^*.>* /J^'-. %/ :^r. %,** -V '-^o^ ;♦ <&' o». *.. .^■•"-••,*°o /..^^.V /.:;.:^.> w<'^;:.\. \^ "^ *r "^^'''^^'V '^^ r -^o^ ^^•^^. '*^f^^^^^ -o/^r^^o'^ ^o*.,.\-. -^o .s-; ^> ^ ..^^ ^<*^^ .J .%^ ll^ .**' .'-^ti/'V c<'-'.^-."'^° -^'-. * ,-> !.♦ •?: Ik cv • * * * *Ao^ ' 1 ■Cv*^ «> * d &"" *y aV ^^. .<• lH°^. ^ Ur-. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary ■J GLIMPSES of our NATIONAL PARKS CONTENTS Page Page I. —The National Parks .... 3 VIII.— The Glacier National Park. . 34 II. —The Yellowstone National Park . 9 IX. — The Rocky Mountain National III.- —The Yosemite National Park . 16 Park 37 IV. — The Sequoia National Park . . 20 X. — The Grand Canyon (National V. —Mount Rainier National Park . . 23 monument administered by VI. — Crater Lake National Park . . 27 Department of Agriculture) . 42 VII. —The Mesa Verde National Park . 30 XI. — The Hot Springs Reservation . 46 WASHINGTON GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 1916 dii-«>ii<>l<>' in tlio ox-tloi- of t lit-i i- <'i"o:« t ion [Number, 14; Total Area, 7,290 Square Miles] NATIONAL AREA PA U KS in order of creation LOCATION in square miles DISTINCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS Hot Springs Middle li 46 hot springs possessing curative properties— Many hotels and is:i2 Arkansas boarding houses— 20 bathhouses under public control. Vellowstoiie North- 3,348 More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling 1S72 west ern springs — Mud volcanoes — l^etrified forests — Grand Canyon Wyoniinf; of the Yellowstone, remarkable for gorgeous coloring— Large lakes— Many large streams and waterfalls— Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bi.son, moose, antelope, bear, moun- tain sheep, beaver, etc., constituting greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world— Altitude 6,000 to 11,000 feet- Exceptional trout fishing. Yosemite Middle 1, 125 Valley of world-famed beauty — LoftvclifTs — Romantic vistas — 1890 eastern Many waterfalls of extraordinary height — 3 groves of big California trees — High Sierra — Large areas of snowy peaks— Waterwheel falls — Good trout fishing. Sequoia Middle 237 The Big Tree national park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in 1890 eastern diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter — Towering momitain California ranges — Startling precipices — Fine trout fishing. General Grant Middle 4 Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet 1890 eastern in diameter— 6 miles from Sequoia National Park and under California same management. Moimt Rainier West 324 Largest accessible single peak glacier system— 28 glaciers, some 1899 central of large size— Forty-eight square miles of glacier, fifty to five- Washington hundred feet thick — Wonderful sub-alpine wild flower fields. Crater Lake South- 249 Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no 1902 western inlet, no outlet— Sides 1,000 feet high— Interesting lava for- Oregon mations—Fine trout fishing. Mesa Verde South- 77 Most notable and best preserved prehistoric cliff dwellings in 1906 western Colorado United States, if not in the world. Piatt Southern li Many sulphur and other springs possessing medicinal value, under Government regulation. 1906 Oklahoma Glacier North- 1,534 Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed Alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty— 60 small glaciers- I9in western Montana Peaks of unusual shape— Precipices thousands of feet deep- Almost sensational scenery of marked individuality — Fine trout fishing. Rocky Mountain. North 358 Heart of the Rockies — Snowy range, peaks 11,000 to 14,2.50 feet 1915 middle Colorado altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. National Parks of less popular interest are: Sullys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. Casa Grande Ruin, 1S92, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. ^ D. of D. JUN 1^. 1916 10 DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR FRANKLIN K. LANE, Seceetaey GLIMPSES OF OUR NATIONAL PARKS By Robert Sterling Yard THE NATIONAL PARKS npHE national parks are areas which Congress has set apart. l)ecanse -'- of extraordinary scenic beauty, remarkable phenomena or other unusual qualification, for the use and enjoyment of the people for all time. They are administered by the Department of the Interior. These are not parks in the common meaning of the word. They are not beautiful tracts of cultivated country with smooth lawns and winding paths like Central Park in New York, or Lincoln Park in Chicago, or Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. They are. on the contrary, large areas which nature, not man, has made beautiful and which the hand of man alters only enough to provide roads to enter them, trails to penetrate their fastnesses, and hotels and camps to live in. There are fourteen national parks, of which eight are of the first order of size and scenic magnificence — which means a great deal in a land so beautiful as ours. Every person living in the United States ought to know much about these eight national parks and ought to visit them when possible, for, considered together, the}' con- tain more features of conspicuous grandeur than are readily accessible in all the rest of the world together ; while, considered individually, there are few, if any, celebrated scenic places within easy reach abroad Avhich are not equaled or excelled in America. Even the far- famed Swiss Alps are equaled, and. some travelers believe, excelled by the scenery of several of our own national parks. SCENERY OF THE FIRST ORDER We have said that in some respects American scenery is unequaled abroad. There are more geysers of large size in our Yellowstone National Park, for instance, than in all the rest of the world together, the nearest approach being the geyser fields of Iceland and far New Zealand. Again, it is conceded the Avorld over that there is no valley 3 4 OUK NATIONAL PAKKS, in existence so strilvingly beautil'ul :;s our Yosemite Valley, and nowhere else can be found a canyon of such size and exquisite coloring as our (Jrand Canyon of the Colorado. In the Sequoia National Park grow trees so huge and old that none quite compare with them. These are well-known facts with which every American ought to be familiar. The eight national \)n\ks of the first order ai'e the Mount IJainier National Park in M'ashington, the Crater Lake National Park in Oivgon. the Yosemite and Seciuoia National Parks in California, the (Jhicier National Park in Montana, the Yellowstone National Park, principally in Wyoming, and the Rocky Mountain and Mesa Verde National l^irks in Colorado. AVith these must be classed the (irand Canyon of the Colorado in Arizona, which, though still remaining a national monument, is one of the great wonders of the world. The principal dilference between a national monument and a national park is that tlie former has merely been made safe from encroachment by private interests and enterprise, while the latter is also in process of development by roads and trails and hotels, so as to become a convenient resort for the people to visit and enjoy. EACH A PERSONALITY OF ITS OWN One of the striking and interesting features of the eight greater national i^arks of our country is that each one of them is quite dif- ferent from all the others; each has a marked personality of its own. Mount liainier, for instance, is an extinct volcano down the sides of which flow twenty-eight glaciers, or rivers of ice. Crater Lake fills with water of astonishing blue the hole left when the top of ]\Iount Mazama, another volcano in the same chain as Mount Painier. was swallowed up in some far distant past. The Yosemite National Park, in addition to its celebrated Yo- semite Valley and lofty waterfalls, has in the north a river called the Tuolumne which spouts wheels of water fifty feet and more into the air. It has great areas of snow-topped mountains. The Sequoia National Park contains more than a million sequoia trees, of which 12,000 are more than ten feet in diameter, and some twice that and several from twenty-five to thirty-six feet through from side to side. Measure thirty-six feet on the sidewalk and see what that means. Some of these trees are older than human history. The (ilacier National Park was made by the earth cracking in some far distant time and one side thrusting up and overlapping the other. It has clitfs several thousand feet high and more than sixty glaciers feed hundreds of lakes. One lake floats icebergs all summer. This scenery is truly Alpine. The Yellowstone National Park, beside its geysers, has many hot springs which l)uil(l glistening plateaus