DINOSAURS pt. 1

The dinosaur craze of the 1990s, inspired largely by the Jurassic Park movies, led to a legion of children dreaming of becoming paleontologists. In the century before, these beloved prehistoric beasts blossomed into pop culture stars through early Hollywood films, wild World's Fairs exhibits, department store parades, cheery fossil fuel campaigns, and Christian fundamentalist propaganda. For part one of this two part series, we will not only explore the way dinosaurs captured America's heart, but also how the idea of deep time—the knowledge that the earth was far older than a biblical 6,000 years—affected the nation, leading to a desire to bring these long dead, mythic creatures back to full-blooded life.

You can listen to DINOSAURS pt. 1 online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

DINOSAURS pt. 1 is an episode from American Hysteria by W!ZARD Studios.

This episode is 65:16 long.

This episode was published on Mar 23, 2026.

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