The Real Chicago

Top Menu

  • Home
  • E-newsletter
  • Contact

Main Menu

  • Home
  • The Big City Blog
  • General Features
  • Around Town
    • First Look – Reviews
    • Hidden Gems
    • Inside Scoop
  • Eat. Drink. Shop.
    • Good Eats
    • Signature Dishes
    • A Round of Drinks
    • Shop Around the Corner
  • The Local Angle
    • Chicago Insider
    • The Local Corner
    • My Chicago
  • Interviews
  • Forum
Sign in / Join
  • Home
  • E-newsletter
  • Contact

logo

Header Banner

The Real Chicago

  • Home
  • The Big City Blog
  • General Features
  • Around Town
    • First Look – Reviews
    • Hidden Gems
    • Inside Scoop
  • Eat. Drink. Shop.
    • Good Eats
    • Signature Dishes
    • A Round of Drinks
    • Shop Around the Corner
  • The Local Angle
    • Chicago Insider
    • The Local Corner
    • My Chicago
  • Interviews
  • Forum
Breaking News

Chicago’s hidden gems: Kiss Kiss Cabaret, Unabridged Bookstore, Lulu Belle’s Pancake House and TNT at The Annoyance

General Features
Home›featured-blogs›General Features›Dinosaur delight: Curator Peter Makovicky describes the Field Museum’s new exhibit about prehistoric Antarctica

Dinosaur delight: Curator Peter Makovicky describes the Field Museum’s new exhibit about prehistoric Antarctica

By TheRealChicagoOnline
September 16, 2018
1953
0
Share:

By Peter Makovicky

** The Field Museum’s new exhibit, Antarctic Dinosaurs, is performing very well in our visitor polls, so we feel it is successfully telling the story of prehistoric Antarctica. The exhibit is very immersive and visitors get transported to present-day, icy, nearly lifeless Antarctica, and then back in time to when life thrived there. We showcase fossils from Antarctica along with life-sized reconstructions of these animals in their environments.

Some of the highlights are skeletons and life reconstructions of Jurassic dinosaurs — including two species that are so new to science they don’t yet have scientific names — as well as giant crocodile-sized amphibians and some of the clothing and items used by the earliest Antarctic explorers.

Throughout the exhibit, visitors learn about changes in the earth’s history like continental drift and how Antarctica changed from being a forested landmass teeming with life to the barren ice desert it is today.

** The Field Museum is a great place to learn about the diversity of life on Earth and its history. Our exhibits showcase some amazing specimens and artifacts that tell stories guaranteed to blow your mind. And we change it up pretty often, so visitors will always have something new to see.

** Maximo is a titanosaur, a family of sauropod dinosaurs that lived mainly in the Southern Hemisphere in the Cretaceous Period. Our cast is based on parts of six individuals that were found together at a site in Patagonia, where they perished about 100 million years ago. At 122 feet and an estimated 70 tons, it is the largest dinosaur yet discovered.

** The star of our show is Cryolophosaurus, a 26-foot-long predator with a crest running across the top of its skull. When we were excavating its skeleton, we kept finding shed teeth of what we thought was a smaller species of predator in the rock alongside the bones. After some careful study, we determined the teeth actually belong to the same species — Cryolophosaurus fed on its own kind 195 million year ago! Just as today, Antarctica was a tough place to survive back then, only for different reasons.

Peter Makovicky is the Curator of Dinosaurs in the Field Museum’s Section of Earth Sciences. He has conducted fieldwork on four continents and described more than 15 new dinosaur species. Makovicky is lead curator on the Antarctic Dinosaurs exhibit and on the new SUE experience. The Field Museum is located at 1400 S. Lake Shore Dr. FieldMuseum.org

TagsAntarctic DinosaursField MuseumMaximo titanosaurPeter MakovickySUE experienceThe Real Chicago
Previous Article

The Big City Blog: “Tootsie,” the beloved ...

Next Article

The Big City Blog: The foodie paradise ...

0
Shares
  • 0
  • +
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

TheRealChicagoOnline

Related articles More from author

  • General Features

    The Berghoff and Gino’s East: Tasty new breweries in Chicago landmark locations

    May 9, 2019
    By TheRealChicagoOnline
  • We Ask, They Answer

    We Ask, They Answer: Q&A with Zanies comedian Pat McGann on following a dream and what happens in the green ...

    October 1, 2015
    By TheRealChicagoOnline
  • The Big City Blog

    The Big City Blog: Five Chicago rock concerts this music lover can’t wait to see in 2018

    February 11, 2018
    By TheRealChicagoOnline
  • First Look - Reviews

    First Look review: Griffin Theatre’s version of “Ragtime” is a seriously unserious story of race and class in turn-of-the-century America

    June 29, 2017
    By TheRealChicagoOnline
  • General Features

    A dog’s world: Nine pet-friendly places in Chicago to spoil your furry friends

    August 7, 2017
    By TheRealChicagoOnline
  • Hidden Gems

    Chicago’s hidden gems: Three Dots and a Dash tiki lounge, cocktails at Scofflaw, and The Spice House

    April 27, 2015
    By TheRealChicagoOnline

You might be interested

  • Around TownGeneral Features

    Coffee craze: Exploring the best, most unique independent coffee shops Chicago has to offer

  • Around TownGeneral Features

    Love is in the air: Romantic spots to spend Valentine’s Day in Chicago

  • Around TownGeneral Features

    Southport shopping spree: Plenty of unique stores on this quaint street

Originally launched in 2006, The Real Chicago — as a glossy entertainment magazine, website and email newsletter — has consistently provided the very best insider information, features and reviews to help both tourists and active locals get the most out of exploring the greatest city on Earth.
© Copyright The Real Chicago. All rights reserved.

Login

Welcome! Login in to your account
Lost your password?

Lost Password

Back to login