of highly colored mineral OUR N"ATIOXAL PARKS. The Highest Watekfall in the Would, Yosemite National Pakk The Upper Yosemite Fall drops 1,430 feet slieer, nearly as high os nine Niagaras piled one above the other. The Lower Yosemite Fall drops 320 feet. Their combined height, including intermediate cascades and rapids, is half a mile OUR NATIOXAL PAEKS. NATIONAL PARKS AND PRINCIPAL RAILROAD CONNECTIONS deposits. It has a canyon o-orgeoiis Avith all the colors and shades of the rainbow, and it is literally the greatest Avild animal sanctuary in the Avorld. The Ivocky ^Mountain Xational Park straddles the Continental Di\ide at a lofty height, with snow-capped mountains extending from end to end. Its glacier records are remarkable. The Mesa Verde National Park hides in its barren canyons the well-preserved ruins of a civilization which passed out of existence so many centuries ago that not even tradition recalls its people. It Avill be seen that one may visit a new national park each year for nearly a decade and see something (juite new and remarkable at each visit. HOTELS AND CAMPS The maj) Avill show Avhere these national parks are located. They are all ujion lines of railways and are easily and comfortably reached from any part of the Ignited States. Each of them is in charge of a resident supervisor who has under his charge enough park rangers to protect the forests from fire, the Avild animals from hunters, and the visitoi's from harm. There are good roads in all of these parks, and hotels or public camps or both where visitors may stay as long as they like to enjoy the scenery and study nature. Trails are built to the waterfalls, up the highest moimtains, and, in short, wherever especially fine views may l)e found. ()\er these trails visitors may Avalk or ride on horseback as they prefer. OUR NATIONAL PARKS. Many of the hotels are fine ones where every hixury may be had by those who insist upon luxuries even in the wilderness. There are often cheaper hotels also, and in the great public camps visitors may live very comfortably indeed and quite economically. One may go to these camps just as to a hotel, only he is assigned a comfortable tent instead of a room, and eats his meals at a big table in a big dining tent. There is another big tent, usually, to serve as a general living room. At night a camp fire is built in the woods, and all gather around it to sing and tell stories. Many per- sons who can easily afford the luxurious hotels live in the camps because they prefer doing so. The Department of the In- terior, which has all the na- tional parks in its care, is trying to make them popular and comfortable and available for people of all degrees of income. Not only should these i>arks be the best and most fully patronized health and pleas- ure resorts in the United States, but they should also become great centers of nature stud3\ In the national parks only is nature most carefully conserved exactly as designed. No trees are cut down for lumber, as in the national forests outside the parks, but are allowed to reach their utmost size and age. No ani- mals are killed except moun- tain lions and other predatory beasts which destroy the deer and young elk. Here, then, the student and the lover of nature may study nature in I'hotosi-apb by rillsbury The Lakgest and Oldest Living Thing IX the Would The General Sherman Tree in the Sequoia National Parli, diameter 36.5 feet 8 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. her pristine beauty and under conditions Avliich else^Yhere exist only in the few remote hinds not yet invaded by man. To these national parks, then, the Department of the Interixir invites the student, amateur and professional alike. NATIONAL PARKS AND NATIONAL FORESTS One must not confuse the national forests with the national parks. The national forests aggregate many times the area of the national parks. They were created to administer lumbering and grazing interests for the people; the lumbering, instead of being done by pri- vate interests often ruthlessly for private profit, as in the past, is now done under regiilations which conserve the public interest. The trees are cut in accordance with the ])rinciples of scientific forestry, which conserve the smaller trees until they grow to a certain size, thus perpetuating the forests. Sheep, horses, or cattle graze in all pastures under governmental regulation, while in national i)arks horses and cattle only may be admitted where not detrimental to the enjoyment and preservation of the scenery. Regular hunting is per- mitted in season in the national forests, but never in the national parks. In short, the national parks, unlike the national forests, are not properties in a commercial sense, but natural preserves for the rest, recreation, and education of the peo]>le. They remain under nature's OAvn chosen conditions. They alone maintain '' the forest primeval." Lovers of sport also find their national parks rich fields of pleasure, provided they do their hunting onl,y with the camera. This is en- couraged; and there are no other places in the world where wild animals may be approached so closel^^ In the Yellowstone, where shooting has been strictly prohibited since 1872, one may with rea- sonable care and precaution photogi-aph deer at close quarters, ap- proach elk and antelope and even moose and bison near enough for good pictures. BIRDS AND WILD ANIMALS The lesson of the Yellowstone is that wild animals greatly fear man only when man is cruel and murderous. Another lesson from national parks experience is that no wild animal will injure human beings except in self-defense. Even the gi-izzly bear, which we were brought up to believe an aggressive, ferocious animal, is found to be entirely shy and harmless except when violently assaulted. The monster cat of our rock fastnesses — the mountain lion — big enough and powerful enough to drag down a full-grown elk, is one of the most timid of all the beasts in the national parks, flying at gTeat speed at the first sight or scent of man. The national parks cover a great area, 4,065,960 acres in all. If all were put together it would mean an area of 7,290 square miles. OUR NATIONAL PARKS, 9 as large, nearly, as the State of Xew Jersey. The Yellowstone Na- tional Park alone contains more than 3,300 sqnare miles, and is as big as many of the independent Enropean principalities that warred with each other for centuries before the genius of Bismarck united them into a great empire. Such a group of scenic areas, if developed and handled after the fashion of Switzerland, for instance, will constitute a national eco- nomic asset of incalculable value. GENEKAL INFORMATION BULLETINS The following descriptions of some of our national parks are not intended to be exhaustive. In each, those characteristics are em- phasized which individualize the park, distinguishing it from others. Any person who wishes to know more about any national park than is here available, who wishes, for instance, to know the particular traveling and living facilities in each and the expense of a visit thereto, should write to the Secretary of the Interior for the Gen- eral Information ])ulletin of the particular national park in which he is interested. It will be sent free. II THE YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristics: Geysers and Hot Springs; Wonderfully Colored Canyon; Largest Wild Bird and Animal Befuge THE Yellowstone Xational Park, which lies principally in Wyo- ming, is the most widely celebrated of all our national parks because it contains more and greater geysers than all the rest of the Avorld together. The geyser fields next in size are in Iceland and Xew Zealand. The rest are inconspicuous. Geysers are, roughly speaking, water volcanoes. They occur only at places where the internal heat of the earth approaches close to the surface. Their action, for so many years unexplained, and even now regarded with wonder by so many, is simple. Water from the surface trickling through cracks in the rocks, or water from subter- ranean springs collecting in the bottom of the geyser's crater, down among the strata of intense heat, becomes itself intensely heated and gives otf steam, which expands and forces upwai'd the cooler Avater that lies above it. This makes rooui for the more rapid formation of steam which innnediately gathers under enormous pressure. It is then that the water at the surface of the geyser begins to bub- ble and give off clouds of steam, the sign to the watchers above that the geyser is about to play. 32164°— 16 2 10 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. At last tlu> Avater in the bottom reaches so great an