page_title: Brontosaurus
section_title: In popular culture
hierarchical_section_title: Brontosaurus / In popular culture
caption_attribution_description: Illustration of Brontosaurus in the water, and Diplodocus on land.
context_page_description: Brontosaurus is a genus of gigantic quadruped sauropod dinosaurs. Although the type species, B. excelsus, had long been considered a species of the closely related Apatosaurus, researchers proposed in 2015 that Brontosaurus is a genus separate from Apatosaurus and that it contains three species: B. excelsus, B. yahnahpin, and B. parvus.
  Brontosaurus had a long, thin neck and a small head adapted for a herbivorous lifestyle, a bulky, heavy torso, and a long, whip-like tail. The various species lived during the Late Jurassic epoch in the Morrison Formation of what is now North America, and were extinct by the end of the Jurassic. Adult individuals of Brontosaurus are estimated to have weighed up to 15 tonnes and measured up to 22 metres long.
  As the archetypal sauropod, Brontosaurus is one of the best-known dinosaurs and has been featured in film, advertising, and postage stamps, as well as many other types of media.
context_section_description: The length of time taken for Riggs's 1903 reclassification of Brontosaurus as Apatosaurus to be brought to public notice, as well as Osborn's insistence that the Brontosaurus name be retained despite Riggs's paper, meant that the Brontosaurus became one of the most famous dinosaurs. Brontosaurus has often been depicted in cinema, beginning with Winsor McCay's 1914 classic Gertie the Dinosaur, one of the first animated films. McCay based his unidentified dinosaur on the apatosaurine skeleton in the American Museum of Natural History. The 1925 silent film The Lost World featured a battle between a Brontosaurus and an Allosaurus, using special effects by Willis O'Brien. These, and other early uses of the animal as major representative of the group, helped cement Brontosaurus as a quintessential dinosaur in the public consciousness.
  Sinclair Oil Corporation has long been a fixture of American roads (and briefly in other countries) with its green dinosaur logo and mascot, a Brontosaurus. While Sinclair's early advertising included a number of different dinosaurs, eventually only Brontosaurus was used as the official logo, due to its popular appeal.
  As late as 1989, the U.S. Postal Service caused controversy when it issued four "dinosaur" stamps: Tyrannosaurus, Stegosaurus, Pteranodon, and Brontosaurus. The use of the term Brontosaurus in place of Apatosaurus led to complaints of "fostering scientific illiteracy." The Postal Service defended itself (in Postal Bulletin 21744) by saying, "Although now recognized by the scientific community as Apatosaurus, the name Brontosaurus was used for the stamp because it is more familiar to the general population." Indeed, the Postal Service even implicitly rebuked the somewhat inconsistent complaints by adding that "[s]imilarly, the term 'dinosaur' has been used generically to describe all the animals [i.e., all four of the animals represented in the given stamp set], even though the Pteranodon was a flying reptile [rather than a true 'dinosaur']," a distinction left unmentioned in the numerous correspondence regarding the Brontosaurus/Apatosaurus issue. Palaeontologist Stephen Jay Gould not only supported this position, but indeed, cheered and advanced it enough to not only name an essay, but even the entire book of which it is but a part Bully for Brontosaurus, stating: "Touché and right on; no one bitched about Pteranodon, and that's a real error." His position, however, was not one suggesting the exclusive use of the popular moniker; he echoed Riggs' original argument that Brontosaurus is a synonym for Apatosaurus. Nevertheless, he noted that the former has developed and continues to maintain an independent existence in the popular imagination.
  The more vociferous denunciations of the usage have elicited sharply defensive statements from those who would not wish to see the name be struck from official usage. Tschopp's study has generated a very high number of responses from many, often opposed, groups - of editorial, news staff, and personal blog nature (both related and not), from both sides of the debate, from related and unrelated contexts, and from all over the world.
caption: Outdated 1897 restoration by Charles R. Knight of B. excelsus submerged in water, and Diplodocus dragging its tail
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