History
Established on June 27, 1955 as part of Alberta's 50th Jubilee Year with the goal of protecting the fossil beds, the first warden was Roy Fowler (1902-1975), a farmer and amateur fossil hunter.
The park was established as a UNESCO World Heritage Site on October 26, 1979 both for its nationally significant badlands and riverside riparian habitats, and for the international importance of the fossils found here.
Until 1985, discoveries made in the park had to be shipped to museums throughout the world for scientific analysis and display, including the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa, and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. This changed with the opening of the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology 100 kilometers upstream in Midland Provincial Park adjacent to Drumheller.
Read more about this topic: Dinosaur Provincial Park
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