Q». ' o i» o ^V" '■^ • I 1 - A** ^ * o « o ' .^ O^ .0^ .^•^°- ^4* *» " "w" .-^te- \/ -'.^fe'-- %<^" ^0 o. "^< >. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR FRANKLIN K. LANE, Secretary "V, -.NATIONAL PARK SERVICE STEPHEN T. MATHER, Director THE NATIONAL PARKS PORTFOLIO BY ROBERT STERLING YARD ^in GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE WASHINGTON, D. C. 1917 SECOXD EDITION FOR SALE BY SUPERINTENDENT OF DOCUMENTS GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE, WASHINGTON, D. C. PoRTFOuo IN 11 Sections, Loose :x Flexible Cover 35 Cents Book Bovnd in Cloth 55 Cents D. of D. DEC 3 1917 DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR FRANKLIN K. LANE, Secretary NATIONAL P.\RK SERVICE STEPHEN T. MATHER, Director INTRODUCTION \0 BUILD a railroad, reclaim lands, give new impulse to enterprise, Taiid offer new doors to ambitious capital — tliese are phases of the ever-widening life and activity of this Nation. The United l| States, however, does more; it furnishes playgrounds to the peo- ple which are, ^\•e mav modestly state, without any rivals in the world. Just as tlie cities are seeing the wisdom and necessity of open spaces for the chil- dren, so with a very large view the Nation has been saving from its domain tlie rarest places of grandeur and beauty for the enjoyment of the \vorld. And this fact has been discovered only recently by many. Europe being closed, thousands for the lirst time have crossed the continent and seen one or more of the national parks. That such mountains and glaciers, lakes and can- yons, forests and ^vaterfalls were to be found in this country was a revelation to many who had heard but had not believed. It would appear from the ex- perience of the past year that the real awakening as to the value of these parks has at last been realized, and that those who have hitherto found themselves enticed by the beauty of the Alps and the Rhine and the soft loveliness of the valleys of France mav find equal if not more stimulating satisfaction in the mountains, rivers, and valleys which this Government has set apart for them and for all others. There is no reason why this Nation should not make its public health and scenic domain as available to all its citizens as Switzerland and Italv make theirs. The aim is to open them thoroughly bv road and trail and give access and accommodation to every degree of income. In this belief an effort is making now as never before to outfft the parks \\itli new hotels and public camps which should make tlie visitor desire to linger rather than hasten on his journey. One large new hotel has been luiilt in the \^alley of the Yosemite with an annex high overhead on Glacier Point, while more modest lodges have been dotted about in the obscurer spots to make accessible the rarer beauties of the inner Yosemite. For, with the new Tioga Road, which, through the generosity of Mr. vStephen T. Mather and a few others, the Government has acquired, there is to be revealed a new Yosemite which only John Muir and others of similar l^ent have seen. This is a Yosemite far different from the quiet, incomparable valley. It is a land of forests, snow, and glaciers. From 54390°— 17 (,) Mount Lyell one looks, as from an island, ii])on a tumbled sea of snowy peaks. Its lakes, many of which have never been fished, are alive with trout. And through it foams the Tuolumne River, a water spectacle destined to world celebrity, A new hotel, accompanied by adequate camping facilities, has been built on a shoulder of Mount Rainier, in Paradise Valley; and roads are projected to open up the northern side of this wonderful ice mountain. New roads and trails are building in the Glacier National Park, and new hotels are projected to make accessible portions of this scenic wilderness of incomparable magnificence. Wliile as the years have passed we have been modestly develojjing the su]5erb scenic possibilities of the Yellowstone, nature has made of it the largest and most populous game i)reserve in the Western Hemisphere. Its great size, its altitude, its vast wildernesses, its plentiful waters, its favorable conforma- tion of rugged mountain and slieltered valley, and the nearly perfect protec- tion alTorded by the policy and the scientific care of the Government have made this park, since its inauguration in 1872, the natural and inevitable cen- ter of game conservation for this Nation. There is something of significance in this. It is the destiny of the national parks, if wisely controlled, to l)ecome tlie public laboratories of nature study for the Nation. And from them specimens may be distributed to tlie city and State preserves, as is now being done with the elk of the Yellowstone, wliicli are too abundant, and mav be done later with the antelope. If Congress will but make the fimds available for the construction of roads over which automobiles may travel with safety (for all the parks are now open to motors) and for trails to hunt out the hidden places of beauty and dignity. we may expect that year by year these parks will become a more precious possession of the people, holding them to the further discovery of America and making them still prouder of its resources, esthetic as ^vell as material. Franklin K. Lanu, Secretary of the Interior. (4) T PRESENTATION HIS Nation is richer in natural scenery of the first order than any other nation; but it does not know it. It possesses an empire of grandeur and beauty which it scarcely has heard of. It owns the most inspiring playgrounds and the best equipped nature schools in the world and is serenely ignorant of the fact. In its national parks it has neglected, because it has quite overlooked, an economic asset of incalculable value. The Nation must awake, and it now becomes our happv dutv to waken it to so pleasing and profita1)le a reality. This portfolio is the morning call to the day of realization. Individual features of several of our national parks are known the world over; but few to whom the Yosemite Valley is a household word know that its seven wonderful miles are a part of a scenic wonderland of eleven hundred square miles called the Yosemite National Park. So with the Yellowstone; all have heard of its geysers, but few indeed of its thirty-three hundred square miles of wilderness beauty. Some of the linest of our national parks here pictured you probably have never even heard of. The Sequoia National Park, a hundred miles south of the Yosemite, one of the noblest scenic areas in the world, is the home of more than a million sequoias, the celebrated Big Trees of California; but even its name is known to few. The Crater Lake National Park encloses the deepest anrl bluest lake in the world surrounded by walls of pearly fretted lavas of indescribable beauty — a very wonder spot; but it is probably least knovv-n of all. The main object of this portfolio, therefore, is to present to the people of this country a panorama of our national parks and national monuments set side by side for their study and comparison. Each park will be found highly individual. The whole will be a revelation. This is the first really representative presentation of American scenery of grandeur ever published, perhaps ever made. The selection is from photo- graphs collected during a period of many months from all available sources, and represents the most striking work of many photographers. The portfolio is dedicated to the American people. It is my great hope that it will serve to turn the busy eyes of this Nation upon its national parks long enough to bring some realization of what these pleasure gardens ought to mean, of what so easily they may be made to mean, to this people. Stephen T. Mather, Director, National Park Service. (5) NOTE TO SECOND EDITION HE first edition of the National Parks Portfolio, which numbered 275,000 