expansion under continued heat that the less heated water above can no longer weigh it down, so it bursts upward with great A'iolence, rising many feet in the air and continuing to play until practically all the water in the crater has been expelled. Si)ring water, or the same water cooled and falling back to the ground, again seeps through the sur- face to gather as before in the crater's depth, and in a greater or less time, according to difficulties in the way of its return, becomes reheated to the bursting point, when the geyser spouts again. One may make a geyser with a test tube and a Bunsen burner. The Department of the Interior has built a small model geyser mounted on a wooden table which, when heat is applied to the metal i-etort on the floor, plays at regular intervals of about a minute and a quarter. The same water returns again and again to tlie retort, becomes re- heated, and is again spouted into the air. This model, by the way, has been named Young Faithful. THE HOT-WATER PHENOMENA Xearly the entire Yellowstone region, covering an area of about 8,300 square miles, is remarkable for its hot-water phenomena. The geysers are confined to three basins lying near each other in the middle west side of the park, but other hot water manifestations occur at more widely separated points. JNIarvelously colored hot springs, mud volcanoes, and other strange phenomena are frequent. At ]\Iammoth, at Xorris, and at Thumb the hot water has brought to the surface quantities of white mineral deposits which build ter- races of beautifully incrusted basins high up into the air, often engulfing trees of considerable size. Over the edges of these carved basins pours the hot water. Microscopic plants called algie grow on the edges and sides of these basins, assisting the deposition of the mineral matter and painting them hues of red and pink and bluish gray, which in warm Aveather glow brilliantly, but in cold Aveather almost disappear. At many other points lesser hot springs occur, introducing strange, almost uncanny, elements into Avoocled and other- wise quite normal landscapes. A tour of these hot-Avater formations and spouting geysers is an experience never to be forgotten. Some of the geysers play at quite regular intervals. For many years the celebrated Old Faithful played Avith great regularity every seventy minutes, but during the summer of 1015 the interval lengthened to about eighty-five minutes, due. it is supposed, to the smaller snoAvfall and consequent lessened Avater supply of the preceding Avinter. Some of the largest geysers play at ii'regular intervals of days, Aveeks, or months. Some A'ery small ones play every few minutes. ]N[any bubbling hot springs, Avhich throAV OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 11 i'holu.m-aph liy .1. j;. Uayins, St. I'aul Old Faithful Geyser. Yellowstone National Pakk 12 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. water two or three feet into the air once or twice a iiiiiiiite, are really small, imperfectly formed geysers. The hot-siH-ino- terraces are also a rather awe-inspiring spectacle Avhen seen for the first time. The visitor may climb upon them and pick his way around among the steaming pools. In certain lights the surface of these pools appears vividly colored. The deeper hot pools are often intensely green. The incrustations are often beauti- fully crystallized. Clumps of grass, and even flowers, which have been submerged in the charged waters become exquisitely plated, as if with frosted silver. But the geysers and hot-water formations are by no means the only wonders in the Yellowstone. Indeed the entire park is a won- derland. Tlie Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone affords a spectacle worthy of a national park were there no geysers. But you must not confuse your Grand Canyons, of which there are several in our wonderful western country. Of these, by far the largest and most impressive is the Grand Canyon of the Colorado Eiver, in Arizona. That is the one always meant when people speak of visiting " the Grand Canyon," without designating a location. It is the giant of canyons. GRAND CAlSTYOlSr OF THE YELLOWSTONE The (irand Canyon of the Yellowstone is altogether different. Great though its size, it is much the smaller of the two. What makes it a scenic feature of the first order is its marvelously variegated coloring. It is the cameo of canyons. Standing upon Inspiration Point, which pushes out almost to the center of the canyon, one seems to look almost vertically down upon the foaming Yellowstone River. To the south a waterfall nearly twice the height of Niagara rushes seemingly out of the pine-clad hills and ])ours downward to be lost again in green. Fr(;m that point two or three miles to where you stand and be- neath you widens out the most glorious kaleidoscope of color you will even see in nature. The steep slopes dropping on either side a thousand feet and more from the pine-toi^ped levels above are inconceivably carved and fretted by the frost and the erosion of the ages. Sometimes they lie in straight lines at easy angles, from which jut high rocky prominences. Sometimes they lie in huge hollows carved from the side w^alls. Here and there jagged rocky needles rise perpendicularly for hundreds of feet like groups of gothic spires. And the whole is colored as brokenly and vividly as the field of a kaleidoscope. The whole is streaked and spotted and stratified in every shade from the deepest orange to the faintest lemon, from dee]) crimson through all the brick shades to the softest pink, from black through all the grays and pearls to glistening Avhite. The greens are OUR js^ational parks. 13 Copyright by J. K. IlayiU'S, f^f. I'aul The Gorgeously Coloked Canyon, Yellowstone National I'APac Showing the Great Falls of the Yellowstone, 308 feet hl.uh furnished by the dark pines above, the lighter shades of growth caught here and there in soft masses on the gentler slopes and the foaming green of the plunging river so far below. The blues, ever changing, are found in the dome of the sky overhead. It is a spectacle which one looks upon in silence. There are several spots from which fine partial views may be had, but no person can say he has seen the canyon who has not stood upon Inspiration Point. Remember this when you visit the Yellowstone. WILD ANIMALS LIVING NATURALLY Another interesting feature of the Yellowstone National Park is its wild-animal life. It is the largest and most successful preserve in the 14 OUR XATIOXAL PARKS. > world. Its ?>.?)00 square miles of mountains and valleys remain nearly as nature made them, for the two hundred miles of roads and the seven hotels and many camps are as nothing in this immense wilder- ness. Xo tree has been cut except when absolutely necessary for road or trail or camp, Xo herds invade its valleys. Xo rifle has been fii-ed at a wild animal since the park was established in 1872, except by occasional poachers along the border and by the official destroyers of predatory beasts. Visitors for the most i)art keep to the beaten road, and the wild animals have learned in the years that they mean them no harm. To be sure, they are seldom seen by the people filling the long trains of stages which travel from point to point daily during the season ; but the quiet watcher on the trails may see deer and bear and elk and antelope to his heart's content, and he may even see mountain sheep, moose, and bison by journeying on foot or by horseback into their distant retreats. In the fall and springs, when the crowds are absent, wild deer gather in great numbers at the hotel clearings to crop the grass, and the officers' children feed them flowers. One of the diversions at the road builders' camps in the wildernei-s is cul- tivating the acquaintance of the animals. There are photographs of men feeding sugar to bear cubs while mother bear looks idly on. Thus one of the most interesting lessons from the Yellowstone is that wild animals are fearful and dangerous only when men treat them as game or as enemies. BEARS. ELK, MOOSE, DEER, ANTELOPE, AND BISON Even the big grizzlies, which are generally believed to be ferocious, are proved by our national parks experience to be entirely inoffensive if not attacked. Even when attacked they make every possible effort to escape, and only turn upon men when finally driven into some place from which they can not get away. Then only are they dan- gerous, and then they are dangerous indeed. The grizzlv bear, by the way, is one of the shyest of Avild animals, and may be seen only with difficulty. It lives principally on roots, berries, nuts, and honey — when honey may be had. It can not climb trees like the brown bears. Its little ones are born in caves where bears hibernate through the winters and are little larger than squir- rels when they first come into the world. The brown, cinnamon, and black bears, which, b}^ the way, are the same species only differently colored — the blondes and brunettes, so to speak, of the same bear family— are quite different. They are playful, comparatively fearless, sometimes even friendly. They are greedy fellows and steal camp supplies whenever they can. The large meat wagons which carry supplies to the distant hotels and camps overnight are equipped with iron covers, because the bears OUE NATIOISTAL PAEKS. 