When Teddy Roosevelt was still a gleam in the eye of Mt. Rushmore’s creator, when Wall Drug was a struggling South Dakota pharmacy and not a self-made tourist destination, when bathing beauties walked the Earth, there was Dinosaur Park. Built in the mid-1930s as a Works Progress Administration project, Dinosaur Park’s allure is simple: seven life-size concrete prehistoric replicas you can climb and pose on–the perfect rest stop for young and restless travelers. If you insist on more realism from your dinosaurs, visit Sue at the Field Museum (she was found not far from here), but see if they let you climb on her.
Miles from which the apatosaurus (at right) is supposedly visible: 10.
State with the largest tourism budget: Illinois. State with the second-largest tourism budget: Hawaii.
Percentage of parents who traveled in the past year who let their children miss school: 22.
Percentage of those parents who have a post-graduate education: 30.
Miles from Dinosaur Park to Wall Drug: 50.
