Jurassic Quest returns to Montgomery, a land rich in dinosaur days
As Jurassic Quest returns to Montgomery this weekend, the Capital of Dreams is a surprisingly good spot for dinosaur lovers who want to go beyond seeing them on the big screen.
After all, our state was home to a variety of real life prehistoric critters at least 145 million years ago. Not quite back to Jurassic times, at least not according the remains found so far, but pretty close. That's probably because roughly 200 million years ago, Jurassic Alabama was a hot mess.
During the main age of dinosaurs, our little spot of land was much closer to the equator and had a shoreline that varied by hundreds of miles, according to Birmingham geologist David C. Kopaska-Merkel, writing in the Encyclopedia of Alabama. That means much of south central Alabama was either submerged or in a desert state for millions of years. During this period when the shore was up, the Black Belt and Montgomery was covered by a warm, shallow sea that was believed to have a shoreline that extended across Autauga County.
You think Alabama summers are hot now? The Jurassic days here stayed pretty consistently above 100 degrees year round.
Fortunately, it should feel much cooler here in good ol' 2022 inside the Renaissance Montgomery Convention Center this weekend during Jurassic Quest. Among its many life-size dinosaurs, it has a Spinosaurus and the iconic Tyrannosaurus (AKA the T. rex). Guests will also see ancient ocean dwellers, including a 50-foot ancient shark called megalodon.
It's a fun time for kids, who can also ride dinosaurs, explore bounce houses, create a dino craft, dig for fossils, meet baby dinos, and walk with dinosaurs.
Jurassic Quest will be open Friday 1-8 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m.-8 p.m., and Sunday 9 a.m.-5 p.m.
All guests 2 and older must have a ticket. Standard admission tickets for kids and adults are $22. Ages 65 and up get in for $19. For kids 2-10, they have a kids unlimited admission for $37, which includes unlimited access to stationary and walking dinosaur rides, fossil dig, and inflatables. Tickets are available online at jurassicquest.com/upcoming-events, where guests can select a day and an entry time.
Welcome to Cretaceous Alabama
Alabama had real creatures like what you may have seen in the "Jurassic Park" and "Jurassic World" movie franchise, though our state's known ones are from the Cretaceous period — between 145 and 65 million years ago — just after Jurassic and just ahead of the big extinction.
The most dominant known predator of that day roamed around Montgomery. The Appalachiosaurus (Appalachian Lizard) montgomeriensis is a relative of the T. rex, with much larger arms. Bones of a 22-feet-long juvenile Appalachiosaurus were discovered in Montgomery County 40 years ago by another geologist, Auburn University professor David King.
“We knew it was a predatory dinosaur, but we didn’t know exactly what kind, so that took a while,” King told the Advertiser in June.
Today, Appalachiosaurus remains are on display at the McWane Science Center in Birmingham, where they have a few other Alabama dinosaurs from the Late Cretaceous Period on exhibit:
Ornithomimid — This 16-foot herbivore probably fed on fruit and insects. Somewhat ostrich-like, they were fast-runners, with toothless jaws, and traveled in herds. Fun fact: An Ornithomimid egg was found in Selma in 1970.
Nodosaur — This 13-feet-long armored herbivore walked on all four legs. It was covered in plating and bony spikes. They were the second most abundant dinosaurs in North America.
Dromaeosaur — This 9-foot-long carnivore was very much like their relatives, the Velociraptors (heavily featured in "Jurassic Park"). They were light, fast and hunted in packs with their powerful claws. However, it also had feathers.
You can see these and some non-dinosaur Alabama creatures from that time — the flying reptile Pteranodon with a 25-foot wingspan, and the 1-foot tall sea bird Ichthyornis — at McWane Science Center on the corner of Birmingham's 2nd Avenue North and 19th Street. Learn more at mcwane.org.
Get to know Alabama's official fossil
Another creature that roamed Alabama's coastal waters during the Eocene period, between 55.8 and 33.9 million years ago, is Basilosaurus cetoides — a 50- to 60-foot-long whale with hind limbs and wicked teeth used to hunt fish, sharks and likely even smaller whales. It's just as long or longer than the megalodon. Many of their remains were found in Choctaw County.
