Bob the dinosaur, spared from becoming a waiting room spectacle, is back on the market for a home

VALLEY CITY, N.D. — As triceratops go, Bob was a big one and he garnered lots of attention during the year and a half he was displayed at the Barnes County Historical Society.

But, in early 2016 Bob was shipped off to a commercial fossil seller in Arizona amid talk that a buyer in the United Arab Emirates had designs on him. The asking price at the time was said to be about $1.4 million.

Then things got quiet and Bob's fate became something of a mystery — until now.

"I sold him (Bob) to a doctor over in South Korea. He was going to put him in the foyer of his hospital," said Alan Komrosky, whose Valley City business, Hell Creek Relics, works with rural landowners to dig up and market fossils like Bob the triceratops.

Komrosky said Bob's Korean buyer ran into difficulties with Korean authorities who frowned on his plans for the dinosaur, so Bob's overseas journey never happened.

Komrosky declined to share what the Korean doctor paid for Bob's bones, but he said as far as he knows no other triceratops has sold for more.

According to Komrosky, Bob is still with a fossil broker in Arizona and is once again up for sale.

Attempts to reach the broker were not successful.

Meanwhile, Komrosky said the remains of another triceratops has come to light near Rhame in Bowman County, N.D., and signs indicate it could be larger than Bob, whom Komrosky described as one of the largest — if not the largest — triceratops on record.

Komrosky is tentatively calling the new dinosaur Willard, but he said the final naming decision will reside with the owner of the property where the dinosaur remains were found.

Traditionally, dinosaur fossils are named after the landowner on whose property the bones were dug up.

According to Komrosky, another recently unearthed triceratops is also unusually large and he said there is speculation that that dinosaur, as well as Willard, could both belong to a new variety of triceratops.

By comparing bones, Komrosky said it appears Willard was two feet taller at the hip than Bob.

Wes Anderson, curator at the Barnes County Historical Society, said people there were saddened by Bob's departure in early 2016, but he said the arrival a short time later of a different, albeit smaller, triceratops named Gundy helped to fill the void created by Bob's absence.

"Oh, we miss (Bob) terribly," said Anderson, but he added that Bob's replacement has become a popular attraction in her own right.

At about 18 feet long, Gundy is significantly smaller than Bob's 26-foot length.

And unlike Bob, who is an actual fossil, Gundy is a cast of a fossilized triceratops that makes its home in a museum in Japan, Anderson said, adding that while Gundy is smaller than Bob, she may be a better fit for the museum.

"Bob took up a lot of space," he said.

Age: Bob's fossilized remains hail from the Cretaceous Period, or roughly 65 million years ago

Found: In 2003 in the southwestern corner of North Dakota in Bowman County on Craig and Bobbi Egeland's ranch near the South Dakota border.

Discovered by: Bobbi Egeland, Bob's namesake, spotted part of the triceratops' shoulder and chipped away at the ground to uncover the fossil. About 90 percent of the dinosaur's large bones were found.

Origins: Bob's remains come from the Hell Creek Formation, which spans parts of the eastern Montana Badlands, northwestern South Dakota and southwestern North Dakota.

Age: Like Bob, Gundy lived during the Cretaceous Period, approximately 65 million years ago.

Found: In 1992 on a private ranch in the Hell Creek formation deposits of northwestern South Dakota. Gundy is a cast of a skeleton of a sub-adult triceratops. Gundy is a cast; the original specimen is on display at the Gunma Prefectural Museum in Japan.

Discovered by: Mike Triebold, a North Dakota native who is now president of Triebold Paleontology, a company located in Woodland Colo. Gundy's skeleton was about 80 percent complete.

1/2: This is a photo of Gundy, a cast of a female triceratops fossil that is housed in the Barnes County Historical Society in Valley City. Gundy is about 18 feet long, much smaller than Bob, a 26-foot-long male triceratops whose fossilized remains were on display at the museum from early 2014 until late 2015. Special to The Forum

2/2: Alan Komrosky, owner of Hell Creek Relics, says a dinosaur skeleton he is putting together could be an example of a new, very large variety of triceratops. Pictured here, on the left, is the nose horn of the triceratops he is tentatively calling Willard. To the right is the nose horn of a different triceratops. Special to The Forum