15 Photograph by (J. Swnnsoii Black Tail Deek, Yellowstone National Pakk used to rip off the AYocden tops during the resting- times and run olf with sides of beef and mutton. One night several years ago teamsters drove three bears from tlie top of a single one of these big wagons. This wild animal paradise contains thirty thousand elk, several thousand moose, innumerable deer, many antelupe, and a large and increasing herd of wild bison. It is an excellent bird preserve also ; more than a hundred and fifty species live natural, undisturbed lives. Eagles abound among the crags. Wild geese and ducks are found in profusion. INIany thou- sands of large white pelicans add to the picturesqueness of Yellow- stone Lake, The Yellowstone also contains a petrified forest of prehistoric trees, the partial trunks of some of which remain standing. DISCOVERY OF THE YELLOWSTONE The first recorded visit to the Yellowstone was made by John Colter in 1810. He was returning home alone from the Lewis and Clark expedition and took refuge there from hostile Indians. His story of its wonders was discredited. The next recorded visit was by a trapper named Joseph Meek in 1829, who described it as " a country smoking with vapor from boiling springs and burning with gases issuing from small craters." From some of these craters, he said, " issued blue flame and molten brim- stone," which, of course, was not true, though doubtless Meek fidly believed it to be the truth. Between 1830 and 1810 ^Varren Angus Ferris, a clerk in the American Fur Co., wrote the first description of the Firehole Geyser Basin, but it was not until 1852 that the geyser district was actually 16 OUE XATIOXAL PARKS. defined and the c'eysors precisely located. This was dt)iie by Father De Smet, the famous Jesuit missionary. It remained for a (lovernment expedition, sent out in 1859 under command of Capt. AV. F. Reynolds, to first really explore and chart the ivirion. Several private explorers followed, but so gTeat was public incredulity as to the marvels they described that they did not dare tell their exjx'riences before any genei'al audiences, for several lecturers had been stoned in the streets as impostors. The large exploring expedition luider Henry D. Washburn, surveyor general of Montana, in 1870, finalh" established the facts to the public belief and led to the creation of the Yellowstone National Park. Ill THE YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristics: Sensationally Beautiful Valley and Spectacular Waterfalls THE Yosemite National Park lies near the crest of the Sierra Nevada in middle eastern California. Its 1,100 square miles contain scenic features of beanty so unusual and variety so wide that ade(juate description reads like romance. The famous Yosemite Valley is a small part of this extraordinary holiday garden — a mere crack in its granite mountains seven miles long by less than a mile wide. For the rest, the park includes, in John Muir's words, "the head- waters of the Tuolumne and Pierced Eivers, two of the most songfid streams in the world; innumerable lakes and waterfalls and smooth silky lawns; the noblest forests, the loftiest granite domes, the deepest ice-sculi-)tured canyons, the brightest crystalline pavements, and snowy mountains soaring into the sky twelve and thirteen thousand feet, arrayed in open ranks and spiry pinnacled groups partially separated by tremendous canyons and ami^hitheaters; gardens on their sunny brows, avalanches thundering down their long white slopes, cataracts roaring gray and foaming in the crooked rugged gorges, and glaciers in their shadowy recesses working in silence, slowly completing their sculptures ; new-born lakes at their feet, blue and green, free or encumbered with drifting icebergs like miniature Arctic Oceans, shining, sparkling, calm as stars." This land of enchantments is a land of enchanted climate. Its summers are warm, but not too warm: dry, but not too dry; its nights cold and marvelousl}^ starry. The world-famous Yosemite Valley was discovered in 18r)l l)y mounted volunteers pursuing Indians into their fastnesses. Because OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 17 Bird's-eye View of Yosemite Valley I^ooking Eastwakd to the Crest of the Sierra Nevada 1. Clouds Rest; 2, Half Dome; 3, Mount Watkins ; 4, Basket Dome; 5, North Dome ; 6, Washington Column ; 7, Royal Arches ; 8, Mirror Lake and mouth of Tenaya Canyon ; 9, Yosemite Village ; 10, Head of Yosemite Falls ; 11, Eagle Peak (the Three Brothers) ; 12, El Capitau : 13, Ribbon Fall ; 14, Merced River; 15, El Capitan Bridge and Moraine; 16, Big Oak Flat Road; 17, Wawona Road ; 18, Bridalveil Fall ; 19, Cathedral Rocks ; 20, Cathedral Spires ; 21. Sentinel Rock ; 22, Glacier Point ; 23, Sentinel Dome ; 24. Liberty Cap ; 25, IMount Broderick ; 26, Little Y^'osemite Valley. of its extraoidinary character and quite exceptional beanty it quickly became celebrated; but it was not until 1874 that a road was built into it. Until then it was approached only by trail. THE VALLEY AND ITS WATERFALLS No matter what their expectation, most visitors are delightfully astonished upon entering the Yosemite Valley. The sheer immensity 32164°— 16 3 18 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. of the precipices on either side of the valley's peaceful floor; the loftiness and the romantic suggestion of the numerous water walls ; the majesty of the granite walls; and the unreal, almost fairy quality of the ever-yarying whole, can not be successfully foretold. This yalley Avas once a tortuous riyer canyon. So rapidly was it cut by the Merced that the tributary yallej^s soon remained hanging high on either side. Then the canyon became the bed of a great glacier. It was widened as well as deepened, and as a consequence the hanging character of the '*?!<:? side y alleys Avas accentuated. There were hundreds, thou- sands, of other ice-filled can- yons in the Sierra ; but in none did the glaciers accom- plish as much as they did in the Yosemite Valley. Why? Because there the Sierra gran- ites, as a rule solid and excep- tionally resistant, Avere tra- versed by thousands of fis- sures and therefore readily scooped out. The manner of its making explains the extreme loftiness of the Avater falls Avhicli pour over the rim into the A'alley. The Yosemite Falls, for in- stance, drops 1,430 feet in one sheer fall, a height equal to nine Niagara Falls piled one on top of the other. The LoAver Yosemite Fall, imme- diately beloAv, has a drop of 3-20 feet, or tAvo Niagaras more. Vernal Falls has the same height, while Illilouette Falls is 50 feet higher. The Nevada Falls drops 501 feet sheer; the celebrated Bridal Veil Fall 620 feet, Avhile the Kibbon Falls, highest of all, drops 1.G12 feet sheer, a straight fall ten times as great as Niagara. NoAvhere else in the Avorld may be had a Avater spectacle such as this. Similarly the sheer summits. Cathedral Rocks rise 2,500 feet per- pendicular from the valley; El Capitan, 3.001 feet; Sentinel Dome, 1,157 feet ; Half Dome, 1.802 feet ; Cloud's Rest. 5,001 feet. Among these monsters the ]\Ierced sings its Avinding way. The falls are at their best in May and June while the winter snows are melting. They are still fine in July, but after that decrease rapidly in volume. riiotograph by Liiulley Eddy CojiMox Black ok Bkowx Bear OUR XATIOXAL PAEKS. 