Flying Dinosaur Killed In 1800's Arizona? Maybe

As if hourly gun fights, prostitutes, rampant hallucinogenic drug use, gambling and the occasional Indian uprising weren't enough to make the towns PR guy quit.

In the 1800's, silver was discovered near Tombstone, Arizona and "the town too tough to die" was born. On top off all the lawlessness and deadly epidemics, it seems they also had a dinosaur problem.

The universe had it out for the Tombstonians. Even with regard to the dinosaur. It wasn't a slow moving Stegosaurus, no ... it was a huge pterodactyl that could swoop down from out of nowhere. 'Cuz, why not??

Seriously, according the the towns newspaper, the Tombstone Epitaph, it was about 100 feet long with an 8 foot head. I doubt that's the picture below. From what I learned in Jurassic Park, pterodactyl's weren't people fans.

Peeps in Tombstone, obviously, had to be tough so, I can see why they'd be loathe to let an overgrown DoDo bird get the best of them. A story published by the Tombstone Epitaph published 4/26/1890 says 2 Cowboys killed it. Supposedly, somewhere, there's a photograph.

Photoshop was still a few hundred years away so, if the pic was fake, it took some effort to create it. These people, mind you, had more pressing things ... like, not dying ... on their mind. That being said, I doubt they'd invest time, money and effort into coming up with a fake critter hardly anyone had yet to even hear of.

According to the History Channel, people have claimed to remember seeing the picture as recently as the 30's and 40's. An edition of the Epitaph dated 4/26/1890 does have a story about the creature and its demise but there's no pic.

Could it have been a "Thunderbird"? The giant bird that creates thunder and lightning according to native American lore and appears over and over in their legends and ancient drawings? Hmm ...