No, it's not a dinosaur. It's not even a lizard, though it's name means "king lizard." Like other whales, Basilosaurus is a mammal. A 1912 story about them in the Advertiser referred to them by another name, Zeughlodon.
Some examples of its remains can be seen in Tuscaloosa at the Alabama Museum of Natural History on the University of Alabama's campus, and at the the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science.
According to a release from Dr. Dana Ehret, curator of paleontology for The University of Alabama Museums, remains of the Basilosaurus were found in the 1830s. Their huge vertebrae were seen as perfect materials to use for furniture and construction materials.
In 1984, Alabama adopted the Basilosaurus as it's official state fossil.
Go on a Dino Dig at the zoo
The Montgomery Zoo and Mann Wildlife Museum, 2301 Coliseum Parkway, has a wildly popular Dino Dig Education Program perfect for junior explorers.
Along with a classroom lesson plan, participating kids aspend time getting dirty during real dig time. There's also a life animal presentation, and all participants get a goody bag to take home.
For participants ages four through 12, it's $28 per child, or $20 for Montgomery Zoo members. Accompanying adults (ages 13 and up) are $17, or free for Montgomery Zoo members. Advanced reservations are required. No tickets will be sold at the door. While this Saturday's Dino Dig is sold out, there's another one next month on Nov. 19.
To learn more and reserve your spot for the next Dino Dig, email the zoo's education department at zooinfo@montgomeryal.gov, or call 334-625-4909.
Learn more online at montgomeryzoo.com.
Dinosaurs in Advertiser history
A dinosaur dig through the Advertiser's archives reveals a facionation with learning about the "terrible lizards" as far back as 1900:
The earliest was a story about a party of 65 geologists, paleontologists and botanists who were invited by the Union Pacific Railroad to explore the fossil fields of Wyoming for 40 days. Half way through, their number shrunk to 14. They found about six tons of fossil remains, but no complete skeletons.
Wyoming was a high level player in the world of dinosaur remains. In 1907, there was a story about a bone cabin discovered in 1897, built there by a Mexican sheep herder. The cabin's foundations were built out of fossil bones the man found. It contained "jaws of a diplodocus, teeth of a brontosaurus, knuckles of the ichthyosaurus, vertebrae of the camarasaurus," and "chunks" of several other dinosaurs. The bones came from a nearby hill. The cabin would open in 1932 as a roadside attraction.
In 1926, Montgomery welcomed the 1925 dinosaur film "The Lost World" at the Capitol and Prattauga theaters.
From the mid-1920s through the 1940s, Sinclair Motor Oils, distributed in Montgomery by McConnell and Wells, ran a series of ads in the Advertiser showing dinosaur exhibits from the World Fair and dinosaur illustrations. In the decades to come, the use of dinosaurs in ads for a multitude of other products became much less positive — representing old, outdated everything, especially cars.
In 1976, Troy University exhibited the remains of two hadrosaurian dinosaurs that were on loan from the Montgomery Paleontological Society. The bones were discovered in Montgomery's city limits, off of I-85, by Patrick Casson of Montgomery and Ken Whetstone of Lawrence, Kansas.
In April 1976, students at East YMCA kindergarten made a family of large dinosaur sculptures, which they put on display in an improvised museum there.
In 1979, a 6-foot-long fossilized fish believe to be 85 million years old was found in Greene County.
In 1987, paleontologists found remains of a Mosasaur in Montgomery County, a marine reptile from the Late Cretaceous Period. The largest confirmed Mosasaur was 56 feet.
In 1990, Montgomery Mall hadn't yet gone the way of the dinosaurs, but it did have a dinosaurs. The Dinosaur Alive! exhibit included robotic T. rex, Stegosaurus, a baby Brontosaurus and others, all half-scale to fit into the building. It was sponsored by the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts.
In 1993, dinosaurs were brought to cinematic life with the release of the first "Jurassic Park" movie, based on Michael Crichton's novel. It would spawn a series of films including "Jurassic World" that continued into 2022.
Contact Montgomery Advertiser reporter Shannon Heupel at sheupel@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Jurassic Quest returns to Montgomery, a land rich in dinosaur days