19 The Yosemite Valley, extraordinary though it is from both the scenic and the scientific points of view, is an exceedingly small part of the Yosemite Xational Park; but until the summer of 1915, when the Department of the Interior acipiired possession of the old Tioga IJoad, the magnificent country north of the valley was known only to a few enthusiastic mountaineers who went in yeaVly with camp outfits. The old Tioga Road was built in 1881 to a mine soon after abandoned. Its recent repair by the Government has opened to all one of the finest scenic sections in America, a country dotted with splendid snowy summits, grown with glorious forests, and watered with rushing trout streams. THE WATER WHEELS And thus is added to the amazing water spectacle for wdiich the valley is famous still another kind of Yosemite waterfall destined to world-wide celebrity. The Tuolumne River, descending sharply to the head of the Hetch Hetchy Valley, becomes, in John Muir's phrase, "one wild, exulting, onrushing mass of snowy purple bloom spreading over glacial waves of granite without any definite channel, gliding in magnificent silver plumes, dashing and foaming through huge bowlder dams, leaping high in the air in wheel-like whirls, dis- playing glorious enthusiasm, tossing from side to side, doubling, glinting, singing in exuberance of mountain energy." The crowning feature of this mad spectacle are the water wheels which rise 50 feet or more into the air when the slantinc; river strikes obstructions. Photograph by W. L. Huber Wateewheels in the Tuolumne River, Yosemite National Pakk The sloping current, striking projecting roclcs, rises fifty feet or more in tlie air 20 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. In iuUlition to its many other attractions, tlie Yosemite National Park contains three groves of sequois, the celebrated "Big Trees of California.'' One of these trees, the Grizzly Giant, has a diameter of 29.G feet and a height of 204 feet. IV A THE SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristic: Largest and Oldest Trees in the "World XD they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven. Thus is recorded, in the eleventh chapter of Genesis, the building of the Tower of Babel. While this tower was doubtless still standing, and a hundred years or two before the birth of Abraham, a tiny seed in the warm soil of a mountain slope on quite the opposite side of the world thrust into the light of day a slender green spike Avhich was destined, during an existence of more than four thousand years, to become itself a lofty tower; noble in form, "with a physiognomy almost Godlike," as John Muir puts it, pulsating with life to its top- I'liotojil-aiih \,y .T. !■:. Kolicrts PicMc I'AKTY Among tmk Bk; Tueks o^■^ Skquoia National Pakk OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 21 most leaflet more than three hundred feet above the groitnd, and oiving forth a bal)el of bird song to the accompaniment which the summer ^Yinds played upon its many millions of tiny leaves. On the stump of this prostrate sequoia tree, one of the noblest of the celebrated Big- Trees of California, John Muir counted more than four thousand rings, a ring for every year of its life. Its trunk, exclusive of bark, Avas thirtj'-five feet eight inches in diameter. As the bark of the very largest sequoias is two feet or more in thickness, this giant must have measured forty feet in diameter when it was still growing on one of the slopes of the Kings River. LARGEST OF THE MONSTERS In the Sequoia National Park, upon the upper slopes of the Sierra Nevada in central California, and in the little General Grant National Park, six miles away and under the same management, grows 1.1GC),000 sequoia trees, of which 12,000 are more than ten feet in diameter. Some of the others have these dimensions: General Sherman Tree: Diameter, 36.5 feet; height, -279.9 feet. General Grant Tree : Diameter, 35 feet ; height, 261 feet. Abraham Lincoln Tree : Diameter, 31 feet ; height, 270 feet. California Tree : Diameter, 30 feet ; height, 260 feet. George Washington Tree: Diameter, 29 feet; height, 255 feet. William ISIcKinley Tree : Diameter, 28 feet ; height, 291 feet. Dalton Tree : Diameter, 27 feet ; height, 292 feet. There are sequoia trees of great size in several other parts of Cali- fornia also, notably in the Yosemite National Park, where three dis- tinct groves are found ; but by far the greatest number, and the indi- vidual trees of greatest size, are in the Sequoia National Park and its little neighbor. HOW TO VISUALIZE A BIG TREE It is extremely difficult to realize what the dimensions of these trees really mean. To visualize as best you can the greatest of those now standing, the General Sherman Tree, measure off and stake its diameter, 36 feet 6 inches, upon the ground in front of a church the height of whose steeple you can readily ascertain. Then stand back a distance equal to the height of the tree, 280 feet, and look hard at the stakes whose distance apart represents the thickness of the trunk. Now raise your eyes slowl3^ imagining this trunk rising in front of the church, tapering very slightly as it rises. When you are look- ing upward at an angle of forty-five degrees from the spot where you are standing (and this Avill not be difficult to calculate) you will be looking at the point where the top of the General Sherman Tree 22 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. would be if it were growino; in front of your church instead of in the Sequoia National Park. The known height of the steeple will help you verify this calculation. It will help your comprehension of the great size of these trees to know that a box big enough to have easily held the ill-fated ship Lusitania, one of the largest ever built, could be made from inch boards sawed from any one of these great sequoias, with boards enough left over to build a dozen houses. Automobiles and six-horse teams have been driven up and down, the fallen trunks of several great sequoias, and there are regular wagon roads running through gaps in the trunks of several others in our national parks. Two parallel street car lines and a driveway might be run through the trunks of several of the very largest. THE OLDEST LIVING THING But the age of the sequoia is still more difficult to realize. It is beyond compare the oldest lining thing. Several of the trees now growing in hearty maturity in the Sequoia National Park were vigorous youngsters before the pyramids were built on the Egyptian desert before Babylon reached its prime. Hundreds of them were thriving before the heroic ages of ancient Greece — while, in fact, the rough Indo-Germanic ancestors of the Greeks were still swarming from the north. Thousands were lusty youths through all the ages of Greek art and Roman wars. Tens of thousands were flourishing trees when Christ was born in Bethlehem. But with all its vast age the sequoia to-day is the embodiment of serene vigor. No description, says Muir, can give any adequate idea of its majesty, much less its beauty. He calls it nature's forest mas- terpiece. He dwells upon its patrician bearing, its suggestion of ancient stock, its strange air of other days, its thoroughbred look inherited from the long ago. " Poised in the fullness of strength and beauty, stern and solemn in mien, it glows with eager enthusiastic life to the tip of every leaf and branch and far-reaching root, calm as a granite dome, the first to feel the touch of the rosy beams of morning, the last to bid the sun good night." The sequoia is regular and symmetrical in general form. Its power- ful, stately trunk is purplish to cinnamon brown and rises without a branch a hundred or a hundred and fifty feet — which is as high or higher than the tops of most forest trees. Its bulky limbs shoot boldly out on every side. Its foliage, the most feathery and delicate of all the conifers, is densely massed. The bright green cones are about two and a half inches long, generating seeds scarcely more than an eight of an inch across. The wood is almost indestructible except by fire. Fallen trunks and broken branches lie for centuries unde- cayed and almost unaltered. OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 23 The sequoias are the glory, as they were the cause, of the Sequoia National Park. Scattered here and there OA'er great areas, they cluster chiefly in thirteen separate groves, and it is in these groves that they attain their greatest size and luxuriance. But they are by no means the only attractions of this national park, Avliich many frequenters declare nature has equipped best of all for the joys and pleasures of mountain living. IDEAL FOR CAMPING OUT It is the ideal place to camp out. It is a country of magnificent mountain scenery, easily accessible when once you are in it. Its peaks are among the loftiest, its canyons among the deepest and most romantic. Its summer temperatures are even and bracing. Its sum- mers are practically without rain. Across its borders north and east opens up a mountain region, on the crest of the Sierra, of unexcelled grandeur. Mount AVhitney, the highest mountain in the United States, 14,501 feet, lies beyond its eastern boundary. The Kings and the Kern Rivers have few scenic equals. These and its many other rushing streams abound in