Brontosaurus

**Brontosauruses** (also simply called **Brontos**) are a species of giant dinosaurs which existed during the Stone Age featured in the franchise of *The Flintstones* and were the franchise's most iconic dinosaurs after Dino. They were quite possibly the most important creatures in caveman society, as they were essential for cities around the world, most especially Bedrock, both both their use in construction and as the primary staple food source for caveman society.

## Background

Brontosauruses were gigantic long-necked dinosaurs with thick scaly hides and equally long and thick tails. They came in a large variety of colors and sizes ranged from large to gigantic. A few also had ridges along their backs which allowed them to be used as stairs, although these were pretty rare. Despite being hairless, a few brontosauruses did sport small tufts of hair on their heads, much like certain breeds of dogasaurses (specifically the snorkasaurus).

Brontosauruses were of utmost importance to caveman society, serving a wide variety of essential uses to them, with one of the most essential uses of all being construction and food, and as such many brontos were domesticated and very few wild ones were ever seen, but those that were young and wild were very aggressive.

## Uses

### **Bronto-Cranes**

Bronto-Cranes were specially trained brontosauruses bred for the sole purpose of construction labor, as their large size made them the perfect animal for doing heavy work. Bronto-Cranes were used for excavation, piling, mining, building, demolition and anything else that was require for the collection of materials and the construction of buildings. Fred Flintstone made a living as a bronto-crane operator and he was one of the few to understand the rig of a bronto-crane perfectly, with his only shortcoming in the field being his desire to goof off. Bronto-Cranes functioned by being controlled through reigns tied to their mouths, necks and tails. These reigns were fitted to a small cab on the back of the dinosaur which was large enough to hold a single caveman. The reigns were operated by a primitive control system of levers and pulleys inside of the cab. Bronto-Cranes however were not without their short comings, as they required constant dental care to keep their teeth in tiptop shape.

### **Other Uses**

Aside from construction, brontos could be used for any other large scale (and a few small scale) jobs, functioning as bridges, elevators, stairs, transportation, playground equipment, maintenance and most importantly food.

#### **Bronto-Bridges**

**Bronto-Bridges** connected all the roads and pathways that led over deep canyons and deep rivers, and for the really long and deep crevices, Bronto-Drawbridges were used, having two brontos instead of one that would link themselves by the tail, and only ever raising their tails for crossing boats, ships and rafts.

#### **Bronto-Car**

Brontos would occasionally be used as vehicles due to making excellent beasts of burden due to their strength, being used as **Bronto-Cars** for pulling or carrying heavy cargo in the streets or airports (similar to a truck or carrier), or being used by police to carry a large number of prisoners (although the police would use other animals for the job too), or simply as an alternative to a personal car, which was rare due to their slowness when compared to regular Stone Age cars, but it made them an excellent vehicle for Drive-Ins that gave their owners an excellent view high above all the other cars.

#### **Brontobus**

Their most notable use as a vehicle though was as a bus, specifically a **Brontobus**. Originally buses were foot-powered like most vehicles and brontobuses were only used to carry cabs on their backs, but by the time period of *I Yabba-Dabba Do!*, Brontobuses now pulled regular buses (much like a horse-drawn carriage), although regular buses were still in use in places like Hollyrock.

#### **Bronto Elevator Lifts**

Due to their long necks, Brontos also made excellent elevator lifts and were referred to as **Bronto Elevator Lifts**. Bronto Elevator Lifts would usually function by raising or lowering the stone elevator by pulling it via a rope pulley that was tied to reigns in its mouth or simply tied to the bronto's tail, while other times the bronto could serve as the elevator itself (usually done in quarries) where it would raise or lower passengers by letting them ride on its head. Although hotels would often instead employee broncos, crane birds or monkeys, but rarely monkeys would be used in conjunction with brontos, with monkeys serving as the control panel relaying floor numbers to the bronto lift. The most notable bronto elevator lift was a disgruntled bronto named Otis from the episode "*Moonlight and Maintenance*".

