‘Pompeii, but in the middle of a massive city’: the ice age fossil site hidden in Los Angeles

L os Angeles is known for famous museum such as the Getty and the Lacma, but perhaps fewer people are aware that – in the heart of the city – lies a museum that contains one of the world’s most remarkable fossil sites. The La Brea Tar Pits and Museum is home to the remains of more than 2 million ice age flora and fauna, including mastodons and saber-toothed cats, that became trapped in oily pools that still bubble up today. Since opening in 1977, this unique site has drawn legions of tourists, school-age children and other visitors. It is perhaps best known for its vast, dark Lake Pit with a fiberglass family of giant mammoths despairing at their sticky fate. The research center, paleontology-themed museum and 5.2-hectare (13-acre) public park are the only urban, active ice age excavation sites in the world. “There’s almost no other fossil site in the world that has this variety and number of fossils, with this quality of preservation,” said Emily Lindsey, the museum’s associate curator and excavation site director. “It’s incredible; it’s like Pompeii, but in the middle of a massive city which we’ve been able to excavate and study on a vast scale for more than a century.” Chester Stock, an American paleontologist, looks at bones at the museum. Photograph: Courtesy of NHMLAC Now, for the first time in its almost 50-year history, big changes are afoot. …