The Iwaki City Coal and Fossil Museum (Horuru) in Fukushima Prefecture is set to celebrate its 40th anniversary in October. Known as a "treasure house" for fossils, the museum showcases numerous ancient fossils and offers educational and fun experiences for families.
The museum stands on land that was once an ancient ocean where many fossils have been unearthed. The most notable discovery made here was one in 1968 by Tadashi Suzuki, a high school student at the time, who found the fossil of a new genus of plesiosaur on a riverbank.
"I was deeply moved by the discovery, as it overturned the common belief that dinosaur and elasmosaurus fossils could not be found in Japan," Suzuki, now 72, recalled.