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Siobhan Starrs

Siobhan Starrs

Senior Exhibition Developer & Project Manager at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History; creator of major natural history exhibits including the Deep Time fossil hall and the Bison: Standing Strong exhibition.

Jul 8, 2026

Sidedoor

Sidedoor

The Missing Bison

Jul 8 · 32m

Lizzie PeabodyHOST
8:35
And lucky for us, they took good notes.
Siobhan Starrs
Siobhan StarrsGUEST
8:39
In one account, they document being held up at a river for days, waiting for the massive herd of bison to cross the river before they could move forward.
Siobhan Starrs
Siobhan StarrsGUEST
8:51
They document a herd so large that it literally darkened the landscape all the way to the horizon, and they could no longer see the horizon line.
Siobhan Starrs
Siobhan StarrsGUEST
9:07
They commented traveling for miles, and all they heard were the sounds of bison, and all they smelled was bison wherever they went for miles.
Siobhan Starrs
Siobhan StarrsGUEST
9:19
The landscape truly must have been covered with bison.
Lizzie PeabodyHOST
11:13
They were slaughtered to near extinction.
Siobhan Starrs
Siobhan StarrsGUEST
11:19
and all the landscape contained was death.
Siobhan Starrs
Siobhan StarrsGUEST
11:25
there would be skulls and bones and bison wasting away.

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