Comments on: Enter the Dinosphere http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/2008/12/enter-the-dinosphere/ Where Paleontology Meets Pop Culture Sat, 22 Dec 2012 16:48:38 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4 By: Brachiosaurus Moves to Indianapolis | Dinosaur Tracking http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/2008/12/enter-the-dinosphere/comment-page-1/#comment-642 Brachiosaurus Moves to Indianapolis | Dinosaur Tracking Wed, 10 Jun 2009 14:13:12 +0000 http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/?p=663#comment-642 [...] Children’s Museum of Indianapolis, home of the Dinosphere, is welcoming some new additions this week. As reported by local TV station WISH, the museum just [...] [...] Children’s Museum of Indianapolis, home of the Dinosphere, is welcoming some new additions this week. As reported by local TV station WISH, the museum just [...]

]]> By: Michael Stearns http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/2008/12/enter-the-dinosphere/comment-page-1/#comment-261 Michael Stearns Wed, 31 Dec 2008 19:07:40 +0000 http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/?p=663#comment-261 Oh man, I had a similar experience at Seattle's Pacific Science Center. I believe the dinosaur exhibit has changed since, but it terrified me as a child. The entrance to the exhibit had a disturbing sculpture of a primitive deer-like mammal being swept over by a volcanic landslide, and once inside the roaring, moving, monsters on display had me in tears, my dad had to carry me through it. The outstanding memory was when my dad carried me to the "safe" spot, a little nook where a number of Dinosaur models and toys were on display (some I recognized from my own collection at home), and then as soon as I was feeling better and was prepared to maybe walk out, as we stepped out some kind of long-necked beast brought its head around right in front of me, gnashing teeth that I thought were much too pointy for a sauropod. Back into hiding for me.. The next time we went I found the whole thing had changed, the sculpture in the hall was still there, but I remembered a brightly lit room with several dull, brown Dinosaurs that resembled inaccurate toys, the sort where even the herbivores have sharp teeth (but were extremely scary anyway), and now the dinosaurs were colorful, and in more appropriate, life-like environments, with plenty of "cover" to hide behind or look at if the dinosaurs themselves proved too scary. To really help reduce the scare-effect, they even had a "naked" animatronic skeleton to remind kids that the dinosaurs weren't real right at the entrance. It may be that I don't remember it right, and I'm sure the newer exhibit is better, but I was a bit disappointed that I never got to go back and conquer my fears of that first exhibit! Oh man, I had a similar experience at Seattle’s Pacific Science Center. I believe the dinosaur exhibit has changed since, but it terrified me as a child. The entrance to the exhibit had a disturbing sculpture of a primitive deer-like mammal being swept over by a volcanic landslide, and once inside the roaring, moving, monsters on display had me in tears, my dad had to carry me through it. The outstanding memory was when my dad carried me to the “safe” spot, a little nook where a number of Dinosaur models and toys were on display (some I recognized from my own collection at home), and then as soon as I was feeling better and was prepared to maybe walk out, as we stepped out some kind of long-necked beast brought its head around right in front of me, gnashing teeth that I thought were much too pointy for a sauropod. Back into hiding for me..

The next time we went I found the whole thing had changed, the sculpture in the hall was still there, but I remembered a brightly lit room with several dull, brown Dinosaurs that resembled inaccurate toys, the sort where even the herbivores have sharp teeth (but were extremely scary anyway), and now the dinosaurs were colorful, and in more appropriate, life-like environments, with plenty of “cover” to hide behind or look at if the dinosaurs themselves proved too scary. To really help reduce the scare-effect, they even had a “naked” animatronic skeleton to remind kids that the dinosaurs weren’t real right at the entrance. It may be that I don’t remember it right, and I’m sure the newer exhibit is better, but I was a bit disappointed that I never got to go back and conquer my fears of that first exhibit!

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