Monica Lin Brown was born on May 24, 1988, in Lake Jackson, Texas. Lake Jackson is a city in Brazoria County, Texas within the Greater Houston metropolitan area. It is the proverbial small town with a population of around 28,000. She was three when her parents divorced. Her brother Justin was a year older. Her mother worked night shifts as a nurse in hospitals in the Houston, Texas area. After her mother was seriously injured in a car accident, her grandma moved in to raise the kids. Brown attended nine schools in eleven years.  Not ideal, but she played tennis, volleyball, softball, was a cheerleader, and ran cross country. Running was her passion. She said, “Running is like meditation for me, I can just think, without anyone talking to me.” Accompanying her brother to the Army Recruiter’s office in November 2005, she found that she could obtain healthcare training in the Army. The available school was for a Combat Medic. After AIT and Airborne School, she was assigned to the Forward Support Company, attached to the 4th Squadron, 73rd Cavalry, 4th Brigade Combat Team of the 82nd Airborne Division. About a month into the tour, a small outpost requested a female medic. Any treatment of an Afghan woman had to be done by another woman. Brown got the assignment. The outpost was little more than a cluster of tents and no running water. Brown’s aid station was an 8-by-5-foot area barely big enough for a stretcher. “I loved it,” she said. PFC Brown was riding in the Humvee with the Platoon Staff Sergeant Jose Santos. She didn’t hear the explosion, but the .50 cal gunner on her Humvee yelled down, “Two one’s hit. I see smoke and a tire rolling through the field.”  The trail Humvee, with 5 soldiers inside, had rolled over a pressure plate IED, causing a fireball as its fuel tank and fuel cans ignited. PFC Brown immediately grabbed her medical bag and her weapon and opened the door. The .50 cal gunner yelled down, “Shut the door”, as incoming gun fire started pinging the Humvee. They were caught in an ambush. As the .50 cal gunner turned around and started putting suppressive fire at the enemy, SSG Santos yelled, “Let’s go Doc.” With SSgt. Santos a couple of steps ahead, ran through the heavy silt of the riverbed about 300 meters through machine gun and rifle fire to the burning vehicle. The other vehicles were turning around to form a crescent formation and began to return fire. As soon as they got to the ditch, the enemy started dropping mortar rounds around them. Brown threw her body over Smith, shielding him and yelling to another soldier to “cover up” the other casualty, as more than a dozen rounds landed around them. Then the ammunition inside the burning Humvee started exploding: 60mm mortars, 40mm grenade rounds, and rifle ammunition. Again, Brown lay over the wounded. Lieutenant Robbins, the Platoon Leader, moved his Humvee near the injured and was incredulous that Brown had survived. He said, “I was surprised she didn’t get killed, and she’d been there for 10 to 15 minutes or longer. There was small arms fire coming in from two different machine-gun positions, mortars falling, a burning Humvee with 16 mortar rounds in it, chunks of aluminum the size of softballs flying all around. It was about as hairy as it gets.” SSG Santos drove the ANA pickup over to get the wounded. He would later recall that bullets were flying within inches of Brown, but she was focused on the casualties. Staff Sergeant Aaron Best, who was Lieutenant Robbins .50 cal gunner that day, said, “I’ve seen a lot of grown men who didn’t have the courage and weren’t able to handle themselves under fire. On March 21, 2008, the Army flew Monica’s brother Justin to Bagram Air base to stand beside her as Vice President Dick Cheney presented 19 year old, five foot two, 120 pound, Combat Medic, Army Spec. Monica Lin Brown the Silver Star, making her the 2nd and last female to be awarded the Nation’s 3rd highest award for valor in combat.

In the early part of this century the famous Beresovka mammoth carcass was discovered in Siberia. Nearly intact, the animal was found buried in silty gravel sitting in the upright position. The mammoth had a broken foreleg, evidently caused by a fall from a nearby cliff 10,000 years ago. The remains of its stomach were intact and there were grasses and buttercups lodged between its teeth. The flesh was still edible, but reportedly not tasty. No one has ever satisfactorily explained how the Beresovka mammoth and other animals found frozen in the subarctic could have been frozen before being consumed by predators of the time. Some have proposed a sudden change in climate, but this hardly seems a likely explanation. The scientist who uncovered the Beresovka mammoth conjectured that the animal fell into a snow-filled ravine that protected the body until it was perhaps covered by gravel during a summer flood. The Berezovka mammoth was discovered in 1900 near the Berezovka River in Siberia and is one of the most well-preserved mammoth specimens, having been frozen in permafrost for about 44,000 years. Its remains are displayed in the Zoological Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia, where it has provided valuable insights into the life and environment of mammoths. The Berezovka mammoth provides valuable insights into the life and environment of mammoths. Its well-preserved remains allow scientists to study its diet, habitat, and the conditions of the time it lived. The specimen has contributed to our understanding of the mammoth's adaptation to cold climates and its eventual extinction. The remains of the Berezovka mammoth are prominently displayed in a glass casket at the Zoological Museum. This exhibit not only showcases the mammoth itself but also serves as a resource for ongoing research into prehistoric life and environmental changes in Siberia.