Notice of the transfer of the holotype specimen of Niobrarasaurus coleii (Ankylosauria; Nodosauridae) to the Sternberg Museum of Natural History

The holotype specimen of Niobrarasaurus coleii, a nodosaurian dinosaur, was discovered in 1930 in the Niobrara Chalk of southeastern Gove County, Kansas by Virgil Cole, a geologist working for the Gulf Oil Company (Walters 1986). Mehl (1936) designated the remains as the holotype of “Hierosaurus” coleii, considering it to be similar to another Kansas nodosaur (H. sternbergi) collected by Charles H. Sternberg in 1906 and described by Wieland (1909). Both N. coleii and H. sternbergi were found in the lower Smoky Hill Chalk Member of the Niobrara Chalk (Hamm and Everhart 2001) and are considered to be late Coniacian in age (Hattin 1982). Niobrarasaurus coleii was originally curated in the collection of the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Missouri-Columbia as MU 650 VP.