trout. Y THE MOUNT RAINIER NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristic: Complicated Glacial System Flowing from One Peak IX the northwestern corner of the United States rises, from the Cascade Mountains, a series of extinct volcanoes ice-clad from summit to foot the year around. Foremost among them, counting from south to north, are INIount Shasta in California ; INIount Hood in Oregon; Mount St. Helens, Mount Adams, ]\Iount Rainier, and Mount Baker in Washington. Once, in the dim ages when America w^as making, they blazed across the sea like huge beacons. To-day, their fires quenched, they suggest a stalwart band of Knights of the Ages, helmeted in snow, armored in ice, standing at parade upon a carpet patterned gorgeously in wild flowers. Easily chief of this knightly band is Mount Rainier, a giant tower- ing 14,408 feet above tidewater in Puget Sound. Home-bound sailors far at sea mend their courses from his silver summit. Travelers over land catch the sun glint from his shining sides at a distance of more than one hundred and fifty miles. This mountain has a glacier system far exceeding in size and im- pressive beauty that of any other in the United States. From its summit and sirques twenty-eight named rivers of ice pour slowly down its sides. There are others unnamed. Seen upon the map, as 24 OUR NATIONAL PAEKS. » if from an aeroplane, one thinks of it as an enormous frozen octo- pus stretcliiuii' icy tentacles down upon every side amono" the rich gardens of wild flowers and splendid forests of fir and cedars below. BIRTH OF THE GLACIERS EA-erv winter the moisture-laden winds from the Pacific, suddenly cooled against its summit, deposit upon its top and sides enormous snows. These, settling in the mile-wide crater which was left after a great explosion in some prehistoric age carried away perhaps two thousand feet of the volcano's former height, press with over- whelming weight down tlie mountain's sloping sides. Thus are born the glaciers, for the snow imder its own pressure quickly hardens into ice. Through twenty-eight valleys, self-carved in the solid rock, flow these rivers of ice, now turning, as rivers of water turn, to avoid the harder rock strata, now roaring over preci- pices like congealed waterfalls, now rippling, like water currents, over rough bottoms, pushing, pouring relentlessly on until they reach those parts of their courses where warmer air turns them into rivers of water. There are forty-eight square miles of these glaciers, ranging in width from five hundred feet to a full mile and in thickness from fifty feet to many hundreds, perhaps even more than a thousand feet. ONCE WAS 2,000 FEET HIGHER Mount Eainier is nearly three miles high, measured from sea level. It rises nearly two miles above its immediate base. Once it was a complete cone like the famous Fujiyama, the sacred mountain of Japan. Then it was probably 10,000 feet high. Indian legends tell of the great eruption which blew its top off. The National Park, which incloses Mount Rainier, is about eighteen miles square, containing three hundred and twenty-four square miles. It is easily reached by railroad and automobile from neighboring cities. A new automobile road enables stages to bring visitors to beautiful Paradise Valley, whose flowered slopes are bordered by the great Nisqually, Paradise, and Stevens Glaciers. One may reach this point in four hours from Tacoma and return the same day. But it is a spot where the visitor may well spend weeks. The Nisqually Glacier is the best known though by no means the largest of the glaciers. It is five miles long and at Paradise Valley is half a mile wide. Glistening white and fairly smooth at its shining source on the mountain's summit, its surface here is soiled with dust and broken stone and squeezed and rent by terrible pres- sure into fantastic shapes. Innumerable crevasses or cracks many feet deep break across it, caused by the more rapid movement of the OUE NATIONAL PARKS. 25 I'botogi-apli by Curtis & Millei-, Seattle The Kautz Glaciek, Mount Rainier National Park Showing its winding course from its Cirque near the Summit glacier's middle than its edges; for glaciers, again like rivers of water, develop swifter currents nearer mid-stream. Professor Le Conte tells us that the movement of Nisqually Glacier in summer averages, at mid-stream, about sixteen inches a da}^ It is far less at the margins, its speed being retarded by the friction of the sides. It is one of the great pleasures of a visit to Mount Rainier National Park to wander over the fields of snow and climb out on the Nisqually Glacier and explore its crevasses and ice caves. 26 OUR NATIONAL TARKS. 1' holograph by Curl is ^ Milk'i, Seaitk- Mount Rainier, Showing Beginning of Nisquatxy Glaciek View from wilil-flower-carpeted Paradise Valley Like all glaciers, the Xisqually gathers on its surface masses of rock with which it strews its sides just as rivers of water strew their banks with logs and floating debris. These are called lateral moraines, or side moraines. Somotime> glaciers build lateral moraines miles long and over a thousand feet high, as you will see when you visit the Eocky Mountain National Park. The rocks which are carried in midstream to the end of the glacier and dropped when the ice melts are called the medial or middle moraine. The end, or snout, of the glacier thus always lies among a great mass of rocks and stones. The Xisqually River flows from a cave in the end of the Xisqually Glacier's snout, for the melting begins miles upstream under the glacier. The river is milky white when it first appears because it carries sediment and powdered rock, which, how- ever, it deposits in time, becoming quite clear. There are many glaciers as large and larger than the Xisqually, but they are little known because so hard to reach. The Department OUR NATIONAL PAEKS. 27 of the Interior has now completed trails around the great ice moun- tain and all of these glaciers are now accessible. CREATURES LIVING IN THE ICE Many interesting things might be told of these glaciers were there space. For example, several species of minute insects live in the ice, hopping about like tiny fleas. They are harder to see than the so-called sand fleas at the seashore because much smaller. Slender, dark-brown worms live in countless millions in the surface ice. Microscopic rose-colored plants also thrive in such great numbers that they tint the surface here and there, making Avhat is commonly called " red snow." GORGEOUS CARPETING OF FLOWERS But this brief picture of the Mount Eainier National Park would miss its loveliest touch without some notice of the wild-flower parks lying at the base, and often reaching far up between the icy fingers of Mount Rainier. Paradise Valley, Henrys Hunting Ground, Spray Park, Summerland — such are the names given to some of these beauty spots. Let John Muir, the celebrated naturalist, describe them here. "Above the forests," he writes, "there is a zone of the loveliest flowers, fifty miles in circuit and nearly two miles Avicle, so closely planted and luxurious that it seems as if nature, glad to make an open space between woods so dense and ice so deep, were econo- mizing the precious ground and trjdng to see how many of her darlings she can get together in one mountain wreath — daisies, anemones, columbine, erythroniums, larkspurs, etc., among which we wade knee-deep and waist-deep, the bright corollas in myriads touch- ing petal to petal. Altogether this is the richest subalpine garden I have ever found, a perfect flower elysium." VI THE CRATER LAKE NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristic: Lake of Gi-eat Depth Filling Collapsed Volcanic Crater IN the heart of the Cascade Mountains of our Northwest, whose volcanoes were in constant eruption in the ages before history, and now, extinct and ice-plated, shine like huge diamonds in the sunlight, there lies, jewel-like in a setting of lava, a lake of unbe- lievable blue. The visitor who comes suddenly upon it stands silent with emotion, overcome by its quite extraordinary beauty and by a 28 OUR NATIOXAL PARKS. strange sense of mystery >vliich e\en the unimaginative feel keenly and which increases rather than decreases Avitli familiarity. This is Ci-ater Lake. One of the very largest of these ancient volcanoes was ISIoiint Mazama. It stood in the sonther-n central part of what is now Oregon, two hundred miles south of INIount Rainier and nearly as lofty. It was about the height of Mount Shasta, in plain sight of which it rose nearly a hundred miles to its north. I'hotograpli l)y II. T. Cowling Across Ckatek Lake, Showing Wizard Island The hi.iih point on