Fair But Make It Jurassic Park: Dinos To Be At Illinois State Fair This Month
Welcome...to Jurassic Park. There's going to be a prehistoric addition to the Illinois State Fair this month.
We're in fair mode with the Mississippi Valley Fair this week but happening in just a couple of weeks is the Illinois State Fair. This year, it will feature over two dozen dinosaurs that are part of “Dino” Don Lessem's exhibit.
And yes, he really was an advisor on dinosaurs for the original "Jurassic Park". He even has a dinosaur named after him, the lessemsaurus.
Dino Don told WHBF:
I’ve been working on dinosaurs for 35 years. I used to excavate them, write a lot of kids books. And I got interested in robots about three years ago, when I realized I could make them full-sized.
Dino Don has over 300 dinosaurs across the world right now but his business is still pretty new.
The Illinois State Fair is August 11th-21st in Springfield. Here's their website to get info on tickets and times.
Even though he made a career as a paleontologist, Dino Don says he wasn't always a dinosaur buff though. He told WHBF:
I was not a dinosaur kid. Like you weren’t, and most kids are. But as an adult to go out on these things in the middle of no place and see, like to be the first person to see an animal that nobody’s ever seen is unbelievable feeling.
The dinosaur exhibit will be $8 at the fair's Happy Hollow. It will be open 10:00 a.m.-8:00 p.m. daily. You can get more details about the exhibit here.