copies, was issued by the Department of the Interior in June, 1 91 6. The second edition, brought up to date by the substi- tution of later photographs and enlarged by the addition of the Hot Springs Section, is one of the first publications of the new National Park Service, which Congress created August 25, 191 6. Acknowledgments are due to the many photographers, professional and amateur, who contributed some of the best examples of their work to this Portfolio; to the United States Geological Sur\^ey for assistance and hearty cooperation ; to many helpful individuals ; and to seventeen Western railroads, whose contribution of forty- three thousand dollars made possible its first publication. Robert Sterling Yard. (6) PUBLIC RESERVATIONS UNDER CONTROL OF THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE NATIONAL PARKS NAMU SEE SECTION Casa Grande Ruin Page 20 . . Hot Springs. Crater Lake Crater Lake. Generae Grant Pages 3-5 . Sef|uoia. Glacier Glacier. Hawaii Pages 7- 11 , Hot Springs. Hot Springs of Arkansas Pages 2-6 . Hot Springs. Lassen Voecanic Pages 16-17 • Plot Springs. Mesa A^erdE Mesa Verde. Mount McKinlEy Pages 12-15 Hot Springs. Mount Rainier . ' Mount Rainier. Peatt Page 20 . . Hot Springs. Rocky Mountain Rocky Mountain. Sequoia Sequoia. SuEEYS HiEE Page 14 . . Hot Springs. Wind Cave Page 20 . . Hot Springs. YeeeowstonE Yellowstone. YosEMiTE Yosemite. NATIONAL MONUMENTS Indicating Page in Hot Springs Section Where Each May be Found Capuein Mountain 32 Navajo 34 Chaco Canyon 29 Naturae Bridges 28 Colorado 29 Papago Saguaro 32 Levies Tower 26 Pinnacles 32 Dinosaur 30 Petrified Forest of Arizona . 33 El Morro 32 Rainbow Bridge 31 Gran Ouivira 34 vShoshone Cavern 29 Lewis and Clark Cavern . . 30 SiEur de Monts 24 Montezuma Castle . . . . 26 Sitka 33 MuiR Woods ....... 22 Tumacacori ....... 34 Mukuntuweap „ , , . . 18,21 (7) CONTENTS YKi,LowsTf)NK National Park 31 Views Tlic L:ind of Wimdcrs — Threefold Personality — Geysers Spout and Steaming Vapors Rise — Many Colored Canyon — ^Greatcst Animal Refuge — Animals Really at Home — The Paradise of Anglers — Living in the Yellowstone. YosEMiTE National Park 28 Views Land of Enchantment — The Valley Incomparable — Charm of llie Scenic Wild — Living in the Wilderness — Tioga Road — North of the Valley's Rim — Mad Waters of Tuolumne — The iCverlasting Snows. Sequoia National Park 27 \'iews Land of Giant Trees— The Biggest Thing Alive— The Oldest Thing Alive- Other People's Sequoias — Kings and Kern Canyons^Our Loftiest Mountain. Mount Rainier National Park 24 Views The Frozen Octopus — The Giant Rivers of lectin an Arctic Wonderland — Glacier and Wild Flawer — Eiisiest Glaciers t) vSec. L^RATiiK Lake National Park {- ^^i^Rrams [ 21 Views The Lake of Mystery — "The Sea of Silence" — Story of Mount Mazama — The Legend of Llao — Viewed from the Rim — The Mine of Beauty — Fishing. Mesa Verde National Park 27 Views Cities of the P;ist— The Story of the Mesas— In the ClilT Dwellings— Dis cover)' of Sun Temijle — The Mesa's Little People — The Principal Dwellings. rxLACiER N.vriONAL Park 25 \jews An Alpine Paradise — Making a National Park — Its Lakes and \'alleys — Com- fort Among Glaciers — Purchased from Indians — Creatures of the Wild. Rocky Mountain National Park 30 Views "Top of the World" — Precipice-Walled Gorges — The King and His Kingdom — Metropolis of Beaverland — Records of the Glaciers — E;isy t j Reach and vSce. Hot v^i'rings Reservation and Certain other National Parks AND National Monuments 35 Views XalioiKil Parks: Hot Springs — Hawaii — Moimt McKinley — Lassen \'olcanic — Wind Cave — Piatt — Casa Grande — SidlysHill. Xational Moiiuinciils: Mukinitu- weaj) — Natural Bridges — Muir Woods— Sieur de Monts — Montezuma Castle — Devils Tower — Chaco Canyon — Shoshone Cavern — Colorado — Rainbow Bridge — Lewis and Clark Cavern — Dinosaur^Petrified Forest — Sitka — Tumacacori — Gran Quivira — Navajo — Papago Saguaro— El Morro — Pinnacles — Cajjulin Mountain. ('.R.\ND Canyon N.ytkjnal Monument 24 Views Colossus of Canyons — ^By Smiset and Moonrise — Painted in Magic Colors — Romantic Indiim Legend — ^Masterpiece of Erosion — Powell's Adventure. (8) Pliolograpk hy J. F. Hayvr^, Si. Paid OLD FAITHFUL X H F YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Photgrapl! by E J. IJayius. Si. Punl The Great Fails of the Yellowstone, Nearly Twice as High as Niagara Below these falls the ri\er enters the gorgeously colored Grand Canyon of the "^'ellowstone Copyright, igo6, hy \V S. Jicrry Anti-lupe THE LAND of WONDERS HE Yellowstone National Park is the largest and most widely cele- brated of our national parks. It is a wooded wilderness of thirty- three hundred square miles. It contains more geysers than are found in the rest of the world together. It has innumerable boiling springs whose steam mingles with the clouds. It has many rushing rivers and large lakes. It has waterfalls of great height and large volume. It has fishing waters unexcelled. It has canyons of sublimity, one of which presents a spectacle of broken color unequaled. It has areas of petrified forests with trunks standing. It has innumerable wild animals which have ceased unduly to fear man; in fact, it is unique as a bird and animal sanctuary. It has great hotels and many pubUc camps. It has two hundred miles of excellent roads. In short, it is not only the wonderland that common report describes; it is also the fitting playground and pleasure resort of a great people; it is also the ideal summer school of nature study. :i^'\¥^ V \t ;i:'-^^'*^-i«1 a-^-^> ->iVt'..j:r Pliotoijrafh by Georoc R K:n,i The Upper Falls of the ^'ellowsfone, a Few Miles Below Yellowstone Lake bove these falls the rushing river lies nearly level with surrounding country; below it begin the canvons Photograph by Ctutyc K. King Crest of the Lower Falls THREEFOLD PERSONALITY i lHE Yellowstone is associated in the public mind with geysers only. T Thousands even of those who, watches in hand, have hustled from sight to sight over the usual stage schedules, bring home l| vivid impressions of little else. There never was a greater mistake. Were there no geysers, the Yellow- stone watershed alone, with its glowing canyon, would be worth the national park. Were there also no canyon, the scenic wilderness and its incomparable wealth of wild-animal life would be worth the national park. The personality of the Yellowstone is threefold. The hot- water manifes- tations are worth minute examination, the canyon a contemplative visit, the park a summer. Dunraven Pass, Mount Washburn, the canyon at Tower Falls, Shoshone Lake, Sylvan Pass — these are known to very few indeed. See all or you have not seen the Yellowstone. Casti.e Well, One of the Innumerable Hot Springs Tlicse springs, whose marvellously clear water is a deep blue, lia\e an astonishino; depth Photograph hy Edward S. Cn The Cakveu and Fretted Terraces at Mammoth Hot Springs These great white hills, deposits! and built up by the hot waters, sometimes envelope forest trees vs The Gi\n-t Geyser, in M\ny Resplcis the Greatest of All It spouts for an hour at a time, the water reaching a height of 250 feet. Inter^-al, sec to fourteen days iryid -Y^— 17 — 2 I'lu'Uwrath by J. E. llavius. St. Paul Klectric Pi'AK, a Sliphrb Landmark, uk thi- North Side MANY-COLORED CANYON ROM Inspiration Point, looking a thousand feet almost vertically down upon tlie foaming Yellowstone River, and southward three miles to the Great Falls, the hushed observer sees spread before liini the most glorious kaleidoscope of color he will ever see in nature. The steep slopes are inconceivably carved by the frost and the ero- sicHi of the ages. Sometimes they lie in straight lines at easy angles, from which jut high rocky ])rominences. Sometimes they seem carved from the side walls. Here and there jagged