Dinosaurs will return to Mid-America Science Museum starting April 25 with the exhibit “Expedition: Dinosaur.”
The original, fully-interactive exhibit from Sacramento, California-based Stage 9 Exhibits goes through Aug. 16 and features dinosaur animatronics and hands-on activities.
MASM Director of Educational Development Casey Chandler said the popularity of previous dinosaur exhibits motivated this year’s choice.
“If we don’t have a dinosaur exhibit every three to five years, I think there would be public riots,” Chandler said. “So we try and bring them back, but we try and do it a little different each time to make it interesting and interactive.”
The previous dinosaur exhibit was “Expedition Dinosaur: Rise of the Mammals,” which Chandler said was more focused on the extinction of the dinosaurs and the mammals that were developing. This exhibit will cover how humans discovered the remains of the dinosaurs and modern archaeology techniques.
One exhibit is on the Bone Wars, a heated rivalry between paleontologists Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope. Marsh and Cope started their careers as friends, but they soon developed a rivalry in their careers. They each made notable contributions to the field of paleontology.
The exhibit will include hands-on archaeology exhibits.
“The exhibit also goes into a more modern version of archaeology,” Chandler said. “There’s one exhibit that has a robotic arm that you use to try and pick up and retrieve dinosaur eggs. There’s a model that shows what an archaeologist’s tent would have looked like both in the early days in the 1800s and what a modern lab experience would look like.
“There’s an area where you basically get to play Operation on a dinosaur and remove bones from a T. Rex. You can make your own Pangaea. They do a really good job of trying to make it accessible for the more tactile learners who don’t want to just look at a big moving dinosaur, but play with it as well.”
Chandler said she thinks the biggest hit of the exhibit will be the big dinosaur models.
“They’re always just so dynamic and exciting,” she said. “My first memory of the museum was when I came when I was 3 years old, when the first round of dinosaurs came in 1989. I very distinctly remember clinging to my father and screaming in fear. I was not a fan. I’ll be honest: I am still kind of not a fan, but for most kids, that is going to be a pivotal, memory-making moment.”
This year’s exhibit marks the fifth MASM has done in partnership with Stage 9 Exhibits, according to Chief Operations Officer Noreen Killen.
“This is our second dinosaur (exhibit) with them,” Killen said. “We had Hall of Heroes, we had Animation Academy and we had Toy-topia. They work with a paleontologist to make the dinosaur exhibit. So everything you’re seeing is as up-to-date as possible, backed by paleontology.”
For future exhibits, Killen said the special exhibit for 2027 will be called Minotaur Mazes, which will be about mazes and brain games. Chandler said that due to a good relationship with Stage 9 Productions, MASM will be able to open the dinosaur exhibit earlier than usual.
“They reached out to us and said, ‘Hey, we have an opportunity; would you be able to do that?'” Chandler said. “So instead of waiting until Memorial Day weekend, we will actually be opening on April 25, and we’ll have it a little bit longer, too, until Aug. 16. We’ll even have it for some of our field trips as well, which is unique because we don’t usually have our summer exhibit early enough for field trips. So, teachers, bring your kids to see some dinosaurs.”
