Cabazon Dinosaurs
From the interstate highway the uncommon view of two giant dinosaurs, on an arid plain surrounded by mountains, is an irresistible magnet. They were built by Claude Bell, who ran the adjacent Wheel Inn on I-10. Claude, a former amusement park statue designer, took eleven years to build Dinny, a 150-foot-long apatosaurus and arguably the largest dinosaur in America. To cut costs, he scavenged rebar and cement from the construction of the freeway.Claude's next project, a giant Tyrannosaurus with a slide down its tail, was nearing completion when Claude died, age 91, in 1988. More sculptures were on the drawing board, including a Woolly Mammoth. The Tyrannosaurus - known as "Mr. Rex" - was never completed and, according to the museum manager in Dinny's belly, "it never will be."
Creationists:In 2005 Gary Kanter, an Orange County developer, began working with Pastor Robert Darwin Chiles to use the dinosaurs of Cabazon as a platform for their Creationist views.That ended after about ten years. The current owners like to repaint the dinosaurs several times a year in nontraditional dinosaur colors - but, then, no one really knows what colors dinosaurs were anyway.
The Wheel Inn:
Owned by Karel and Marie Kothera since 1993, closed in September 2013, and was bulldozed in December 2016.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Cabazon+Dinosaurs+-+World's+Biggest+Dinosaurs
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Cabazon+Dinosaurs
For almost 50 years, travelers driving west on Interstate 10 in Southern California have been greeted by Dinny the Dinosaur, a 150-foot-long recreation of an apatosaurus. His owners have dubbed him the “world’s biggest dinosaur.” Dinny, whose name is pronounced “Dine-y,” and his 65-foot-long Tyrannosaurus Rex counterpart “Mr. Rex” are part of a desert roadside attraction known as the Cabazon Dinosaurs.
Claude Bell:
A theme park artist and sand sculptor, created the reptilian beasts in the 1960s to attract customers to the Wheel Inn Cafe, his business. But though luring in tourists was his main goal, Claude had an additional motive. He wanted to build something that would last longer than his cafe.
Sand SculpturesAs a young adult, Bell spent his time working on the beaches of New Jersey, where he built sand sculptures for pocket change. His sand creations gained so much popularity that he was invited to compete in festivals all around the continent. However, he soon grew tired of watching the elements wreck his work.
Bell began building the dinosaurs in 1964 using spare materials from a nearby construction site. Without contractors or a proper construction company, he spent the next 11 years completing Dinny, who weighs over 150 tons.
Bell began constructing Mr. Rex in 1981, but passed away in 1988 before finishing his plan to build a large slide down the tyrannosaurus’ tail. Though he died before his work was complete, he lived long enough to see the dinosaurs gain fame after appearing in a Coke commercial, music videos, and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure.
The dinosaurs, lovingly named Rex and Dinny, have been welcoming wary travelers on the scorching journey between LA and Palm Springs for decades. They're massive creatures, and highly detailed, with looming shapes that are visible far from the route 10 highway.
Basically Hollywood royalty at this point, the dinos are cultural icons of the weird and kitschy culture that define SoCal. Their faces adorn nearly every book and website that covers California attractions, oddities, and road tripping. With stubby arms (I'm looking at you, Rex) and desert worn skin, they are true ambassadors of our fair state, and for that, I will forever be in awe of their awesomeness.
Visiting is a fun experience all around: kids laughing, millennials reminiscing over those sweet pop culture moments that have taken place here, and everyone smiling to snap that perfect dino-selfie. It’s actually quite surreal to experience these guys in person.
http://www.californiacuriosities.com/cabazon-dinosaurs
The T-Rex, affectionately known as “Mr. Rex,” took seven years to build, and you can climb right up into its head if you feel so inclined. Once you reach the base of the T rex, you can proceed up the walkway into the staircases. Three flights of stairs lead you up to the head of the T Rex.
The head of the T Rex is pretty creepy from the inside, as you can see in the photo above. When you are up there, you do have a pretty good view of the surrounding area.
https://californiathroughmylens.com/2011/07/photographing-the-cabazon-dinosaurs
Look through the teeth at the other dinosaur and the crowd below.
Depending on the time of year you pass these creatures, they might look a little different. I’ve seen the sculptures change from the Easter Bunny to Santa, to all pink with hearts to coincide with the holidays.
https://www.chrissihernandez.com/journal/2021/8/9/visit-the-giant-roadside-cabazon-dinosaurs
The dinosaurs were painted for Valentine’s Day
https://www.google.com/maps/@33.9205588,-116.7721168
https://pages.facebook.com/cabazondinosaurs
Mr. Rex put on his Santa suit!
During the weekends, the Sweet-o-saur Truck is serving up delicious dinosaur-themed ice cream treats! We may or may not have enticed our teenagers to come with the promise of one of their freshly made waffle dinosaur ice creams. Yum yum yum...Sweet-o-saur didn't disappoint.
