Otterbein College’s Department of Life and Earth Sciences will celebrate scientist Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday, according to a school press release.

Birthday festivities will take place from 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Feb. 12 in the conference center on campus at 60 Collegeview Rd. Darwin’s birthday celebration will kick off the Science Lecture Series to be held next fall at Otterbein. 

The party will feature an evolving cake, music inspired by Darwin's life and work and a Darwin replica sand walk, where students can follow sandpaper footprints and examine organisms, specimens and photos representing Darwin’s work.

Darwin was a British scientist who greatly influenced the way scientists look at the natural world, as well as laid the foundations for the theory of evolution. He proposed the theory of evolution through natural selection and worked on this theory for 20 years. In 1859 Darwin published On the Origins of Species by Means of Natural Selection, challenging the prevailing orthodoxy of creation. Darwin’s discoveries now hold a prominent position within the science world.

For more information regarding Darwin’s 200th Birthday, please contact Michael Hoggarth at 614-823-1667.