WASHINGTON — From the banks of the Potomac River, in a region steeped in American history, a massive fossil was dug up last month that apparently can be traced back to a time long before this country’s recorded history.
The fossil is the skull of a whale that is “approximately 15 million years old,” said John Nance, the paleontology collections manager at the Calvert Marine Museum in Southern Maryland.
The skull is about 6 feet long and is believed to weigh about 1,000 pounds. It was excavated in July from the cliffs at the edge of the Potomac on the grounds of Stratford Hall, the birthplace of Robert E. Lee.
The rest of the skeleton, which experts believe belongs to a type of baleen whale that has since gone extinct, remains embedded in the cliffs.