#### **Bronto-Bowl-a-Rama**

Early on during the time period of the original show, the Bedrock Bowl-a-Rama used monkeys-setters and rocktopuses to set their pins, but 20 years later at the time of *Hollyrock-a-Bye Baby* according to *The Flintstones' Wacky Inventions*, monkey-setters had been replaced with brontos dubbed **Bronto-Bowl-a-Ramas**, which were far faster at setting up pins than monkey-setters, able to scoop up all the fallen pins at once with their mouths and spit them out fully organized just as quickly. Unlike most brontos, they had both spiky ridges and a horn on their nose.

### **Culinary Uses**

Quite possibly the most essential and regular use of the brontosaurus was as a major food source, with bronto meat being as essential and common as cow meat is in real life, and although the modern Stone Age already had cowasauruses, cavemen still preferred the large, tasty and filling scrumptiousness of bronto meat. Even other animals like pigasauruses and sea serpents adored the rich juicy taste of bronto meat.

Bronto meat was often considered the best of all foods and could be made into a wide assortment of different forms and culinary meals. Bronto Steaks, Bronto Ham, Bronto Beef, Bronto Hash, Bronto Sausages, Bronto Soup, Bronto Dogs, Bronto Sandwiches, Bronto Roasts, Bronto Ribs, and most importantly Bronto Burgers, which were served all across places like Bedrock and beyond in almost every eating establishment, but even all restaurants had at least one example of bronto meat somewhere in the menu and it tasted great with anything it was served alongside of.

## Breeds

Although some were simply called brontosauruses with no unique names, there were a few different varieties of brontosauruses, such as ones with a single horn on top of their heads or on their noses (similar to a rhino), ones with ridges on their backs, and ones with ridges and a horn. Those with ridges were often used for stairs alongside other dinosaurs with ridges along their backs.

### **Broncosaurus**

There was also a smaller breed of bronto referred to as a broncosaurus (or a horseasaurus), which were about the size of a modern horse and behaved likes ones too. They also resembled snorkasauruses but with longer necks. They could be found in less urban locations like Arkanstone and Texarock. Because of this, they were popularly used as steeds by western folk and rodeo riders.

### **Thunder-Brontosaurus**

A thunder-brontosaurus was a gigantic species of brontosaurus, quite possibly the largest dinosaur in the world. Unlike regular brontos, these titans were bipedal and could eat anything, although they were naturally friendly. They were believed to be extinct but at least two are shown to exist in *Dino: The Great Egg-scape*.

## Gallery

The first Brontosaurus from the pilot episode.A rare Brontosaurus with stair-like ridges.Brontosaurus drawbridge from "*Bedrock Rodeo Round-Up*".A bronto fire truck from "*Hop Happy*".Bronto airport control tower lift from "*Deep in the Heart of Texarock*".Mobile brontosaurus stairs at the airport from "*Deep in the Heart of Texarock*".The Bronto-Bowl-a-Rama with Monkey-Setters from *The Flintstones' Wacky Inventions*.Bronto-Cranes from the 1994 film.A Bronto Elevator Lift from "*Moonlight and Maintenance*".A Bronto Police Car from "*Pebbles' Birthday Party*".A Bronto-Crane toy for the 1994 film.A brontosaurus from a *Flintstones* Ed-U-Card.Wild dinosaurs on a rampage.A brontosaurus and a tyrannosaurus in the episode, "*Reel Trouble*".
### **Cuisine**

The iconic Bronto Ribs.Bronto Burgers and Ribs Drive In.Roast Loin of Brontosaurus from "*The Happy Household*".Brontosaurus Fillet Steak New York Cut from "*The Happy Household*".BBQ Brontosaurus Ribs from "*The Surprise*".Brontosaurus Soup from "*The Surprise*".A Bronto Burger on an autographed card (signed by Hanna & Barbera).BBQ Bronto Steak on a card.
## Notes/Trivia

* Bronto-Cranes have also alternately been referred to as Dino-Cranes.
* The dogasaurus breed of snorkasauruses (Dino's species) greatly resemble a relatively small brontosaurus, except they have smaller front feet and are capable of bipedal movement. Although in the ambiguously canon *The Flintstone Kids*, Dino is claimed to be a dogasaurus by Fred but one episode has him finding his original family in the wild who are all giant brontosauruses, suggesting that Dino is one, at least in this continuity.