Dakota Dinosaur Museum - Dickinson North Dakota

 Print This Post

Dakota Dinosaur Museum - Dickinson North Dakota

The Dakota Dinosaur Museum is located at 200 East Museum Drive in Dickinson, North Dakota. It began when the collections of Alice and Larry League began to exceed their dinosaur collection storage space. They needed more space to preserve and display their specimens which numbered in the thousands.

In 1987, the Leagues began overseeing the fundraising and construction of the museum. Through the establishment of a non-profit corporation and with donations from the local community, it opened in 1994, and the Leagues continue to serve as the museum Curator and Director. Today, over 300,000 people have visited the museum, and the number continues to grow. The museum operates on admission fees and the revenues from the gift shop.

The goal of the museum is to provide residents and tourists with a facility to see geological and paleontological specimens. They want to educate schools and communities in both North Dakota and other nearby states. The museum currently has eleven full size dinosaurs inside and three dinosaurs outside. The dinosaurs contained in the museum are from the Triassic through Cretaceous period.

The museum is proud of their Triceratops skeleton and skull that is in excellent shape and recent acquisitions include a baby Tyrannosaurus Rex. Ninety-one percent of the exhibits are real and many of them were found locally. The museum also has a fluorescent mineral display containing many different types of stones and minerals. The museum has over 800 different specimens of rocks, seashells, minerals and invertebrate fossils as well as vertebrate fossils of animals other than dinosaurs.

The self-guided museum tour gives visitors a chance to see all the exhibits the museum has to offer. For children, the museum has a Museum Scavenger Hunt, which allows children to work in teams and use the exhibits to find the answers to the hunt questions. Each exhibit is designed to both educate and entertain.

The gift shop at the Dakota Dinosaur Museum includes many fun and educational items for visitors to purchase in order to remind them of their museum visit. There are rocks and minerals, amber containing insects, jewelry, books, puzzles and Carnegie dinosaurs. The proceeds from the gift shop help support the operation of the museum.

The Dakota Dinosaur Museum is open from May 1 through Labor Day. It is open daily from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The museum is only open seasonally. The admission prices are $6 for those ages thirteen and up and $3 for those ages three to twelve years old. Children under age three are admitted free. School field trips and bus tours with more than twenty people can be scheduled for the museum in advance by contacting the museum. The museum asks that visitors do not bring food, drinks, pets or cell phones into the buildings.