the opposite rim of Llao Rock But this was ages ago. Xo human eyes ever saw Mount Mazama. Long before man came, the entire upper part of it in some titanic cataclysm fell in upon itself as if swallowed by a subterranean cavern, leaving its craterlike lava sides cut sharply downwardly into the central abyss. What a spectacle that must have been ! The first awful depth of this vast hole no man can guess. But the volcano was not quenched; it burst up through the collapsed lavas in three places, making lesser cones within the greater, but none quite so high as the surrounding rim. Then the fires ceased and gradually, as the years passed, springs percolated into the vast basin and filled it with water within a thou- sand feet of its rim. As you see it to-day one of these cones emerges a few hundred feet from the surface. The lake is 2.000 feet deep in places. It has no inlet of any sort nor is there any stream running OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 29 out of it ; but the water is supposed to escape by underground chan- nels and to reappear in the Khnnath River, a few miles away. Geologists find Crater Lake of special interest because of the way nature made it. Many volcanoes have had their tops blown off. Mount Eainier was one of these. But no other in the United States has fallen into itself, like Mount Mazama. The evidence of this process is quite conclusive. The lava found on the slopes that remain was not blown there from an exploding summit but ran, hot and fluid, from a crater many thousands of feet higher. The pitch of these outer slopes enables the scientist to tell with reasonable probability how high the volcano originally was. ROMANTIC INDIAN LEGENDS The Indians believed that Crater Lake was the home of a great spirit whom they called Llao. The blue waters teemed with giant crawfish, his servants, some of them so large that they could reach great claws to the top of the cliffs and seize venturesome visitors. Another great spirit chieftain, whom they called Skell, was supposed to live in the Klamath Marsh near by and to have many servants who could take at will the forms of eagles and antelopes. War broke out, so the Indian legend says, between Llao and Skell and Skell was captured. The monsters from the lake tore out his heart and played ball with it, tossing it back and forth from mountain top to mountain top. But it was caught in the air by one of Skell's eagles and by him passed to one of SkelFs antelopes, and b}^ him passed to others who finally escape with it. Skell's body miraculously grew again around his heart and, in time, he captured Llao and tore his body into fragments, which he tossed into the lake. The giant crawfish, thinking them fragments of Skell's body, devoured them greedily. But when, last of all, Llao's head was thrown in, the monsters recognized it and would not eat it. The remains of Llao's head i-emain to-day sticking out of the water of Crater Lake. Some Indians still look upon it with awe, but scientists recognize it as the little cone described above. Its name is Wizard Island. Another legend describes the strength-giving power of the water. A band of Klamath Indians came unexpectedly upon the rim and ran away in terror. But one, braver than the others, remained to gaze upon its beauty. Lie lit a camp fire and slept. Again and again he returned. One day he ventured to the water's edge. After many moons he dared even tO' bathe in the lake, and Avas filled with great strength. He told his tribe, and, after many moons, others came and bathed and were strengthened. Then all the tribe bathed in the waters and became wonderfully strong. 30 OUR NATIONAL PARKS, But finally Lino had his revenge. His monsters seized the brave who first ventured, bore him to the highest part of the rim, and tore his body into small pieces. The spot Avhere this Avas done is to-day called Llao Ixock. PHANTOM SHIP AND WIZARD ISLAND Crater Lake is one of the most beautiful spots in America. The gray lava rim is remarkably sculptured. 'Hie water is remarkably blue, a lovely turquoise along the edges, and, in the deep parts, seen from above, extremel}^ dark. The contrast on a sunny day between the unreal, fairylike rim across the lake and the fantastic sculptures at one's feet, and, in the lake between, the myriad gradations from faintest turquoise to deepest Prussian blue, dwells long in the memory. Unforgettable, also, are the twisted and contorted lava formations of the inner rim. A boat ride along the edge of the lake reveals these in a thousand changes. At one point near shore a mass of curiously carved lava is called the Phantom Ship because, seen at a distance, it suggests a ship under full sail. The illusion at dusk or by moonlight is striking. In certain slants of light the Phantom Ship suddenly disappears — a phantom, indeed. Another experience full of interest is a visit to Wizard Island. One can climb its sides and descend into its little crater. YII THE MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristic: Prehistoric Cliff Dwellings HEEE did the Indians come from ? That is one of the innu- w merable questions which anthropologists have not yet solved. Some suggest that they came from Asia by way of Alaska because the Eskimo seem to somewhat resemble Mongolians. Othei-s think they came from Europe by wa}^ of Greenland; others that they came from the South Sea islands by way of South America. Perhaps all these theorists are right. In one thing onl}^ do they agree and that is that, from the Arctic to the Antarctic, no matter what their tribal or other differences due to varying conditions of climate and surroundings, all American Indians are of one physical type with similar mental characteristics and cultural tendencies. Their highest civilization undoubtedly developed in Peru, Central America, and southern Mexico, where architectural ruins of quite astonishing beauty are to-day crumbling under the jungle. This civilization was ruthlessly destroyed by the Spanish conquest follow- ing the discovery of America. The next highest prehistoric civilization was in our own Southwest, and the remains of its highest special development are the cliff OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 31 Si'KUCE TuKK lIoL'.sh, ]Me,sa Vekue Xatio.xai. I'akk Showing how the dwellings are protected under overhanging cliffs dwellings of the Mesa Verde in southwestern Colorado, to preserve which Congress has set apart the Mesa Verde National Park. When one speaks of the Pueblo Indians he does not mean an Indian stock or tribe, but merely Indians, possibly of various stocks and many tribes, who used to live, and a few of whose modern descendants still live, in pueblos or community houses of many rooms holding entire tribes or villages under one roof. The builders of Mesa Verde's prehistoric dwellings were of the Pueblo type. BURROWING INTO THE MESAS Those who have traveled through our Southwestern States have seen from the car window innumerable mesas or small isolated pla- teaus rising abruptly for hundreds of feet from the bare and often arid plains. The word mesa is Spanish for table, and indeed mam' of these mesas when seen at a distance may suggest to the imaginative mind tables with cloths reaching to the floor. Once the leA^el of these mesa tops was the level of all of this vast southwestern countr}^, but the rains and floods of centuries have washed away all the softer earth down to its present level, leaving standing only the rocky spots or those so covered with surface rocks that the rains could not reach the softer gravel underneath. All have heard of the Enchanted Mesa in Xew ISIexico which the Indians of recent times considered sacred. The Mesa Verde, or green mesa (because it is covered with stunted cedar and pinyon trees in a land where trees are few) is the next most widel}^ known. 