Background
Wiffen was born in 1922 and was brought up in Havelock North and King Country. She only had a very short secondary school education as her father believed that higher education was wasted on girls, so he made her leave.
- Photos
- Works
- Photos
- Works
Joan Wiffen
Edit ProfileCareer
At the age of 16, Wiffen joined the Women"s Auxiliary Air Force during World World War II where she served for six years. In 1975 Wiffen discovered the first dinosaur fossils in New Zealand in the Maungahounga Valley in Northern Hawkes Bay. Her first discovery was the tail bone of a theropod dinosaur.
Her later finds included bones from a hypsilophodont, a pterosaur, an ankylosaur, mosasaurs and plesiosaurs.
In 1999, Wiffen discovered the vertebra bone of a titanosaur in a tributary of the Te Hoe River. The fossils Wiffen found are primarily held in a GNS Science collection.
Fossils were first found in New Zealand in 1865.
Achievements
-
Born
-
Died
June 30, 2009 (aged 87) -
Nationality
New Zealand
Awards
-
Commander of the Order of the British Empire Morris Skinner Award; Paleontology Wiffen was awarded an honorary DSc by Massey University in 1994. In the 1995 New Year Honours, she was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to science. In 2004, she won the Morris Skinner Award from the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.Commander of the Order of the British Empire Morris Skinner Award; Paleontology Wiffen was awarded an honorary DSc by Massey University in 1994. In the 1995 New Year Honours, she was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to science. In 2004, she won the Morris Skinner Award from the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.