Robert Charles Wolf

Born in Storm Lake, Iowa, Robert Wolf spent the first five years of his life on a farm near Pocahontas. He is a lifelong Iowan. He is a self-taught geologist specializing in Paleozoic and Cretaceous fossils and rocks of the Iowa area.

When he was nine a friend showed him some fossils in road rock in a driveway. He has been collecting since, more than 40 years. He calls himself a CEO, collector of everything old. He may have the largest collection of common, worthless Iowa fossils anywhere. “Many of my specimens you will not find in any other collection. They don’t want them,” he said. “I have more rocks in my basement than some people have in their driveways. I even have rocks in my head.”

Fossil collecting is like traveling to another world that no one has ever seen and bringing back souvenirs. “Fossils are gifts from God. You don’t know what is inside. You are the first person to see what is inside when you crack open a rock.”

He began writing about his hobby and eventually submitted a manuscript to what was then the Iowa State University Press. A first reader made several suggestions for improvements but concluded the book could never be suitable for a university publisher. Robert made the changes and resubmitted the work which was accepted and published as Fossils of Iowa, Field Guide to Paleozoic Deposits. He tells other aspiring writers to never give up.

In his travels throughout Iowa he frequently visits state and county parks which lead to his second book, Iowa’s State Parks Also Forests, Recreation Areas, and Preserves.

Today Robert Wolf is a freelance writer in Fort Dodge, Iowa and works as a newspaper correspondent, writes for local publications, and has worked on two novels. One, a science fiction novel has been rejected by 75 publishers. He will not give up.