rocky needles rise perpendicularly like gi'oups of gothic spires. And the whole is colored as brokenly and vividlv as the field of a kaleido- scope. The whole is streaked and spotted in every shade from the deepest orange to the faintest lemon, from deep crimson through all the brick shades to the softest pink, from black through all the grays and pearls to glistening wliite. The greens are furnished by the dark pines above, the lighter shades of gro\vth 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 tlie skv overhead. Copyright by Hayius, St. Paul Sylvan Lake, below Sylvan Pass, Cody Road Copyright by Gifford \'iEw FROM Mount Washburn Snovnso Yellowstone Lake in Distance The northern east side is a country of striking and romantic scenery made accessible by excellent roads Cupyiigiii by J . E. Ilayncs, Si. Paul Standing upon Artist's Point, Which Pushes Out Almost Over the Foaming River You into the Most Glorious Kaleidoscj (ousAND Feet Below, the Incomparable Canyon of the Yellowstone Widens Before (f Color You Will Ever See in Nature Copyright by S. N. Leek Thirty Thousand Elk Roam This Sanctuary Wilderness Photo,jraphhyS,hlohtin It is the Natural Home of the Celebrated Bighorn, the Rocky-Mountain Sheep "koi^ Dehr Make Unexphcted Silhouettes at Frequent Intervals GREATEST ANIMAL REFUGE IHE Yellowstone National Park is by far the largest and most suc- Tcessful wild-animal preser\'e in the world. Since it was estaVj- lished in 1872 hunting has been strictly prohibited, and elk, bear ' I deer of several kinds, antelope, bison, moose, and bighorn mountain sheep roam the valleys and mountains in large numbers. Thirty thousand elk, for instance, live in the park. Antelope, nearly extinct elsewhere, here abound. These animals have long since ceased to fear man as wild animals do ever^-- where except in our national parks. While few tourists see them who follow the beaten roads in the everlasting sequence of stages, those who linger in the glorious wilderness see them in an abundance that fairly astonishes. Photograph by S. S . Leek In Winter When the Snows Are Deep Park Rangers Leave Hay in Convenient Spots ANIMALS REALLY AT HOME Photograph by Edward S. Curtis Unlike the Grizzly, the Brown Bear Climbs Trees Quickly and Easily ERY different, indeed, from the beasts of the after-dinner story Vand the literature of adventure are the wild animals of the Yel- lowstone. Never shot at, never pursued, they are comparatively i| as fearless as song-birds nestling in the homestead trees. W^ilderness bears cross the road without haste a few }'ards ahead of the solitar}' passer-by, and his accustomed horses jog on undisturbed. Deer by scores lift their antlered heads above near thickets to watch his passing. Elk scarcel}^ slow their cropping of forest grasses. Even the occasional moose, straying far from his southern wilderness, scarcely quickens his long lope. Herds of antelope on near-bv hills watch but hold their own. Only the grizzl}^ and the mountain sheep, besides the predatory beasts, still hide in the fastnesses. But even the mountain sheep loses fear and joins the others in winters of heavy snow when park rangers scatter hay by the roadside. ., • ^^: 'i^'H im^ -a r '* Photograph by S. N. Leek THE PARADISE OF ANGLERS HK Yellowstone is a land of splendid rivers. Tliree watersheds find tlieir beginnings within its borders. From Yellowstone Lake flows north the rushing Yellowstone River with its many tributaries; from Shoshone, Lewis, and Heart Lakes flows south the Snake River; and in tlie western slopes rise the Madison and its many tributaries. All are trout waters of high degree. The nati\'e trout of this region is the famous cutthroat. The gra\ding is native in the Madison River and its tributaries. Others have been planted. Besides the stream fishing, which is unsurpassed, the lakes, particularlv Shoshone Lake and certain small ones, aftord admirable sport. Photograph by J. E. Haynes, St. Paul A Big Lakk Trout from Shoshone Lake The game cutthroat is the commonest trout in the Yellowstone, but there are six other varieties Photograph by J. E. Haynes St Paul Cutthroats from One to Three or Four Pounds Are Taken in Large Numbers AT THE Yellowstone Lake Outlet f^ Copyright by Gifford Young Pelicans on Molly Island in Yellowstone Lake The "Yellowstone pelicans are very large anc! pure white, a picturesque feature of the park Photograph by J. E. Haynes, St. Paul Old I'Mthi-ui. Inn Cot^yn.!!! 'r / /■ //,;■.-;, -^.Sl. Paul Tun Mammoiu 11l'il.l Photograph by J. E. Haynes, St. Paul The Lake Hoi el Three of the Five Large Hotels in the Yellowstone National 1'ark Photograph by Shiplers, S-dl L.ik, C . There Are Also Large Public Camps LIVING in the YELLOWSTONE HE park has entrances on all four sides. Three have railroad connections; the southern entrance, by way of Jackson Hole and past the jagged snowy Tetons, is a\-ailable for vehicles. The roads from all entrances enter a central Ijelt road which makes a large circuit connecting places of special interest. Four large hotels are located at points convenient for seeing the sights, and are supplemented by public camps at modest prices. But the day of the unhurried visitor has dawned. If you want to enjoy your Yellowstone, if, indeed, you want even to see it, you should make your minimum twice five days; two weeks is better; a month is ideal. Spend the additional time at the canyon and on the trails. See the lake and the pelicans. Fish in Shoshone Lake. Climb Mount Washburn. Spend a day at Tower Falls. See Mammoth Hot vSprings. Hunt wild animals with a camera. Stay with the wilderness and it will repay you a thousandfold. Fish a little, study nature in her mvriad wealth — and live. The Yellowstone National Park is ideal for camping out. When people reaHze this it should quickly become one of the most lived in, as it already is one of the most livable, of all our national parks. ^I^^^Kittmmmtttstt^ m » ' ' " ■ " ' ^¥^& ^> Vj Copvrioht hv S. N Lerk The South Entrance Is Near the Lordly Teton Range, Jlst Over the Boundary THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17 ; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles, .\rranged chronologically in the order of their creation. N.\TION'AL PARK and Date LOC.\TIOX Hot Springs Res- Middle ERV.^rro.N' Arkansas 1832 Yellowstone North- western Wyoming AREA square miles DISTIN'CTIVE CHARACTERISTICS YOSEMITE 1890 Middle eastern California Sequoia 1890 Middle eastern California General Grant 1890 Middle California Mount Rainier 1899 West central Washington Crater Lake 1902 Southern Oregon Platt 1904 Southern Oklahoma Mesa Verde 1906 Southern Colorado Gl.\cier 1910 North- western Montana Rocky Mount.\in Northern Colorado Hawaii 1916 Hawaii Lassen Volcanic 1916 Northern Calif OTnia Mount McKinley 1917 South central Alaska x% 46 hot springs possessing curative properties— Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent citv- of Hot Sprin'^^s — Bathhouses under public control. 3,348 More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling springs— Mud volcanoes— Petrified forests— Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkable for gorgeous colorin'^^ Large lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preser^-e in world. 1 1, 125 j Vallej' of world-famed beauty — Loft\- cliffs — Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extraordinan,- height — 3 groves of big trees— Large areas of snowy peaks— Water^vheel falls. The Big Tree National Park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. 4 Created to preser\-e the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter — 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. 324 Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, ;o to 1,000 feet thick— Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. 