DATE: Tuesday, October 7, 1997              TAG: 9710070296

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY ALETA PAYNE, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH                    LENGTH:   89 lines

SEARCHING FOR T. REX

For three weeks this summer, Bill Wagner worked on a windswept Montana hilltop, spending his break from teaching at Cape Henry Collegiate School to put in 12-hour days in 100-degree heat.

Now he has gone back for more.

Wagner was part of a team of volunteers, led by University of Notre Dame paleontologist Keith Rigby, that uncovered what may be the largest Tyrannosaurus rex fossil ever found. The group had to leave the site before the work was finished so that Rigby and the team members could return to their regular jobs. But now they're headed back to complete as much of the excavation as they can before the Montana winter sets in.

Their rapid return was prompted by a group of local ranchers who allegedly attempted to dig up some of the bones themselves, damaging the fossils in theprocess, before federal and local authorities intervened. The ranchers reportedly hoped to sell what they uncovered.

Just this weekend, Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History paid $8.4 million for the fossilized remains of a T. rex named Sue. The 50-foot-long skeleton, discovered in South Dakota, is the most complete T. rex ever found. Corporate sponsors McDonald's and Disney provided the museum with financial help on the purchase.

Rigby called Wagner to ask if he could return to the Montana site and, with the cooperation of Cape Henry, the middle school science and math teacher left Saturday to spend another week on the dig.

For Wagner, a self-described ``dinosaur nut since the second grade,'' participating in such an important find on his first dig ``is like winning the lottery.''

Only about 20 specimens of the mammoth, meat-eating T. rex have been discovered. The 52-inch portion of the pelvis uncovered by Rigby and his team of volunteers is 4 inches larger than its closest competitor. The thigh bone is what paleontologists use to estimate the size of dinosaurs, however, and that has yet to be uncovered.

Wagner made the trip to Ft. Peck, Mont., this summer as part of a Massachusetts-based group, Earthwatch, that sends volunteers on such expeditions. Participants pay their own way.

``We had no idea we'd end up involved in something like this,'' Wagner said. He and the dozen or so other volunteers expected to find ``little tiny bits.''

Instead they found ribs and finger bones, portions of a pelvis, teeth and a skull buried in 66-million-year-old rock.

``The more we dug, the more we found,'' he said. ``It was the thrill of discovery every day.''

When it came time to leave, the group covered the site to protect it until next year. At least, that was the plan, before the impromptu excavation by others.

Cape Henry has agreed to let Wagner take personal leave for the week and is helping him pay for his return trip to Montana.

``This has captured the imagination of the school,'' said Dan Richardson, headmaster of Cape Henry. ``I think the school will benefit in the long run from what he will bring - and has brought back - and incorporates in the classroom.''

Teaching is a second career for Wagner, who retired after 20 years in the Navy as a P-3 Orion pilot. He started at Cape Henry in 1990 and has ``never looked back.''

His classroom is filled with aquarium and fossil displays. Two parakeets occasionally step out of their cage to circle the room. A poster above the bulletin board displays the value for pi to at least 100 decimal places.

Since he started teaching, Wagner has done mock excavations in which his students unearthed ``fossils'' he had buried. This year, he also took a group to Surry for a real dig.

Wagner said things he learned in Montana through his hands-on experiences - like using good old Elmer's glue to bond together ancient dinosaur bones - he shares with his students.

``I brought back the ability to talk to them in first-person terms about how this kind of science takes place,'' he said.

His work as a middle school teacher has taught him that students are ``just so enthusiastic . . . if you can turn them on. If you can find that switch somewhere, they'll do amazing things for you.''

And the young people pick up on his enthusiasm.

``He's like really cool and he tells us lots of stuff about his dig,'' 12-year-old Caroline Camp said. ``It's nice to be learning stuff we normally wouldn't be.'' MEMO: Wire services contributed to this report. ILLUSTRATION: [Color photos]

Only about 20 Tyrannosaurus rex specimens have ever been discovered.

Courtesy of Bill Wagner

Cape Henry Collegiate School teacher Bill Wagner is back on the dig

in Montana, helping to uncover what might be the biggest T. rex find

yet.

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