32 OUR NATIONAL PARKS. The Mesa Verde is one of the hirgest mesas. It is fifteen miles long and eight miles Avide. At its foot are masses of broken rocks rising from 300 to 500 feet above the bare plains. These are called the talus. Above the talus yellow sandstone walls rise precipitously two or three hundred feet higher to the mesa's top. It stands on the right bank of the Mancos River, down to which a number of small, rough canyons, once beds of streams, slope from the top of the mesa. It is in the sides of these small canyons where the most Avonderful and best preserved cliif dwellings in America, if not in the world, are found to-day. LIVING HARD IN PREHISTORIC TIMES In prehistoric times a large human population lived in these cliff dwellings, seeking a home there for protection. They obtained their livelihood by agriculture on the forbidding tops of the mesa, culti- vating scanty farms which yielded them small crops of corn. Life must have been hard in this dry country, when the Mesa Verde communities flourished in the side of these sandstone cliffs. Game was scarce and hunting arduous. The Mancos yielded a few fishes. The earth contributed berries or nuts. At that time, as at present, water was rare and found only in sequestered places near the heads of the canyons, but notwithstanding these difhculties the inhabitants cultivated their farms and raised their corn, which they ground on flat stones called metates, and baked their bread on a flat stone griddle. They boiled their meat in well-made vessels, some of which were artistically decorated. Their life was hard, but so confidently did they believe that they were dependent upon the gods to make the rain fall and the corn grow that they were a religious people who worshipped the sun as the father of all, and the earth as the mother Avho brought them all their material blessings. They possessed no written language, and could only record their thoughts by a few symbols which they painted on their earthenware jars or scratched on the sides of the cliffs adjoin- ing their habitations. As their sense of beauty was keen, their art, though primitive, was true; rarely realistic, generally symbolic. Their decoration of cotton fabrics and ceramic work might be called beautiful, even when judged by the highly developed taste of to-day. They fashioned axes, spear points, and rude tools of stone ; they wove brightly-patterned sandals and made attractive basketry. They were not content with rude buildings, and had long outgrown caves or earth homes that satisfied less civilized Indians farther north and south of them. They shaped stones into regular forms, orna- mented them with designs and laid them one on another. Their masonry resisted the destructive forces of centuries of rain and snow beating upon them. OUR XATIOXAL PARKS. 33 The Mesa Verde tribes probably had little culture when they first climbed these precipitous rocks and found shelter, like animals, in the natural caves under the overhanging floor of the mesa. These caves were shelters not only from the storm of winter and the burn- ing sun of summer, but from rapacious human enemies as well; for there are evidences of determined warfare among the prehistoric tribes of our southwest lands. But with the generations, perhaps the centuries, they made rapid strides. Ladders were substituted for zigzag trails, making their retreats more inaccessible, adobe supplemented caves, brick and stone succeeded adobe, culture succeeded savagery. DISCOVERY OF SUN TEMPLE A great mound on the top of the mesa which Dr. Fewkes unearthed in the summer of 1015 shows that, probably about i;^>00 A. D., they had begun to emerge from the caves to build upon the surface, still a further advance in civilization. It is significant that this building is partially sculptured and architecturally ambitious. It is still more significant that it was not a house for temporal needs nor a fortress, but religious structure. It was a temple to their god, the sun. The remains of this advanced civilization, of quality so greatly beyond its neighbors, may be seen and studied by all who choose to visit the Mesa Verde National Park. It is an experience full of interest and pleasure. There are many canyons, and many ruins in each canyon. There are ruins yet unexplored. There are several mounds, like that under which Sun Temple was discovered, yet un- earthed. The visitor may enter these ruins and examine many of the articles which were found in them. EXPLORATION OF THE MESA VERDE Two herdsmen. Richard and Alfred Wethcrill, while hunting lost cattle one December day in 1888, discovered these ruins. Coming to the edge of a small camion, they saw under the overreaching cliffs of the opposite side, apparently hanging above a great precipice, what they thought was a city with towers and walls. They were aston- ished beyond measure — and indeed even the expectant visitor of to-day involuntarily exclaims over the beauty of the spectacle. Later they explored it and called it Cliff Palace — an unfortunate name, for it Avas not a palace at all, but a village with two hundred rooms for family living and with twenty-tAvo kivas, or sacred rooms, for Avorship. Later on they found another similar coiimnmity dAvell- ing Avliich once sheltered three hundred and fifty inhabitants. This they called Spruce Tree House because a large spruce tree grcAv near it. These names have remained. 34 OUR NATIOXAL PARKS. Other explorers followed and iiiaiiy other ruins were found. This is not the place to name or describe them, but it may be said that here may be seen the oldest and most fully realized civic-center scheme in America. City planning of wdiich we hear so much now, as if it were a new idea, began in America five or six centuries ago under the cliifs of the Mesa Verde. Antiquities are not the only attractiojis in the Mesa Verde National Park. Its natural beauties should not be overlooked. In winter it is wholly inaccessible on account of the deep snows: in some months it is dry and parched, but in June and July when rains come vegeta- tation is in full bloom, the plants flower and the grass grows high in the glades; the trees put forth their new green leaves. The Mesa Verde is attractive in all seasons of the year and full of interest for those who love the unusual and picturesque of mountain scenery. VIII THE GLACIER NATIONAL PARK Special Characteristics: Unsurpassed Alpine Scenery; 250 Lakes of Particular Beauty THE Glacier National Park is so named because in the hollow of its rugged mountain tops lie more than sixty glaciers. It is in northwestern Montana right up against the Canadian boundary line, from which, on the map, it appears to hang down like a boy's pocket full of the sort of things boys usually carry there. It is a land of peaks and precipices, snow, ice, rushing rivers, waterfalls, and lakes of great loveliness. Experienced travelers tell us that nowhere in the world is alpine beauty found in such diversity and luxuriance. It contains 1,-"J34 square miles. A glacier is a river of ice, remarkably like a river of water in its action, only, of course, much slower. The glacier begins in a pocket or cir(|ue of snow instead of in a lake or spring, as does a river. Like the river, it flows through valleys, the ice becoming harder under the pressure from above. It grows in size by smaller glaciers floAving into it. It breaks into ripples of ice while flowing over rocky ledges, and, also like rivers, forms falls when dropping over precipices. The glacier ends when it reaches far enough down the mountain sides for the warmer weather to melt the ice into a river of water. But, Avith all its glaciers, the Glacier National Park is chiefly re- markable for its picturesquely modeled peaks, the unique quality of its rugged mountain masses, its gigantic precipices, and the romantic loveliness of its lakes. Though all the other National I*ai'ks have these general features in addition to others which dif- ferentiate each from the other, the Glacier National Park possesses OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 35 them in uiuisnnl abundance and especially happy combination. In fact, the almost sensational massing of these scenic features is what gives it marked individuality. A ROMANCE OF GEOLOGY How Nature made this remarkable spot far back in the dim ages long before man is a stirring story. Once this whole region was covered with water, but whether the water was a lake or a part of the sea no man knows. The tiny earthy jiarticles carried in this water, just as you see mud carried in a stream after a shower, deposited themselves gradually in layers on the bot- tom, continually lessening the water's depth. Geologists call these la^'ers strata after they harden into rock. If you Avere in the Glacier National Park to-day you would see broad horizontal streaks of differently colored rock in the mountain masses thousands of feet above your head. These are the very strata that the waters deposited in its depths in those far-away ages. But how did they get away np there in the air? The answer to that is the wonderful storv. I'hotograph by H. T. Cowling Chaeacteristic Foixted IMorNTAix IN Glaciek National Park Slouiit llockwell, overlooking Two INIedicine Lake 36 OUR XATIOXAL PARKS. Accordiiic; to one famous theory of creation the earth was once a o-i'oat o-lobe of • -. ^-^^ c^ ,^^ ..^ /^^^\!i'^'L r^ ^ ^^ ^^/}h\^J^' ^ . • • aO rA^ .^^ <>^ ..•v/'^c*. ».,o* .0 ^ft* •" vv^ °^ *•-» A° ^ "' ^-e*^ "o- WtRT BOOKBINDING CrsnrviUe Pi.