After more than a decade of trying, the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History will finally be getting its very own Tyrannosaurus rex, or "tyrant lizard king," on April 15.

The Tuesday morning arrival of this iconic dinosaur will cap a 2,000-mile (3,219-kilometer) journey that scientists, movers, and museum officials have been preparing for months. (See "My T. Rex Is Bigger Than Yours.")

Rancher Kathy Wankel discovered the T. rex while out hiking with her family near Montana's Fort Peck reservoir (map) in 1988, on land that belonged to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The Corps kept the Wankel rex at the Museum of the Rockies (MOR) in Bozeman, Montana, for nearly 20 years, and have now loaned