Smithsonian compiled a short list of dinotourism in which Utah is mentioned. This Dinosaur Diamond is also an official Scenic Byway. Of particular note, Dinosaur National Monument fossil beds were discovered August 17, 1909 by Earl Douglass and fifty years earlier the first Utah dinosaur bones were discovered nearer Moab Utah by J.S. Newberry. The first Utah bones were those of Dystrophaeus. The discovery was made on August 17, 1859 near Moab Utah. Earl Douglass, a paleontologist from the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania would find the fossil quarry which would later be declared Dinosaur National Monument in 1915. Moab has several dinosaur sites. Look at these Moab dinosaur brochures.
In addition, May 2012, three new raptors were discovered near Arches National Park by Utah Geological Survey Paleontologists. Read more… The scientific Paper is here. The official Bureau of Land Management Press Release is here. During John N. Macomb’s 1859 Expedition to the Canyonlands of the Colorado, the very first dinosaur bones were discovered near Moab Utah. That is 50 years to the day, before the bones discovered up north which would later be preserved in Dinosaur National Monument.
