Advertisement

Making space for Scotty: Royal Sask. Museum hosts online auction

Making space for Scotty: Royal Sask. Museum hosts online auction

As the Royal Saskatchewan Museum (RSM) makes room for a new permanent prehistoric resident, you can own a little piece of Saskatchewan's history.

A replica of Scotty, the 65 million year old Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton found near Eastend, Sask., is set to come to the RSM in May of next year. An exhibit of that size will take up a lot of room — so much that the museum is hosting an auction of some exhibits to make space.

"The museum has pretty much run out of storage space. We have really no place to keep the exhibitory and cabinetry," Michelle Hunter, the executive director of Friends of the RSM, told CBC Saskatchewan's The Morning Edition.

Among the items up for auction are pieces from the human factor and Zoom exhibits, along with photographs from the map room.

Proceeds from the RSM's auction will assist the development of future exhibits, according to a press release from the he Ministry of Parks, Culture and Sport. All items are up for auction until Oct. 31.

'It's a massive project'; exhibit to open in 2019

Creating an exhibit for Scotty is no small feat.

Hunter said the exhibit will encompass two floors of the museum.

"Her head is going to go through the ceiling of the second gallery floor," Hunter said. "She will be based on the lower level gallery and we'll put a big hole in the second level and her head will come out of that quite nicely."

Scotty, found in 1991, was the first T. Rex skeleton to be discovered in Saskatchewan. After five years of excavation, 60 to 75 per cent of the skeleton was found. Scotty was more than six meters tall and may be the heaviest T. Rex ever discovered.

Another life-sized replica of Scotty currently stands at the T. Rex Discovery Centre in Eastend.

With files from CBC Saskatchewan's The Morning Edition