It may have something to do with all those Brontosaurus burgers everyone’s favorite modern stone-age family ate, but when you think of a giant dinosaur with a tiny head and long, swooping tail, the Brontosaurus is probably what you’re seeing in your mind. Well hold on: Scientifically speaking, there’s no such thing as a Brontosaurus.

Even if you knew that, you may not know how the fictional dinosaur came to star in the prehistoric landscape of popular imagination for so long.