A Dinosaur Named Sue
The story of "Sue" is probably the biggest secrets in the Animal Kingdom. Dinosaur 13 is a documentary that chronicled the events of American paleontologists Sue Hendrickson and Pete Larson and the team that discovered the largest and most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex ever found while digging in the badlands of South Dakota.
In short, the skeleton was seized from Larson by the Federal government, followed by a ten-year-long legal battle with the FBI, the National Park Service, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and Maurice Williams, the landowner on whose property the bones were discovered. In that time, Pete spent 18 months in jail and Maurice WIlliams wons the rights to Sue.
When Maurice Williams decided to auction Sue at Sotheby's, many feared that she would end up in a private collection. The Field Museum in Chicago was concerned about Sue going to a private collector, and decided to purchase Sue. The Field Museum realized they may not have the funds to purchase Sue so they requested that companies and private citizens provide financial support. Among those companies was Walt Disney Parks and Resorts. The Field Museum won Sue at auction for $7.6M - $8.3 with commissions.
Two preparation labs were funder to prepare the fossil, one at the Field Museum, and the other was at the newly opened Animal Kingdom at Walt Disney World. Missions of people witnessed the preparation at both labs. One set of casts were mounted into a skeleton and is on display near the entrance to the Dinosaur attraction in the Animal Kingdom at Walt Disney World.
This is a 3 bracket HDR image with the normal exposure set to aperture f/7.1, 1/100 sec shutter speed, ISO 100, and 21mm focal length (1.5x crop).
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