GREAT DINOSAURS 



113 



The gigantic skeleton in the center of the hall is the huge extinct 

 reptile, the dinosaur Brontosaurus, found in the Jurassic beds of Wyom- 

 ing. It is the only mounted specimen of its kind in the 

 world and more than two-thirds of the skeleton is the 

 original petrified bone. It is sixty-six feet eight inches in length, 

 sixteen feet in height and is estimated to have weighed when alive 

 thirty-five tons. Brontosaurus is one of the largest giant reptiles and 

 as is indicated by its teeth was herbivorous, probal)ly living on the rank 

 water weeds of the nearly sea-level marshes of Wyoming. Contrasted 

 AA-ith the herbivorous Brontosaurus is the carnivorous dinosaur Allo- 

 saurus, mounted to represent the animal feeding on the 

 fallen carcass of a Brontosaurus, upon which it preyed. 



Allosaurus 



Section of the skin of Traciiodon sfiowin; 

 About natural size. 



the small scutes with which the animal was covered. 



This is not a fanciful mounting, for these -v-ery skeletons were found 

 in close proximity to each other in the Jurassic beds of Wyoming, and 

 the skeleton of the fallen Brontosaurus shows gouges made by the 

 teeth of Allosaurus as it tore the flesh from its victim. 



Near the Allosaurus group is a portion of a skeleton of Tyrannosaunis, 

 the last and most powerful of the carnivorous dinosaurs. A complete 

 skeleton is temporarily placed in the Hall of the Age of 

 Man, as there is not room for it in the Dinosaur Hall. 

 To the left of Brontosaurus are two complete specimens of the duck- 

 billed dinosaur Trachodon. One shows the animal erect 

 and standing on guard, while the other is shown feeding on 

 shellfish and plants of the Cretaceous swamps of Montana. 



Tyrannosaurus 



Trachodon 



