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JOHN YANG: Now to our
"NewsHour" Shares, something
interesting that caught our eye.

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Ray Stanford has been looking
for dinosaurs in creek beds
and rivers for more than 30

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years.

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Despite being a self-taught
tracker, Stanford is
something of a legend
among paleontologists.

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As the "NewsHour"'s Pamela
Kirkland reports, six years ago,
he made his biggest discovery

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to date.

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RAY STANFORD, Paleontologist:
There's part of a track down
to the lower right, too.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: When it
comes to tracking dinosaurs,
Ray Stanford is a natural.

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Stanford is a self-taught
paleontologist known
for his talent for
finding dinosaur fossils

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from the Cretaceous era,
140 to 65 million years ago.

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In 2010, while visiting his
wife, Sheila, an information
specialist at NASA's Goddard

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Space Flight Center, he
noticed a loose rock.

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RAY STANFORD: This is the
theropod track that led to
ultimately the grand discovery.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: On a separate
visit two years later, a rock
on the hillside, not far from

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the first track he
found, caught his eye.

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RAY STANFORD: If you had
told me this, I would
never have believed
that I was going to find

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something like this.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: This time, it
was the footprint of a nodosaur,
the Cretaceous period's version

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of an armadillo.

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Beneath the ground,
there were more tracks
Stanford couldn't see.

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After years of analysis, it
turns out he'd stumbled upon
one of the best fossil trackways

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in the world.

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RAY STANFORD: Over 100 tracks,
over -- or nearly 40 mammal
tracks of at least three

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and probably five species of
mammals, at least three species
of dinosaur tracks, and probably

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two or three species of
flying reptile tracks.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: At
least 110 million years
ago, these dinosaurs
sauropods and nodosaurs,

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small mammals, and
flying reptiles, like
the pterosaur, crossed
paths on the 8.5-foot slab

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of sandstone.

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Because none of the prints
overlap, experts think the
tracks occurred over the course

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of few days or hours.

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They remained
untouched until now.

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This replica is displayed
in Goddard's Earth Science
Building in Greenbelt, Maryland.

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The original sits in a
warehouse for further study.

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If not for Stanford, the
discovery might have been
lost to construction.

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At the time, NASA had
planned to build on the site.

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COMPTON TUCKER, NASA: I had
walked by that place probably
30 or 40 times, and I had no

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idea there was something
so cool right there.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: Compton Tucker
is a climate researcher at
NASA and oversaw the excavation

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of the four-ton stone.

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NASA tapped Tucker for
his experience working
on archaeological digs
to find buried ruins.

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COMPTON TUCKER: We found
where the sandstone was.

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We organized a team
of volunteers to
come in on weekends.

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And we dug out all of the
rocks we found in our survey,
and one of those rocks is the

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amazing rock which has the
track Ray Stanford found.

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RAY STANFORD: These people are
used to looking into space,
not into ancient time, looking

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down.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: Stanford has
been looking at tracks for
over 25 years, thanks to his

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10-year-old son's
curiosity in dinosaurs.

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RAY STANFORD: Joel (ph), who
at a secondhand bookstore said,
"Daddy, let's get this book

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on tracking dinosaurs."

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And we began to find dinosaur
tracks in the stream, although
we'd read another book that

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said that nothing had been
found in the D.C.-Maryland area.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: Since then,
Stanford has tripled the
number of dinosaurs and winged

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reptiles identified in
the state of Maryland.

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One of his finds, a hatchling
of a baby nodosaur, the only
hatchling of an armored dinosaur

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in the world, sits on display
at the Smithsonian National
Museum of Natural History.

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RAY STANFORD: This is
my favorite footprint
possibly of all of them.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: He and his
wife, Sheila, estimate they
have collected over 1,000.

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RAY STANFORD: In the
middle of this, we have the
adult theropod dinosaur.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: For Stanford,
fossil hunting is second nature.

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RAY STANFORD: It's a gift.

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It's a habit that grows.

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And the more you do it,
the better you get at it.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: After
unearthing his largest
find, the 79-year-old
is still searching for

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the next big discovery.

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RAY STANFORD: You get
addicted, I confess.

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You just keep on tracking.

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PAMELA KIRKLAND: For the "PBS
NewsHour," I'm Pamela Kirkland
in Greenbelt, Maryland.