It’s OFFICIAL – Podokesaurus is the Massachusetts State Dinosaur!

 


Restoration of Podokesaurus holyokensis.  – art by FunkMonk (Michael B. H.) – 
Based on figures in original description[1] and skeletal diagrams of the related Coelophysis, such as in the 2016 book The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs by Gregory S. Paul. Creative Commons – https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0

 Hooray!  The Mass State Dinosaur bill has passed the state legislature, and was just signed by the Governor on 5/2/22.   Stay tuned for updates and/or celebration details. 

Welcome to the future home of the Massachusetts State Dinosaur!

In February 2021, MA lawmakers filed a bill to designate a state dinosaur for Massachusetts. The proposed bill is currently making its ways through the legislative process. Here, you can learn more about the proposed dinosaur, the Podokesaurus Holyokensis and the process for making a law.

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    3D VRML MODEL OF THE STATE DINOSAUR — Here’s a small teaser of the cool content we’ll be posting on this site in the near future.  Check out this 3D VRML file of the ACTUAL original state dinosaur Podokesaurus cast, discovered in the early 1900’s by a female paleontologist named Dr. Mignon Talbot in Western Massachusetts (please note: this 3D model is big and can take a few seconds to a few tens of seconds to load up — PLEASE BE PATIENT for it to load, thank you!).  Be sure to use the controls on top to expand the model and play with it full screen:

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    (model by Barnas Monteith, photos by Larisa Allen, Alfred Venne & Beneski Museum, Amherst College, CCA 4.0)

    License details: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)