Source Materials: The Wildlife of Primeval World

If you enjoy my Sentimental Paleontology posts, you'll love this one—it's about actual paleontology! Dinosaurs, man! Who doesn't love dinosaurs?

I love dinosaurs. And that's why I've always had a special place in my heart for the Primeval World Diorama. You can keep your Fun Facts^TM about the New York World's Fair and the Ford Magic Skyway and the world record for the longest diorama display. All that stuff is important, but it pales in comparison to the simple fact that: Dinosaurs.

But are they...accurate dinosaurs? No. No they are not. We can get that out of the way right off the bat. The Primeval World diorama contains animatronic figures built in the mid-60s, many of them riffing off an animated movie that came out in 1940. At best, they reflect the paleontological consensus of the times, filtered through the sensibilities of animators and other artists who were not necessarily scientifically literate, let alone scientists.

So just how bad is it? Let's find out. While grinning like an eight-year-old at the Natural History Museum, because dinosaurs.

Coal Age Forest

The first section of the diorama pre-dates the dinosaurs. It's the Carboniferous Period, when you definitely could see the forest for the trees, because the forests weren't made of trees but of giant horsetail plants.* Actually, the depiction of the plants in this section is really good—they look just like every illustration I've ever seen in books on prehistoric life.

But the animals are where it's really at, right? This section of the Primeval World features three kinds. The giant snails and dragonflies basically check out, but we all know who the real stars are here:

Also pictured: Giant snail and dragonfly

When I was a kid, I always assumed these were meant to be Dimetrodon, the most famous of the sail-backed pelycosaurs and a staple of cheap packages of plastic toy dinosaurs even though synapsids are not dinosaurs. They're not even precisely reptiles; they're an early step on the road from reptiles to mammals. Say hello to your own ancestors, in other words.

Anyway, these aren't Dimetrodon. According to the labels on a detailed map of Disneyland, they're Edaphosaurus, another pelycosaur which lived at the same time and was actually preyed upon by Dimetrodon. Are they accurate? Yes and no. The overall shape is pretty good (unlike the cartoonier proportions of some of the ones we'll be examining later), but the legs sprawl too much and as a mammal-ancestor, ol' “Daphy” probably was not quite that scaly. The glowing red eyes can, of course, be chalked up to artistic license.

Sauropods

Okay, now we're on to some actual dinosaurs:

The aforementioned map labels these as Brontosaurus, one of the most well-known of all dinosaur genera even though it's not real. Or maybe it is now. Unless it isn't. I can't keep track of all the drama in the field of paleotaxonomy. In any case, an obscure law actually forbids the depiction of three or more distinct dinosaur types in a single work unless one of them is a sauropod.

Okay, not really. But collectively, sauropods are one of the most recognizable types of dinos. So how do these stack up against reality?

Really, really poorly. The goofy faces and overlarge heads can again be attributed to artistic license, but the view of sauropods as lumbering swamp-dwellers subsisting on water plants is decades out of date. However, I will not hear a word said against these guys, and here's why. It's anecdote time again!

When I was a kid, my mom made a joke about the big sauropod having terrible table manners because of the way it let the plants hang out of its mouth while chewing. And if she ever caught us doing something similarly careless (e.g. with spaghetti), she would say “Don't eat like a dinosaur!” So I have some major family nostalgia connected to the Primeval World's sauropods.

Pterosaurs

The next batch of critters we encounter are a flock of pterosaurs, AKA “flying dinosaurs” even though they also are not dinosaurs. You may also know them as pterodactyls, though this is not strictly accurate—it's a bit like referring to all rodents as rats.** We get a dang close look at one of them, and I think we can safely ID them as Pteranodon, the most familiar of the pterosaurs.

In the broad strokes, this guy looks pretty accurate to the fossils. It's his behavior that deviates from reality (as paleontologists currently understand it, a disclaimer that must be understood to apply to every statement of scientific fact). A real pterosaur would not perch upright like this, but might rather cling to its support with all four limbs. Odd as it may be to envision, pterosaurs were quadrupeds; they could move over the ground quite readily, using their wings as functioning limbs. They probably couldn't rear up on their hind limbs at all.

Triceratops

It's a little unsettling to suddenly see a Pteranodon up close and squawking, but fortunately the ride follows it up with this adorable tableau:

These may be the most accurate critters in the entire diorama. I can't spot any identifiable anatomical inaccuracies, and the parental behavior is on-point. Interestingly, I think back in the Sixties, paleontologists still assumed that most dinosaurs abandoned their eggs (like the majority of modern reptiles) and devoted parents like Maisaura were outliers. It took time to discover evidence suggesting that parental behavior was actually quite common throughout the dinosaur family. If I'm right about this, it means the Imagineers were ahead of the curve in this one instance.

Incidentally, the chirping sounds in this scene are taken from the noises made by hatching baby alligators. I dare you to tell me that's not freaking precious.

Ornithomimus

On second thought, these guys are pretty accurate too:

Not much to say here, except that I always like seeing the so-called “ostrich dinosaurs” get acknowledged. They're sort of underappreciated.

Oh, and one more thing: the dust storm projection on the back wall is freaking eerie to me, and I'm not sure why.

And now for the laughably off-model grand finale!

T. rex and Stegosaurus

Let's just count the mistakes, shall we?

1. These two never met in real life. T. rex lived during the Cretaceous period, Stegosaurus millions of years earlier in the Jurassic. You are temporally closer to meeting a T. rex than Stegosaurus is.
2. T. rex's anatomy. We can perhaps forgive the kangaroo-like posture as reflecting the scientific consensus of the time, but three fingers per forelimb? Excuse me?
3. Stegosaurus's anatomy. It doesn't seem to bad until you notice the fifth spike on the tail.
4. They're standing mere feet from an active lava flow and not bursting into flames. This is more of a physics issue than a paleontological one, but I thought I should point it out.

But you know what? Despite the fact that every error in the Primeval World grates upon my scientifically literate, dinosaur-loving soul, I wouldn't want to see it changed for anything. It's all iconic. It has earned the right to be this much of a hot mess. It's not trying to be educational; it's just a cool thing to brighten the train trip between Tomorrowland and Main Street.

And besides.

Dinosaurs.

* Okay, technically they were also made of trees. But everyone fixates on the giant horsetail plants.

** Which some people do, because they can't be arsed to learn the difference between a marmot and a capybara.