…although it does not shed any light on coloration issues…
http://www.dinohunters.demon.co.uk/History/Trachodon2.htm
tells of the dinosaur mummy that includes preserved skin and
http://www.dinosauria.com/jdp/misc/scipionyx.html
details the dinosaur fossil that includes preserved internal organs (though this specimen does not have preserved skin)…
Here’s another skin sample:
http://www.discover.com/may_99/breakbump.html
And this article indicates that it may be possible to one day actually determine something about dionsaurian skin color:
http://www.newscientist.com/hottopics/dinosaurs/jurpink.jsp
Or dinosaurian skin, even.
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Please include a link to Cecil’s column if it’s on the straight dope web site.
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Cecil’s column can be found on-line at this link:
What color were dinosaurs? (21-Mar-1980)
moderator, «Comments on Cecil’s Columns»
Not to be too much of a party pooper, but there was an exhibit of an anatosaur “dinosaur mummy”, complete with skin impressions, on exhibit in the American Museum of Natural History long before Cecil’s original column appeared. I know – I practically grew up there.
Darwin’s Finch: That’s a spectacular find, but to be fair to Cecil, the hadrosaur skin fossil is actually a skin impression, not the actual preserved skin of the dinosaur. It is, like I said, a spectacular and important fossil, however!
CalMeacham: That dinosaur mummy is the very same one that my first link refers to: so there you have it, independent corroboration!
The column can also be found on pages 10-11 of Cecil Adams’ book «The Straight Dope (1984; reissued 1986, 1998)».