249 Lake of extraordinar>- blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. \'i Sulphur and other springs possessing curative properties — Under Government regulation. 77 Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric cliff dwellings in United States, if not in the world. 1, 534 Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty — 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. 3 98 Heart of the Rockies — SnoAv\- Range , peaks 1 1 , 000 to 1 4 , 2 5 o feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. 118 Two active volcanoes. Mauna Loa. largest in the world, and Kilaues. whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed — j A third volcano. Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, I contains many cones. 124 Active volcano— Lassen Peak, 10.437 feet in altitude — Cinder Cone, 6.907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. 2, 200 Highest Mountain in North America— Rises higher above surrounding cotmtr}* than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natxu-al cavern. Sullys Hill, 1904. North Dakota \;\x>oded hillv tract on Devib Lake. HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS The map shows the loeatioii of all of our National Parks and their principal railroad cimnections. The tra\ eler may work out his roiites to suit himself. Low rounti trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Mountain region and Pacific Co;ist may be availed of in visiting the National Parks during their respective seasons, thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental through trains and branch lines make the Parks easy of access from all parts of the United States. For schedules and excursiiin fares to and between the National Parks apply to your local railway ticket oflice or to any excursion agency, or write to the P;issenger Departments of the railroads which appear on the above map, as follows: Arizon.\ E.vstbrm R.mlro.\p Tucson. Ariz. Atchison. TopKK.\ & S.\MT.\ Fi: R.MLW.w mg Railway Exchange. Chicaco. 111. Chic.\go & XoRTH Wk-;ti;km R.\iLW.vv j.'^i West Jackson Hoiilovanl. CliicaKo. 111. Chicago. BURUNC.TON & Qnvcv R.\iLKO.\D Co 547 West Jackson Boulevard, ChicaRO. 111. Chicago. MiLw.vuKse & St, Taul Railway Railway Hxcliaiise. Chicago. 111. Chic.\go. Rock Isl.\nd & Pacific Railway Co . .' La S.iUc vSireot .Station, ChicaKo.Ul. Colorado & SouTHKRN Railway Railway lixch injio lUiildini;, Pcnvcr.Colo. Denver & Rio Grande R.mlroad Co Equitable HuiUlini;, Denver. Colo. Great N'ORTHERN' Railway Railroail Buildins. Fourth and Jackson Streets. St Paul. .Miirn. Gulf. Colorado & Santa Fg Railway Galveston. Tex. Illinciis Central R.\ilR(^ad Central Station. Chicago. 111. Mis.souRi Pacific R.ULWAY Railway E.xchangc Buildini;. St, Louis. Mo. Northern PacificRailway Railroad Buildin.t;. Fifth and Jackson Streets. St. Paul. Minn. S.\n Pedro. Los Angeles & S.\lt Lake R.mlroad .... Pacific Electric Building. Los Angeles. Cal. SofTHERN P.\ciFic Co Fkxid Building. San Francisco. Cal. L'nion Pacific System Garl.\nd Building. >s East Washington Street. Chicago. 111. Wab.\sh R.mlway Railway E.xchange Building. St. Louis. Mo. . Western P.\cific Railw.w Mills Building, San Francisco. Cal. For information about sojourning and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department ' of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park or Piirks in which you are interested. REMEMBER THAT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THEY ARE THE GREAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHOM THEY ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR ,, \VASHlNGrOX ; GOVERXMEXT rRIXTIXG OFFICE : 1917 Y O s E M I T E DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane Secretary n'ation.JlL park it L.-!-Tr v Pholograph by A. C. Pilhbury The Highest Waterfall in the World — the Yosemite Falls The Upper Fall measures 1,430 feet, as liigh as nine Niagaras. The Lower Fall measures 320 feet. The total drop from crest to river, including intermediate cascades, is almost half a mile Photograph by U . .>. / The "\'usi:mite Valli.v from Insi'iration Point, Showing Bridalveil I'alls LAND of ENCHANTMENT HO does not know of the Yosemite Valley? And yet, how few have heard of the Yosemite National Park! How few know that this world-famous, incomparable Valley is merely a crack seven miles long in a scenic masterpiece of eleven hundred square miles! John Muir loved the Valley and crystallized its fame in phrase. But still more he loved the National Park, which he describes as including "innumerable lakes and waterfalls and smooth silky lawns; the noblest forests, the loftiest granite domes, the deepest ice-sculptured canyons, the brightest crystalline pavements, and snow}' mountains soaring into the sky twelve and thirteen thousand feet, arrayed in open ranks and spiry-pinnacled groups par- tially separated by tremendous canyons and ampi theaters ; 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- jborn lakes at their feet, blue and green, free or encumbered with drifting ice- jbergs like miniature Arctic Oceans, shining, sparkling, calm as stars." Thf YosFMiTE Valley from Giacifr IVint The I ppcr and I owt r ^ oscmite Falls are here sho\\Ti in panial profile PM.w.NW.yj.r.R.,..„ ^^^^^ ^^^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^.^^^ Washington Column Its summit is 4,892 feet above the floor of the Valley F.ARLY Morning Beside Mirror Lake This lake is famous for its reflections of the cliffs. Mount Watkins in the hacksround &^=^^ Copyriohltd. lii:,. by J T Boysen El Capitan" at Slnsft This gigantic rock, whose hard granite resisted the glacier, rises 3,604 feet from the \ alley floor THE VALLEY INCOMPARABLE I'hoUiiinil'h by U. S. ReilaiiuUion Scnnr Beautiful Vkrnal Talls HI{ first view of most spots of unusual celebrity often falls short of expecta- tion, hut this is seldom, if ever, true of the Yosemite Valley. The sheer immensity of the precipices on either side of the peaceful floor; the loftiness and the romantic suggestion of the numerous waterfalls; the maj- esty of the granite walls; and the unreal, almost fairy quality of the ever-varying whole can not be successfully foretold. This valley was once a tor- tuous river canyon. So rapidly was it cut by the Merced that the tributary valleys soon re- mained hanging high on either side. Then the canyon became the bed of a great glacier. It was widened as well as deepened , and the hanging character of the side valleys was accentuated. This explains the enormous height of the waterfalls. 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 Lower Yosemite Fall, immediately be- low, has a drop of 320 feet, or two Niagaras more. Vernal Falls has the same height. The Nevada Falls drops 594 feet sheer, and the celebrated Bridal- veil Falls 620 feet. Nowhere else in the world ma}' be had a water spectacle such as this. ^9 r^ 1^. :. .,. • l|^-^^^^^?^.i <^ !l^>- ■m Photograph by H. C. Tthbitts Its Name Is Self-Evident — the Bridalveil Falls 54590°— Y— 17 2 rh'loarat^hhy H. C TMills Laki: Tknaya. A Striking \'n:\v ok Nevada Ialls, Liukrty (.at on Lhit Phulograpk by A . C. P'.lLbury Vernal and Nevada Falls and Half Dome from thf. Glacier Poim Trail Photograph by J. T. Boysen A Bend in the Big Oak Flat Road Photograph by A. C. Pilhbury The Sheer Immensity of the Precipices on Either Side the Valley's Peaceful li Quality of the Ever-Varm THE RoNL\>TTC NLaJESTY OF THE OLE. Attest It Lscomp.ajl\ele Gr-O^tte Walls, asd the Unreal, Almost F.