The Natural History Museum’s Diplodocus has returned from its UK tour and will be going on display again inside the museum, for the rest of this year.
Dippy in the Hintze Hall January 2016
Dippy first arrived at the Museum back in 1905, after King Edward VII remarked how much he’d like to obtain a Diplodocus specimen while visiting the home of the millionaire industrialist Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie, who owned the bones of a specimen found in Wyoming in 1899, duly commissioned a replica.
Dippy was hidden in the basement during World War Two, but re-emerged once hostilities had ended. Since then, they have starred in films such as Paddington and One of Our Dinosaurs is Missing, and cemented his celebrity status by making the move to Hintze Hall in 1979.
The cast made way for the flying whale in 2017, and has been on a UK tour since then, to let more people see the famous dinosaur, and helping lots of local museums and venues raise a lot of money from the surge in visitors.
Now that it’s back in London, Dippy will go on display in the Natural History Museum’s Waterhouse Gallery, which is the space used by the museum for their temporary exhibitions. In addition to seeing the dinosaur, you can see Dippy’s memories of UK landscapes and hear how nature inspires different communities.
Dippy will be on display from Friday 27th May until Christmas 2022. The exhibition is free, but you need to book tickets in advance from here.
Waterhouse Gallery highlighted on NHM map
So – ‘Dippy’ was originally a Brontosaurus, and was known as such from 1905 to about 1985. Then suddenly, without warning or explanation, she became a Diplodocus, known and loved by generations of children as ‘Dippy’. They just made the name up – she had never been known as ‘Dippy’ to generations of children. And in the gift shop they continued to sell plastic representations of her with ‘Brontosaurus’ on their stomachs, while her label said ‘Diplodocus’, with no explanation or comment.
So the cast has been called Dippy for about 40 years – and that is two generations (plural).
Dippy has always been a Diplodocus!
So what’s happening to Dippy after the end of this year?
One of our dinosaurs is missing, the film, is certainly of its time. Fun it is. Do you remember that? Not a care in the world and a cast list absolutely stuffed to the gills with the cream of the talent of the day, despite it being for children.