Photo courtesy Jeffrey Smith
BYU-Idaho graduate Jennifer Young spent six months painting the “Manning Canyon Shale Mural”, which will be on display in the Wildlife Musem located in the Benson.

Alumna paints mural for wildlife museum

Genenieve Erickson ERI03003@BYUI.EDU Scroll Staff

Growing up, Jennifer Young didn’t spend much time watching TV. Cindy Black, Young’s mother, said as a teenager Young spent her time drawing.

In her father’s office hangs a sketch Young drew in high school of a kingfisher.

All her previous work was just preparation for Young’s most recent project.

Young, who graduated December 2004 from BYU-Idaho with a degree in horticulture, recently completed a mural for the Wildlife Museum of BYU-Idaho, located on the second floor of the Ezra Taft Benson Building.

“Manning Canyon Shale Mural” is part of a display which will eventually contain fossil specimens from the Mississippian and Pennsylvanian Periods (approximately 360 to 290 million years ago). The three-panel mural is Young’s reconstruction of what swamps from the time periods would look like.

The fossils for the display have been donated by Dr. William Tidwell, a world expert on the flora of the Manning Canyon shale deposit in Utah.

“[These fossils] are a prestigious collection and we’re lucky to have them,” said Dave Stricklan, a professor in the Biology Department and curator of the Wildlife Museum.

Stricklan also said the collection has a fossil for every plant, animal or insect found in the mural.

Young spent many hours of research in order to make her mural as accurate as possible. She read books and studied pictures featuring the plants she would be painting.

“I had to figure out which plants would have grown together, which ones liked wet places and which plants were more dry,” Young said.

She even visited with Dr. Tidwell to have a preliminary sketch approved.

“Jennifer spent many, many hours on the mural and did a phenomenal job,” Stricklan said. “She was very accurate, even down to the placement of the leaves. Because of her botanical background, the plant specimens are botanically accurate as well as beautiful.”

Planning for the mural started in January of 2005. The actual painting of the mural took Young six months to complete. Sometimes she spent as many as nine hours a day working on it.

“When Jennifer told me what she was working on, I thought it would be a lot of work, but she’s determined. When she takes on a project, she gets it done,” said Steve Lowry, Young’s father.

An open house was held March 10 in recognition of Young’s work. Many of Young’s family and friends came to admire the mural, which is 7 ½ ft. tall and 12 ft. wide.

“There was no question in my mind that Jennifer could do it,” said Black. “She’s very talented.”