isn’t on most people’s radar,” said Ken Angielczyk, the Field’s fossil mammal curator and MacArthur Curator of Paleomammalogy. “The roots of the modern world are there. Mammals and modern birds undergo big evolutionary radiations, and flowering plants really start to dominate ecosystems.”
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The exhibition, which will be on display until 2027, is equal parts science lesson and immersive experience. Visitors travel through an information- and stimulus-packed space and encounter fossils collected by Field curators over decades, striking murals from Chicago poster artist Jay Ryan, realistic audio, a video presentation and other interactive elements.
“We want to get people to think about this really strange transition time,” exhibition developer Marie Georg said. “The extinction event was so dramatic that it really reset life on Earth and set the stage for the world we live in today.”
A reset button
The Paleocene began in the shadow of catastrophe, after an asteroid that struck Earth triggered years of darkness, fire and ecological collapse. “Small animals, burrowers, things that were more versatile and not so specialized were more likely to survive,” Georg said. “Generalists made it through while many specialists did not.”
Among the survivors were ferns, which thrive without insect pollinators, and plants with thick-coated seeds, such as palms, that could withstand harsh conditions.
“Then, suddenly, you get brand new groups,” said Fabiany Herrera, the Field Museum’s fossil plant curator and Negaunee Associate Curator of Paleobotany. “The peanut family, green beans, passion fruits, guavas. Plants that are incredibly important to us today, those first appear right after the extinction.”
Animals seized the same opportunities. With dinosaurs gone, mammals quickly grew in size and diversity. “Within just a few hundred thousand years, you have mammals bigger than anything that existed during the 100 million years before,” Angielczyk said. “It’s the start of the modern mammal world. Horses, bats, whales … all of that begins here.”
And it wasn’t just mammals. The largest snake ever to grace the planet, Titanoboa, appeared in this era and stretched more than 40 feet long. Giant, 6-foot-tall penguins waddled across ancient coastlines while the mini ancestors of today’s hoofed mammals began their march toward modern forms.
“It was a strange mix of familiar and odd,” Georg said. “You had bats that look practically like a bat today, miniature horses, and then there were little multi-tuberculate mammals that have no descendants and disappear from all of history.”
From Colombia to Chicago
Some of the exhibition’s star fossils were uncovered in coal mines in Colombia, where Herrera began collecting in 2002. “Those discoveries really started my career,” he said. “We’re showing some of the oldest passion fruits, some of the first legumes, even one of the earliest grape fossils. Plants usually don’t get showcased that often, so it’s exciting to bring them into the spotlight.”
That same Colombian dig also produced Titanoboa. Thanks to 3D-printed replicas of many of these fossils, visitors can run their fingers over ancient forms. These include a small climbing mammal with a tail twice as long as its body, the earliest known prehensile tail in the fossil record. “It doesn’t even have a name yet,” Angielczyk said. “That’s how new it is.”
If the fossils provide the evidence, Ryan’s artwork provides the atmosphere. Ryan, known for his rock band posters, collaborated with the Field’s curators to depict this evolutionary “rebuilding” with accuracy and flair.
“This time immediately after the extinction was a weird, trippy time,” said Ben Miller, another exhibition developer. “So we made a fun, unique exhibit to capture the vibe of the world being rebuilt as just being a little bit weird.”
The result is an exhibition that feels both rigorous and playful — and highly Instagrammable. Visitors are encouraged to snap pictures and will find plenty of photo ops within the exhibit’s hot-pink walls. Giant murals capture Titanoboa in all its sinewy glory, while smaller illustrations highlight quirky mammals clambering through ash-filled forests.
Lessons for today
While the exhibition celebrates resilience and innovation in the wake of disaster, it also carries a sobering message. Scientists see clear parallels between the mass extinction that ended the age of dinosaurs and the challenges facing our planet now.
“Studying these events in the fossil record is important because the scale is comparable to what humans are doing today,” Angielczyk said.
Rising global temperatures, shrinking habitats and accelerating extinctions echo what happened millions of years ago. “The fossil record shows that recovery takes time, millions of years,” Angielczyk said. “That should really give us pause. It’s much easier to conserve what we have now than to hope ecosystems bounce back quickly.”
Herrera agreed. “The asteroid was an accident that reset the planet, and life recovered, but it took 6 million years for forests to fully come back,” he said. “Today we are driving change ourselves, and we don’t know what the outcome will be. The lesson is that life is resilient, but recovery is not fast.”
“After the Age of Dinosaurs” runs through Jan. 3, 2027, at the Field Museum, 1400 S. DuSable Lake Shore Drive; 312-922-9410 and www.fieldmuseum.org
Fauzia Arain McGuire is a freelance writer.