Geology Museum, one of the famous landmarks found in Madison, Wisconsin, was first established during the 19th Century. The creation of the museum was first brought up in 1948, where it would be filled with exhibits of geological and mineralogical findings around the State. The museum was housed at the third floor of the Science Hall building at the University of Wisconsin, until it burned down in 1884. Most of the artifacts were ruined in the fire and there was trouble over the reconstruction of the building. Fortunately enough, the campus was able to secure a funding from the legislation.

The Geology Museum resurfaced at the new Science Hall in 1886 until the present day, with most of the collections and artifacts prepared by R.D. Irving. A few geologists worked on for years to revamp the museum, increase its visitors, and made miniature models and plaques of mammoths dinosaurs, and mastodons, which can still be seen until today. Collections of existing specimens were added; and later, replicas and diorama constructions of the Driftless area and Devil?s Lake were also created to boost the museum?s collections.

The most notable collection was from the Boaz mastodon ? bones that were recovered by the Dosch children in a family farm in 1897. The giant skeletons, which stand 9.5 feet tall and 15 feet long, were brought to the Geology Museum later in the early 1900s. Half of the skeletons of the mastodon were recovered while the other half was made manually.

Other collections of the Geology Museum include the Mazon Creek Fossils, estimated to be at least 300 million years old. Geologists mostly found fossils of scorpions, insects, fish, mollusks, worms and crustaceans. Another museum highlight are the skeletons of Dinosaurs from the Hell Creek Formation, which was predicted to be 65 to 67 million years old.