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Triarthrus eatoni, trilobite reconstruction

C.E. Beecher's 1893 reconstruction of Triarthrus eatoni based on fossils from his Trilobite Bed showing appendages.

Beecher's Trilobite Bed

Pyritized trilobites have been known from the famous Beecher's Trilobite Bed in New York State for over a century. The bed was discovered by amateur fossil collector William S. Valiant in 1892, but is named after Charles Emerson Beecher, an academic from Yale University to whom Valiant showed his amazing trilobite finds. Beecher leased the land between 1893 and 1895, and quarried out as many fossils as he could, until he thought there was nothing left to be found. He wrote many scientific papers about the trilobites until his untimely death in 1904. The trilobites were found in just one thin (4 cm) layer of rock, laid down around 455 million years ago, during the Ordovician period.