{"id":1362,"date":"2011-07-13T06:53:31","date_gmt":"2011-07-13T10:53:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=1362"},"modified":"2011-07-31T12:59:35","modified_gmt":"2011-07-31T16:59:35","slug":"escalating-vandalism-at-florida-museum-of-natural-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1362","title":{"rendered":"Escalating vandalism at Florida Museum of Natural History"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something unsavory, and I dare say cowardly going on behind the Florida Museum of Natural History<\/a>. The facility located at the University of Florida, Gainesville is a gorgeous one with an entrancing butterfly rainforest exhibit and a Hall of Florida Fossils that a person can easily spend an entire day in alone. I visited the museum with my wife and kids a while ago and we all felt that it was worth the day trip drive. But we didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know that a unique predator of sorts had been prowling nearby.<\/p>\n

The researchers who work at the museum and the adjoining Bartram-Carr Hall are proud of their work and aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t shy about letting the world know what they do. They display Darwin Fish emblems on their cars and some even have bumper stickers along the lines of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Smile, you are an ape!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Evolution is a fact.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s obvious that someone isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t amused. Vandals have struck.<\/p>\n

It started small. Darwin Fish emblems would be ripped off cars a few times a year. Undeterred, the victims would simply replace them. Then bumper stickers were scraped off. Then notes containing prayers were left on cars. And now the vandal has apparently taken the next step: driving nails into tires. One researcher said she discovered a long nail had been deliberately forced into the side rim of her new tire, destroying it. Another researcher had both front tires ruined by long nails. These incidents all happened in a parking lot behind Bartram-Carr Hall.<\/p>\n

[edited to add: There is erroneous information going around that the victims had never reported these incidents to the university police department. In fact, there were multiple reports filed<\/strong>. The latest incident was filed with the police on June 23, 2011. Case report number was 11-1178. ]<\/p>\n

So far, there appear to be no leads on who the vandal is, or even how many vandals there may be. Please spread the word about this and if you happen to be in the area be vigilant. Ripping an emblem off a car and leaving notes full of prayers is annoying and wrong, but destroying tires is on another level. And who knows if the vandalism will escalate even further?<\/p>\n

[Two photos below the fold.]<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something unsavory, and I dare say cowardly going on behind the Florida Museum of Natural History. The facility located at the University of Florida, Gainesville is a gorgeous one with an entrancing butterfly rainforest exhibit and a Hall of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-lY","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":698,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=698","url_meta":{"origin":1362,"position":0},"title":"Gainesville event: Evidence for Evolution","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 11, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Caf\u00c3\u00a9 Scientifique Gainesville presents ... Evidence for Evolution: A Tour of Fossil Hall and Panel Discussion Saturday, September 13 1:30 pm to 4:30pm Florida Natural History Museum and Harn Art Museum Caf\u00c3\u00a9 Dr. Bruce MacFadden, Florida Museum Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology, and graduate students will lead a tour of the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Science Cafes"","block_context":{"text":"Science Cafes","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=19"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":290,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=290","url_meta":{"origin":1362,"position":1},"title":"Dinosaur Month","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"October 9, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Apparently, it's Dinosaur Month! This newspaper has a good list of places in Florida participating in some way. My favorites: The Florida Museum of Natural History: Just in time for Dinosaur Month, the museum has opened \"The Hall of Florida Fossils: Evolution of Life and Land.\" The exhibit will feature\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "In the News"","block_context":{"text":"In the News","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":147,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=147","url_meta":{"origin":1362,"position":2},"title":"Darwin Day","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"February 3, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Darwin Day is coming up. You can check out the list for possible events near you. Several churches appear to be participating the Evolution Sunday project. There's quite a celebration planned at Flamingo Gardens for anyone who's interested. Come join us in celebrating the birthday of Charles Darwin and his\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Alert"","block_context":{"text":"Alert","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":239,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=239","url_meta":{"origin":1362,"position":3},"title":"Dig site needs volunteers","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"July 5, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"A Florida fossil dig site is looking for volunteers. NEWBERRY -- Now that the second field season of excavating fossils at a site in Newberry has ended, Florida Museum of Natural History paleontologists are gearing up to begin work on the approximately 220 skeletons and literally thousands of specimens uncovered\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Science in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Science in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=5"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":200,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=200","url_meta":{"origin":1362,"position":4},"title":"Largest Shark that Ever Lived","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 27, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"It lurks in High Springs. At 60 feet long, 12 feet wide and 14 feet high, this model shark is the largest project ever for Archie's Welding. The shark is destined for the \"Megalodon: Largest Shark that Ever Lived\" exhibit that opens in June at the Florida Museum of Natural\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "In the News"","block_context":{"text":"In the News","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1008,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1008","url_meta":{"origin":1362,"position":5},"title":"Florida Museum of Natural History","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 18, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Took a day trip up to Gainesville Friday to look around. I spent quite a bit of time at the Florida Museum of Natural History and really enjoyed it! From the outside the museum doesn't look like much, and I admit to feeling afraid that the hour and a half\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 10 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 10 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1008#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1362"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1362"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1362\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1392,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1362\/revisions\/1392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}