Sweet-O-Saur TruckNOTE: It takes around 20 minutes to get your ice creams once ordered as they make the dinosaur waffles fresh
There is more here than just the two dinosaurs that you see from the freeway. Cabazon Dinosaurs has over fifty dinosaurs, a few robotic dinosaurs, a dinosaur dig and fossil panning. They even have a dinosaur you can ride on! The store has a wide variety of dinosaur souvenirs, memorabilia and trinkets that you can purchase.
A perfect pit stop along interstate 10, the location also adds to the experience, because you are far away from any major city. So it looks like the dinosaurs are living in their natural habitat.
https://socalfieldtrips.com/insider-tips-for-visiting-cabazon-dinosaurs-near-palm-springs
He began his artistic career as a teenager sculpting teddy bears in the sand on the beach at Atlantic City, New Jersey in front of a wooden building that was shaped like an elephant. Tips from passersby encouraged him, and before long he was making a living with his sand sculptures at state and county fairs across the country.
Knott's Berry Farm:
In 1947, Walter Knott hired him to create the concrete sculptures of Handsome Brady and Whiskey Bill, who sit on the bench beside the Gold Trails Hotel in Ghost Town at Knott’s Berry Farm.
These were well received by guests, and led to more concrete bench sculptures, including the Calico Belles, who were patterned after real people, Marilyn Schuler, who was a dancer in the Calico Saloon, and Cecelia Peterson, who was a singer there.
Bell also operated the portrait studio at Knott’s from 1951 to 1986. He, his wife, and his daughter, Wendy, all worked there creating portraits of guests. His original portrait studio is now the Rock and Geode Shop. The interior fireplace, mantle, and relief of Mark Twain therein were all sculpted by Claude Bell.
Knott commissioned Bell to execute the minuteman statue at the full-scale replica of Independence Hall at Knott’s Berry Farm. Bell painted portraits of Walter and Cordelia Knott which hang in the Chicken Dinner Restaurant. He also sculpted a bust of Walter Knott which is in Independence Hall, and a copy of which is on display at the ghost town of Calico, California
Cabazon:
Perhaps inspired by Knott, Bell purchased 78 acres near Cabazon in 1946.
There he built the Wheel Inn Cafe, which opened in 1958.
Remembering the building that was shaped like an elephant in Atlantic City, Bell began building a life-sized, concrete dinosaur to attract customers to his cafe in 1964.
Over the next 11 years, he built the 150-foot-long brontosaurus, and later, the 100-ton tyrannosaurus.
The creation of the Cabazon dinosaurs began in the 1960s by Knott’s Berry Farm sculptor and portrait artist Claude K. Bell (1897–1988) to attract customers to his Wheel Inn Cafe, which opened in 1958. Dinny, the first of the Cabazon dinosaurs, was started in 1964 and created over a span of eleven years. Bell created Dinny out of spare material salvaged from the construction of nearby Interstate 10 at a cost of $300,000.
Shotcrete:
The biomorphic building that was to become Dinny was first erected as steel framework over which an expanded metal grid was formed in the shape of a dinosaur.
All of it was then covered with coats of shotcrete (spray concrete).
Bell was quoted in 1970 as saying the 45-foot (14 m) high, 150-foot (46 m) long Dinny was “the first dinosaur in history, so far as I know, to be used as a building.”
His original vision for Dinny was for the dinosaur’s eyes to glow and mouth to spit fire at night, predicting, “It’ll scare the dickens out of a lot of people driving up over the pass." These two features, however, were not added.
Mr. Rex:
A second dinosaur, Mr. Rex, was constructed near Dinny in 1981. Originally, a giant slide was installed in Rex's tail; it was later filled in with concrete making the slide unusable. A third woolly mammoth sculpture and a prehistoric garden were drafted, but never completed due to Bell's death in 1988".
http://cargocollective.com/itslate/venturian-dinosaurs
Cabazon Dinosaurs, formerly Claude Bell's Dinosaurs, is a roadside attraction in Cabazon, California, featuring two enormous, steel-and-concrete dinosaurs named Dinny the Dinosaur and Mr. Rex.Cabazon Dinosaurs:
- Located just west of Palm Springs, the 150-foot-long Brontosaurus and the 65-foot-tall Tyrannosaurus rex are visible from the freeway to travelers passing by on Southern California's Interstate 10.
- The roadside dinosaurs are best known for their appearance in the film Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985).
- Sculptor and theme park artist Claude Bell began construction of the dinosaurs in 1964 with the goal of attracting more customers to his nearby restaurant, the Wheel Inn (open from 1958 to 2013).
- Dinny and Mr. Rex were completed in 1975 and 1986, respectively.
- Bell died in 1988 at age 91 and his family sold the property in the mid-1990s.
Two enormous, steel-and-concrete dinosaurs near Palm Springs. For almost 50 years Dinny the Dinosaur greets travelers driving west on Interstate 10 in SoCal