^rvlike CHARM OF THE SCENIC WILD Flioloarnl^li liy ( '. S. Rcclamalion Hcnicf The Grizzly Giant, the Biggi-st YosEMiTE Sequoia UMMER in the Yosemite is unreal. The Valley, with its foaming falls dissolving into mists, its calm forests hiding the singing river, its enormous granites peaked and domed against the sky, its in- spiring silence haunted by distant water, suggests a dream. One has a sense of fairyland and the awe of infinity. Imagine Cathedral Rocks rising twenty-six hundred feet above the wild flowers, El Capitan thirty-six hundred feet, Sentinel Dome four thousand feet. Half Dome five thousand feet, and Clouds Rest six thousand feet! And among them, the waterfalls! Even the weather appears impossi- ble; the summers are warm, but not too warm; dry, but not too dry; the nights cold and marvelously starry. A few miles away are the Big Trees, not the greatest groves nor the greatest trees, for those are in the Sequoia Na- tional Park, a hundred miles south, but three groves containing monsters which, next to Sequoia's, are the hugest and the oldest living things. Of these the Grizzly Giant is king — whose diameter is nearly thirty feet, whose girth is over ninetv- nine, and whose height is more than two hundred. Their presence commands the silence due to worsliip. Winter is becoming a feature hi the life of the Valley. Hotels are open to accommodate an increasing flow of vis- itors. The falls are still and frozen, the trees laden with snowy burdens. The greens have vanished; the winter sun shines upon a glory of gray and white. Winter sports are rapidly becoming popular on the floor of the Valley. i'hotoijraph by J. T. Boysen Sleighing and Skiing in Yosemite Winter sports are rapicllv becoming popular on the floor o\ the Valley Photograph by J . T. Boysen Skating on Ice on Mirror Lake LIVING IN THE WILDERNESS \\ HO S (.'OMINGr IVING is comfortable in the LYosemite. Several roomy pub- lic camps, and a line hotel offer the visitor to the Valley a choice of kind and price. Above the Val- ley lodges and most comfortable camps occur at convenient interA^als on road and trail. There is a new hotel on Glacier Point. These improved conditions begin the larger development of the Yosemite Na- tional Park which the Department of the Interior has planned so long and so care- hiWy. It has there inaugurated a model policy for all the national parks. The Yosemite is reached from Merced. The Yosemite is an excellent place to camp out. One may have choice of many kinds of moinitain country. Nearly every- where the trout fishing is exceptionally fine. Camping outfits may be rented and supplies purchased in the Valley. Garages for motorists and rest-houses for trampers will be found at convenient intervals. TIOGA ROAD Copyrighted, igio, by J. T. lioysm Woof! BOVE the north rim of the valle}' the old Tioga Road, which the Department of the Interior acquired in 191 5 and put into good condition, crosses the park from east to w^est, affording a new route across tlie Sierra and opening to the pub- lic foi- the first time the magnificent scenic region in the nortli. The Tioga Road was built in 1 88 1 to a mine soon after abandoned. For years it has been impassable. It is now the gate- way to a wilderness heretofore accessible onl}' to campers. NORTH OF THE VALLEY'S RIM EFORH the restored Tioga Road made accessible the magnificent mountain and valley area constituting the northern half of the Yosemite National Park, this pleasure paradise was known to none except a few enthusiasts who penetrated its wilderness year after year with camping outfits. This is the region of rivers and lakes and granite domes and Vjrilliantly polished glacial pavements. The mark of the glacier is seen on every hand. It is the region of small glaciers, remnants of a gigantic past, of which there are several in the park. It is the region of rock-bordered glacier lakes of which there are more than two hundred and fifty. It is the region, above all, of small, rushing rivers and of the roaring, foaming, twisting Tuolumne. From the base of the Sierra crest, born of its snows, the Tuolumne River rushes westward roughly paralleling the Tioga Road. Midway it slants sharply down into the Tuolumne Canyon forming in its mad course a water spectacle destined some dav to world fame. ..,>^pat; II. C. J TioG.\ koAD Scenery ^■c: 0:^: # t^.-.-- p^ ..'■ /•■''.'■•:' f ^^^B j -imat W^-'f ' ' ^' ^^^^^K '^9 ^^B ■ PMw ^f. y.'-; ■k 1 ^B^^l H^ ^'*'. ^^H ^^K J 1 jjiS ^^^^^^^^^^^^^■^^^__I^^| H ^k,'.^ mMili Photograph by W . L. Huber The High Sierra: View of Mount Riiter from Kuna Chest P holograph by Herbert W . Gleason Beautiful Rogers Lake and Regulation Peak in the Northern Part of the Park Photograph by IC L. Hubur The Waterwheel Below California Falls MAD WATERS of TUOLUMNE ONE but the hardiest cUmbers have clamlDered do^vn the Grand Canyon of the Tuohiinne and seen its leaping waters. Here the river, slanting sharply, becomes, in John ]\Iuir's phrase, "one wild, exulting, onrushing mass of snowy purple bloom spreading over glacial waves of granite without an}- definite channel, gliding in magnificent silver plumes, dashing and foaming through huge bowlder dams, leap- ing high in the air in wheellike whirls, displaying glorious enthusiasm, tossing from side to side, doubling, glinting, singing in exuberance of mountain energv." Photograph by A. C. Pillsbh A Pair of Tuolumne V/aterwheels THE EVERLASTING SNOWS UMMITS of !> e r ]) o t u a 1 siu)\v are, for most Amer- icans, a new association with Yosemitc. But tlie region's very origin was that Sierra whose crest peaks on the park's eastern boundary still shelter in shnnikcn old age tlie once all-])owerful glaciers. Kxcelsior, Conness, Dana, Kuna, Blacktop, I, yell. Long — from the com jianionship of tliese great peaks de- scended the ice-])ack of old and de- scend to-dav the sjiarkling waters of the Tuolunme and the Merced. PVom their great siunmits the climber beholds a su1)lime wilderness of crowded, towering mountains, a con- trast to the silent, uplifting A^alley as striking as mind can cmiceive. Ever- lasting snows lill the hollows between the peaks and spatter their jagged granite sides. The glaciers feed in- numerable small lakes. I'holoijraHihy IT.. L Ihibtr ASCKNDINC; Mm NT l.YFI.I. Photograph by II'. L. Ruber CROSsiNt; Snow Hi'M.Mocks in the Ascent of Mount Lyell Xi Y THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17; Total Area, 9,774 vSquare Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. NATIONAL PARK and Date LOCATION Hot vSprings Res- krvation 1832 Yellowstone 1872 YOSEMITE i8qo Sequoia i8go General Grant i8go Mount Rainier Crater Lake 1902 Platt 1904 Mesa Verde 1906 Glacier 1910 Rocky Mountain Hawaii 1916 Lassen Volcanic 1916 Mount McKinley 1917 Middle Arkansas North- western Wyoming Middle eastern California Middle eastern California Middle Califcjrnia West central Washington vSoiithern Oregon Southern Oklahoma Southern Colorado North- western Montana Northern Cfjlorado Hawaii Northern California vSouth central Alaska AREA sriuare miles 3.348 125 252 324 249 77 534 398 118 124 distinctive CHARACTERISTICS 46 hot springs possessing curative properties^Many hotels and hoarding houses in adjacent city of Hot vSprings — Bathhouses under public control. More geysers than in all rest oi world together— Boiling springs— Mud volcanoes -Petrified forests— Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkalde for gorgeous coloring — Large lakes and waterfalls -Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheej), etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. Valley of world-famed beauty— Lofty clifTs— Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extraordinary height — 3 groves of big trees— Large areas of snowy peaks— Waterwheel falls. The Big Tree National Park— 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter— 6 miles from .Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system— 28 glaciers, some of large size— 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable sub;dpine wild-flower fields. Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet— Sides 1,000 feet high. vSulphur and other springs possessing curative properties — Under {ifjverninent regulati(;n. Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric clifT dwellings in United States, if not in the world. Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed alpine character— 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty— 60 small gla- ciers-Peaks of unusual shape— Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies— vSnowy Range, peaks 11, 000 to 14,250 feet altitude— Remarkable records of glacial period. Two active volcanoes, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed^ A third volcano, Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. Active volcano Lassen Peak, 10,437 *^eet in altitude- Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. Highest Mountain in North America Rises higher above surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. SuUys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS The map shows the location of all of our National Parks and their principal railroad connections. The traveler may work out his routes to suit himself. Low round-trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Moimtain region and Pacific Coast may be availed of in visiting the National Parks during their respective seasons, thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental through trains and branch lines make the Parks easy of access from all parts of the United States. For schedules and excursion fares to and between the National Parks apply to your local railway ticket ofHce or to any excursion agency, (jr write to the Piissenger Departments of the railroads which appear on the above map, as follows: Arizom.\ E.\sTERM Railro.\d Tucsoti. Ariz. Atchison, Topek.v & Sant.v Pe U.\ilway mg Railway Exchange, Chicago. III. Chic.\go & North We -iTERN Railw.w 226 West Jackson BoulevMr.l. Chicago. III. Chic.\go, Burli.vgton & Quincy R.mlroad Co 547 West Jackson Boulevard. Chicago. 111. Chicvgo, Milw.vukee & St. Paul R.mlway Railway E-Kchange, Chicago, III. Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway Co L,a Salle Street Station. Chicago, 111. Colorado & Southern Railway Railw.iy E.Kchange Building, Denver. Colo. Denver & Rio Grande Railroad Co Equitable Building, Denver, Colo. Great Northern Railway Railroad Building, Fourth an i Jackson Streets, St. Paul. Minn. Gulf. Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Galves^ton, Tex. Illi.nois Central Railroad Central Station. Chicago. 111. Missouri P-vciFic Railw.w Railway E.Kchange Building, St. Louis. Mo. Northern PacificRailway Railroad Building, Fifth and Jackson Streets. St. Paul. Minn. San Pedro. Los Angeles & Salt Lake R.mlroad .... Pacific Electric Building. Los Angeles, Cal. Southern Pacific Co Flood Building, San Francisco. Cal. Union Pacific System Garland Building. ^S Eist Washington Street, Chicago, 111. Wab.-vsh Railway Railway E.Kchange Building, St. Louis. Mo. Western Pacific Railway Mills Building. San Francisco, Cal. For information about sojourning and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park or Parks in which you arc interested. REMEMBER THAT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THE^' ARE THE GREAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHOM THEY ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OE THE INTERIOR ,4 WASIUXGTO.N : COVEK.V.ME.XT rUI.\TIX(; office : 1S17 THE BIG TREE NATIONAL PARK T IT F SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK Photograph by A. C. Pillsbury DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SER\7CE Photograph by Rodney L. Glisan View of the Big Arroyo from Sawtooth Peak ^^H ^r Jl^ SHH HCnFj P^^l^l LJ*li^B hhh^^ ^^hiH^^I I'holugrupli by I . S. Cculogical Suncy It is iiiK JuKAL Park for CaiMping LAND OF GIANT TREES ATURH'S forest masterpiece is John Muir's designation of the giant tree after which is named the Sequoia National Park in middle eastern California. Here, within an area of two hundred and thirty-seven square miles, are found several large groves of the celebrated Sequoia Washingtoniana, popularl}' known and widely celebrated as the Big Tree of California. More than a million of these trees grow within the park's narrow confmes, many of them mere babes of a few hundred years, many sturdy youths of a thousand years, man\^ in the voung vigor of two or three thousand years, and a few in full maturity. The principal entrance is Visalia, California. Half a dozen miles away is the General Orant National Park, whose four square miles were set apart because they contained the General Grant Tree, second only in size and age to the patriarch of all, the General vSherman Tree. On vSequoia's favored slopes grow other monsters also. It is the park of magnificent trees of many kinds, and it is the park of birds. The vSequoia National Park is the gateway to one of the grandest scenic areas in this or any other land. Over its borders to the north and east lies a land of sublime nobility whose wild rivers and tortuous canyons, whose glacier-carved precipices and vast snowy summits culminating in the supreme altitude of Whitney, will make it some day surpassed in celebrity by none. THE BIGGEST THING ALIVE thousand diameter. F the 1,156,000 se- quoia trees, old and young, whicli form these groves, twelve exceed ten feet in ]\Iuir states that a Photograph by Lmdky Eddy The General Sherman Tree The largest and oldest living thing in all the world diameter of twenty feet and a height of two hundred and seventy-five is perhaps the average for mature and favor- ably situated trees, while trees twenty-fi^'e feet in diameter and approaching three hundred in height are not rare. But the greatest trees have astonishing cHmensions: General Sherman : diameter, 36.5 feet; height, 279.9 f^^t. General Grant: diameter, 3,S feet; height, 264 feet. Abraham Lincoln : cUam- eter, 31 feet; height, 270 feet. California: diameter, 30 feet; height, 260 feet. George Washington: diam- eter, 29 feet; height, 255 feet. A little effort will help you realize these dimensions. Meas- ure and stake in front of a church the diameter of the Gen- eral Sherman Tree. Then stand back a distance equal to the tree's height. Raise }-our e3'es slowly and imagine this huge trunk rising in front of the church. When you reach a point in the sky forty-five degrees up from the spot on which you stand vou will have the tree's height were it growing in front of your church. THE OLDEST THING ALIVE | |HH General Sherman TTree is the oldest li\ing tning. At the I birth of Moses it was probably a sapling. Its exact age can not be determined without counting the rings, but it is probably in excess of thirty- five hundred years. This looks back long before the beginning of human U story. When Christ was born it was a lusty youth of fifteen hundred summers. There are many tliousands of trees in the Sequoia National Park which were growing thrift- ilv when Christ was hiorn; hun- dreds which were flourishing while Babylon was in its prime ; several whiich antedated the pyr- amids on the Egyptian desert. John Muir counted four thousand rings on one prostrate giant. This tree probably sprouted while the Tower of Babel was still standing. The sequoia is regular and symmetrical in general form. Its powerful, stately trunk is purplish to cinnamon brown and rises without a branch a hundred or a hundred and fiftv feet — which is as high or higher than the tops of most forest trees. Its bulky limbs shoot boldly out on every side. Its foHage, the most feathery and deHcate of all the conifers, is densely massed. The wood is almost inde- structible except bv fire. Photograph by \V . L. Hu'.