Museum of the Rockies

The Museum of the Rockies, on the Montana State University campus in Bozeman, holds one of the largest collections of North American dinosaurs in the world. It was founded in 1957, is affiliated with the Smithsonian and serves as Montana's official paleontology repository. Most people come for the dinosaurs, but the museum also has a planetarium, history galleries and a summer living-history farm.

The Siebel Dinosaur Complex is open all year. Its centrepiece is Montana's T. rex, a mounted skeleton about 12 feet tall and 40 feet long, found near Fort Peck Dam and one of only a few mounted T. rex skeletons in the United States. The Hall of Horns and Teeth holds the Tyrant Kings exhibit, a Triceratops growth series that runs from a juvenile to one of the largest dinosaur skulls ever found, and a hip bone bitten by a tyrannosaur. Big Al, a nearly complete Allosaurus found in Wyoming in 1991, is also on show. In the Cretaceous Crossroads exhibit, opened on July 2, 2025, a Maiasaura, Montana's state fossil, is mounted tending its nest. In the Bowman Dinosaur Viewing Lab, volunteers clean fossils behind glass most days from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The dinosaur halls were shaped by Jack Horner, the museum's former curator of paleontology, and were expanded with a $2 million gift from Thomas and Stacey Siebel in 2003. A bronze of Big Mike the T. rex stands outside the entrance. The Taylor Planetarium is a 40-foot dome with 104 seats. The Living History Farm, built round the Tinsley House, is staffed by costumed interpreters from Memorial Day to Labor Day only.

The museum is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. In the coming holidays it closes at 1 p.m. on November 25 and December 24 and 31, 2026, and all day on November 26, December 25 and January 1, 2027. General admission is $20 for adults, $17 for seniors 65 and over, $14 for ages 5 to 17 and free for children under 5. Planetarium shows cost an extra $6. Tickets are sold on site only, by cash or card.

Allow at least two to three hours, more if you add a planetarium show. Parking is free during opening hours, in a paved lot with grass overflow for RVs and buses.