Despite living in Whitefish, 28-year-old Alice Held was no stranger to the clear, sweeping views the “M” trail offers of Bozeman and the valley below, having hiked it just the previous day.

You might not think a paleontologist looking for 66-million-year-old fossils would need to ask a rancher about his great-grandmother's job in the Wyoming badlands. But that's what Paul Sereno, a ...