Remembering Dinotown: B.C.'s beloved prehistoric theme park

If you ever took the long drive up to Bridal Falls years ago, you likely remember the one prehistoric attraction in Chilliwack that made you want to pull over and immerse yourself in the world of The Flintstones.

This beloved B.C. theme park was fondly known as Dinotown, and at one point, it actually did have ties to the Hanna-Barbera animated classic, featuring Fred, Wilma, and the rest of The Flintstones crew.

So, how exactly did Dinotown come to exist on that random 18-acre plot in the Chilliwack/ Bridal Falls area?

The YouTube channel Exit Through the Gift Shop provided an in-depth history of Dinotown in a short documentary published in 2020.

Dinotown wouldn’t have been what it was without a man named Nick Dyck, who immigrated to Canada from Russia in the 1920s.

Dyck was deeply passionate about dinosaurs and developed a keen interest in paleontology, to the extent that he sought to create dinosaur sculptures as close to real-life size as possible.

So, he got to work and soon had a Brontosaurus, a Tyrannosaurus, and several other dinosaurs as part of his collection.

In 1958, Dyck decided it was time to create a theme park for locals to visit his dinosaurs, and Dyck’s Dinosaur Park opened in Maple Ridge.

By the early 1970s, Dyck and his wife Tillie were slowing down. His fossil collection was donated to Douglas College in New Westminster.

As for the dinosaurs, those would soon find a home not too far away.

Bedrock City came before Dinotown

Around the same time, The Flintstones animated series was already an established source of entertainment for kids (and families) on television screens across North America.

The popularity of the fictional “modern Stone Age family” from Bedrock led to the creation of four Flintstones-themed parks. Two were located down south in Arizona and South Dakota. The others were in Kelowna and Chilliwack, right here in B.C.

A businessman named Bob Ell opened Chilliwack’s Bedrock City in 1975.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Flintstones park without dinosaurs, and Ell purchased Dyck’s statues and brought them over to the Bridal Falls theme park.

Bedrock City became a hit and remained a hotspot for families for nearly two decades. The Ell family claimed that it attracted nearly 90,000 visitors annually, according to a 1993 report from The Chilliwack Progress.

The park goes extinct

Unfortunately, licensing troubles meant that Ell was no longer able to use The Flintstones’ brand for the park. The Kelowna attraction closed down in 1998.

An ongoing divorce settlement between Bob and his wife, Helen, also impacted the Chilliwack park’s financial operations, and it closed in 1993.

However, the Ell family didn’t give up hope and managed to reopen the park in 1995, this time under the name Dinotown.

The park had its own set of characters and included rides (many of which were slightly altered from their Bedrock City days), live shows, music, and exhibits.

After a few more years of entertaining families from across the region, Dinotown’s operations began winding down, and the 18-acre property was sold to a developer in 2010.

And that’s how the legendary Dinotown became extinct for good.

Do you remember visiting this popular theme park? Let us know in the comments.

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