Orange Dinosaur

A bright orange dinosaur beside Route 1 in Saugus, Massachusetts, was described by the Boston Globe in 2017 as a guidepost for North Shore commuters, and in 2016 public outcry helped keep it when its home was sold. The Boston Globe described it in 2019 as a 6,000-pound fiberglass tyrannosaur; the Associated Press in 2017 gave 20 feet. It overlooked Route One Miniature Golf & Batting Cages, which Boston Magazine says opened in 1959 and which closed in autumn 2016. How the dinosaur got there is disputed. The Globe reported that a member of the family that owned a local oil distributorship says the company was sent three dinosaurs by Sinclair Oil in the 1960s for promotions and offered the leftover orange one to the golf course for free, while a former golf-course owner told the Lynn Daily Item in 2008 that her uncle commissioned it. When the land was sold for redevelopment, public demand led the developers to agree to keep the dinosaur. In 2017 they moved it about 10 feet, to higher ground behind a newly installed retaining wall, the AP reported, and the Globe said it now fronts the Essex Landing project just before the Route 99 exit. In March 2019 it held a giant Kane's doughnut for the opening of the doughnut shop at the development, according to WHDH; the Globe said the sign had to come down for lack of a permit. Boston.com reported in September 2025 that the developers had displayed the dinosaur prominently on the site.