-r The Genkr.al Grant Tree Second in size and age only to the General Sherman Tree "PllC IN llli: \\\)C)1)V \\ U.DKRM WILDERNESS OF MONSTERS ERSONS who have seen the INIariposa Grove in the Vosemite National Park have seen seqnoias of the nol)lest type; bnt only hi the C.iant Forest of the Seqnoia National Park \\\\\ they see them in the impressive glorv of massed mnltitnde and wildest grandenr. To walk and wonder through these woods, even for a few hours, is to feel an emotion ^vhicll can be tlnplicated nowhere else. It is not the setinoias alone, as in the INIariposa Grove, that stir the soul. but the bewildering and chmatic repetition of monsters rising singly and superbly grouped from a dense and seemingly endless forest of noble growths of many other kinds. Without the sequoias this forest would be notable. "With their constant unexpected repetition the effect is dramatic, even breath-taking. Man>- of the very greatest trees are happened upon casually as the visitor winds through the bush-grown aisles of pine, and their sudden appearance is the more dramatic because of the freedom of their red pillared stems from the bright green flowing moss upon the trunks and branches of the uncountable pines. Until July, 191 6, when Congress appropriated :^ 50, 000 for the purchase of a part of the private holdings in the Giant I'orest, it was our national nnsfortune and peril that most of these monster trees remained the property c f individuals. The balance of the property was purchased for $20,000 by the National Geo- graphic Society and donated to the I'nite 1 States. M " Photograph by LindUy Eddy Vistas of the Giant Forest Many of these trees were growing thriftily when Christ was bom Pholoijuii'li by Liiidky Eddy Alta Pkak. from Moro Rock. Photograph by i i c / Alia Mhadows PstAR the Giam i ukhsi Photograph by Lindley tddy Sunset from the Rim of Marble Fork Canyon Photograph by C. H. Hamilton 54590°— S— 17 2 The Sierra Club in Camp Photograph by S. H. W'lUard Mount Brewer, "The Mountain Magnificent," From East Lake y'/.L-ii'i.Tij; /.■ byS. II. ]\ilhini Rae Lake, Probably the Most Beautiful in the High Sierra Photograph bv H. C. TiUr.:: The Celebrated Kings River Canyon Photograph by H. C. Tibbills University Peak from Kearsarge Pass PhotOijraph by Lmdlcy Eddy THE Pj, This trunk measures z88 feet. Sequoia wood is almost indestrua i GIANT pept by fire. This tree may have been prostrate for many centuries r LVi PhoU^a'dl^h l>y C. n HamiUoii Seijuoia is the park oF big trees ot" many kiiuis, and it is the park ot" birds "THE GREATER SEQUOIA" NJv can not tliiiik or speak of the vSecjiioia National J 'ark without inchuhniT the extraordinary scenic country lyini,^ beyond its boiuid- aries to the north and east. Not that tliere is mucli in conunon between the two, for the jjark marks the si]])remacy of forest lux- uriance and the outlyint; country the su])reniac\' of rock-scid])tin'erl canyf)n and snowy summit. And yet there is the conunon note of supremacy, each f)f its own kind. And there is the conunon note of continuity, for, from the lowest valley of the wooded park to the ])eak of our loftiest heij^ht, Mount Whitney, nature's painting runs the gamut. 'i*he ];arts are indivisible; to separate them is to cut in two the canvas of the Master. And so it is that those who know this land of cxi;l)crant climax have come to call it "The Greater Sequoia" in order to express nf)t the j)art limited by the park's official title but the whole as God made it. There is a bill now before Congress to enlarge the park boundaries so that they shall inclose it all. i'hutu,iral>h hy II. C. Tihinlts 'I'm- (loi.Di-N Trout Cri;f,k The trout caught in this stream arc brilliantly ^olcicn. 7 hey are found nowhere else in the world except where transplanted from this stream Pliolograt^li by J. A'. Lc Clonic Tehipite Dome, 3,000 Fiet Sheer Aiuive ihe Kings River Photograph by S. H Willard GiovND Sentinel, Towering 3,500 ri;HT Above the River, is onk of the Features oe Kings River Canyon KINGS AND KERN CANYONS 1{LL outside tlic park's boundaries and overlooking it from the east the amazing, craggy Sierra gives birth in glacial chambers to two noble rivers. A himdred thousand rivulets trickle from the everlasting snows; ten thousand resultant brooks roar down the rocky slopes; hundreds of resultant streams swell tlieir turl)ulent, trout- haunted currents. One of these rivers, the Kings, flows west, paralleling the northern boundary of the park. The other, the Kern, flows south, paralleling its eastern boundary. The Kings l-^ver Canvon and the Canyon of the Kern are practically matchless for the wild quality of their beauty and the majesty of tlieir setting. The traveler goes home to plan his return, for this is a country whose peculiar charm lavs an enduring clutch upon desire. "The Greater Sequoia" has few visitors yet — but they are worshipers. Unlike many areas of extreme rocky character, this is not specially difficult to travel ; it curiously adapts itself to trails. It is an ideal land for the camper. But one must go well equipped. There must be good guides, good horses, and plenty of warm clothing. The difference here between a good and an indifferent equipment is the difference between satisfaction and misery. I'lu.tooraH' byS. 11. Millard Roaring Fork Falls on the South Fork, ok thh Kings m Photograph by H. C. TibbiUs Here the Sierra Has Massed Her Mountains; Tumbled Them Willfully, Recklessly, Into One Titanic, Sprawling Heap I— ( :z ^ D O H CD o o H U c/) < I— H ^ -^ ii E § « "E .j3 o ir. o oj ,!<: 2 c/5 .^ bO (U Vi X .i^ rt -^ ■ J X 5 G o3 i- 3 .5 cd •;=; x; cri 3i a ^ >t3 c o bXi z ^ ^ IT. g3 CD ^ ^- ,^ '^ _ bjC LT. 5= R E ■^ o3 cj OJ O rt 2:^ Oi P< CO gj aJ (D X 'S '^ 2 *^ a; fe Si C -S tr. ^ E ^ CO +j o . E fcJC o3 be ^ O X oi OJ u o a E =^ 3 03 OJ OJ > X o H .^■^1 The Summit of Mulm Whitney, Nearly Ihki i Aliii^ I In, / -*UJ | JLJU._.'^^ * t-«J- wiJ^J ■M i J I' ^ ' -u 5;^ ^^ fA^Sh 1 '■%:?--->- Photograph by Emerson Hough Summit of Mount Whitney. The Stone Shelter on Molnt Whitney's Summit j THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. XATIOXAL PARK and Date Hot Sprin'gs Res- ervatiox 1832 Yellowstoxe YOSEMITE 1890 Sequoia 1890 Gexeral Grant 1890 MouxT Rainier 1S99 Crater Lake 1902 Platt 1904 Mesa Verde 1906 Glacier 1910 LOCATIOX Middle Arkansas Xorth- \vestem Wyoming Middle eastern California Middle eastern California Middle California West central Washington Southern Oregon Southern Oklahoma Southern Colorado North- western Montana AREA square miles Rocky Mouxtaix Northern iQi- Colorado Hawaii Hawaii 1916 i Lassex Volcanic Northern 1916 California MorxT McKixLEY South 1917 central 3.348 DISTIXCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS 324 249 I>2 1.534 398 118 124 Alaska 46 hot springs possessing curative properties— Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs — Bathhouses under public control. More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling springs — Mud volcanoes — Petrified forests — Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkable for gorgeous colorin'-j- — • Large lakes and waterfalls— Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preser\-e in world. Valley of world-famed beauty— Lofty cliflfs— Romantic vis- tas — \\'aterfalls of extraordinary' height— 3 groves of big trees— I-arge areas of snowy peaks— Waterwheel falls. The Big Tree National Park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter — 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. Lake of extraordinan.- blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. Stdphur and other springs possessini; curative properties — Under Government regulation. Most notable and best-preser^-ed prehistoric cliff dwellings in United States, if not in the world. Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty— 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11, 000 to 14,250 feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. Two active volcanoes. Mauna Loa. largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed— A third volcano. Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. Active volcano— Lassen Peak. 10.437 feet in altitude- Cinder Cone, 6.907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. Highest Mountain in North America— Rises higher above surrounding countr>' than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less jxjpular interest are : Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. Sullys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS ^^i^sA ^-—^ I %S».dC,., S DAK, .^ ,.;„A-_^. ^^ . VL^i, I 0\w A ■'■'^•^'^•^ t"-^--'2-M- ^^ Building. San Francisco. Ca!. For information about sojourning and tr.iveling within the National Parks write to the Department of the Interior for the Information circul.ir of the Park or Parks in which you are interested. RF.MF.MBER TIl.XT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU TH1•.^ ARE THE GREAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHOM THEY ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 5j WASHIXCTO.N : GOVERX,ME.\T PraXTIXi; OIFICE : 1917 MOUNT RAINIER NATIONAL PARK DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. I,ane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Plu'kH,ral^hhvCuH,< i'-- ^filler A Rippling Rivir of Ick 400 Fhet Thick Flowing from the Shining Summit Looking from a wild-flower slope down upon the celebrated Nisqually Glacier and up at Columbia Crest Pkotoyrapk by Curln Cf MilUr ICntrance to Mount Rainier National Park THE FROZEN OCTOPUS I [ROM the Cascade Mountains in Washinj^ton rises a series of vol- F canoes which once blazed across the sea like giant beacons. To- day, their fires quenched, they suggest a stalwart band of Knights l| 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 towering 14,408 feet above tidewater in Puget Sounrl. Home-bound sailors far at sea mend their courses from his silver summit. This mountain has a glacier system far exceeding in size and impressive beauty that of any other in the United vStates. From its snow-covered summit twenty-eight rivers of ice pour slowly down its sides. Seen upon the map, as if from an aeroplane, one thinks of it as an enormous frozen octopus stretch- ing icy tentacles down upon every side among the rich gardens of ^vild flowers and splendid forests of firs and cedars Vjelow. ,1^ Photograph by Curtis & M:'/rr Above Every Curve of the Paradise Road Looms the Great White Mountain Pholonraph by Curtis & AJ iu,:r From Under the Shadowy Firs of Van Trump Park It Glistens Startlingly PhoUhjraph by Curtis <> \filtcr Looking into a Grfat Crevasse in the Stevens Gi acier Crevasses arc causcil by the switrer morion ot the niidi.lle than the sides. This ice is 400 feet deep THE GIANT RIVERS OF ICE ^IVERY winter the moisture-laden winds from the Pacific, suddenly E cooled against its summit, deposit upon Rainier's top and sides enormous snows. These, settling in the mile-wide crater which i| was left after a great explosion in some prehistoric age carried away perhaps two thousand feet of the volcano's former height, press with overwhelming weight down the mountain's sloping sides. Thus are born the glaciers, for the snow under 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 precipices like congealed water falls, 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. t'huKHirnpii In- CuHi^ i;r,iphby Ctct!, ^- .1/...... 1"he Roads Luad to the Glacurs Through Forests of Fir and Cedar 20 MR Cratkr J.ake (Uni-ortunatkly Namf.d) a North-Side Cii;ivi oi Bkau'iy I'kulugraph by Curtis & Miller The Roads Are ADiMH./> rROUT Run From One to Six I'ounus RATER LAKlv is seen in its glory from a hmiich. One may float for days upon its sur- face Avitliout sating one's sense of delighted surj^risc; for all is new again with every change of light. The Phantom Shi]), for instance, sometimes wholly disappears. Now it is there, and a few minutes after, with neAV slants of light, it is gone — a phantom indeed. vSo it is \nth many headlands and ghostlike palisades. This lake was not discovered until 1853. Ivleven Califomians had undertaken once more the search for the famous, j^erhaps fabulous, Lost Cabin Mine. For many years parties had been searching the Casca(ies ; again they had come into the Rogue River region. W^ith all th.eir secrecy their object became known, and a party of Oregonians was hastily organized to stalk them and share their find. The Californians dis- co\ered tlie pursuit and dix-ided their party. Tlie Oregonians did the same. It became a game of liide-and-seek. When provisions were nearlv exhausted all the par- ties joined forces. "Suddenly we came in sight of water," writes J. \V. Hillman, then tlie leader of the combined party; "we were nuich surprised, as we did not expect to see any lakes and did not know but that we had come in sight of and close to Klamath Lake. Not until nn- Pholoijraphby Fred H. Kiur, I'oiilan.l. (),,,ioii The Favorii k Way id Si;h iiii-; Sciii.rriiRi:i) Cuffs Is From a Motor I^oat mule stopped within a few feet of the rim of Crater Lake (Hd I look down, and if I had l^een riding a blind mule I firmly believe I would have ridden over the edge to death." It is interesting that the discoverers quarreled on the choice of a name, dividing between Mysterious Lake and Deep Blue Lake. The advocates of Deep Blue Lake won the vote, but in 1869 a visiting party from Jacksonville renamed tit Crater Lake, and this, by natural right, became its title. HOTELS AND CAMPS i Partly because it is off the main Hue of travel, but chiefly because its lunique attractions are not yet well known. Crater Lake has been seen by com- jparatively few. Under concession from the Department of the Interior, a com- Ifortable camp is operated five miles from the lake and a newly completed hotel land camp on the lake's rim. Equipments for camping may be hired. I 19 CL HARD FIGHTING TROUT HIS magnilicent, body of cold fresh water originallv contained no fish of any kind. A small crustacean was found in large num- bers in its waters, the suggestion, no doubt, upon which was founded the Indian legend of the gigantic crawfish which formed the body- guard of the great god Llao. In 1888 Will G. Steel brought trout fry from a ranch fift}- miles away, but no fish were seen in I the lake for more than a dozen years. Then a few were taken, one of which was fully thirty inches long. Since then trout have been taken in ever- increasing numbers. Thev are best caught by fly casting from the shore. For this reason the fishing is not always the easiest. Often the slopes are not propitious for casting. One has to climb upon outlying rocks to reach the waters of best depth. But the results usually justify the elTort. The trout range from one to ten pounds in weight. Anglers of experience in western fishing testify that, pound for pound, the rainbow trout taken in the cold deep waters of Crater Lake are the hardest-fighting trout of all. Many fish are also taken from rowboats. A trolling spoon will Photograph by U. S. Kiclitmnlion Service Camimnc; Out Back ok ihf Rim often lure large fish. Photograph by U. S. Reclamation Service At the Foot of the Trail From Crater Lake Lodge PL'U',!rjf^hhv FrcJ II. Ki.-rr. I\'r:!.,nJ. Orr.nvi Across the Lake From the Rim Road Crater Lake Lodge on the Rim, i,ooo Feet Above the Lake The lounge occiipics the entire ground floor of the center segment of the building, is 40 by 60 feet, without a pillar or post, and contains what is said to be the largest fireplace in the State of Oregon THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. NATIONAL PARK and Date LOCATION AREA square miles Hot Springs Res- ervation Yellowstone 1872 YOSEMITE 1890 Sequoia 1890 General Grant 1890 Mount Rainier 1899 Crater Lake 1902 Platt 1904 Mesa Verde 1906 Glacier 1910 Rocky Mountain 1915 Hawaii 1916 Lassen Volcanic 1916 Mount McKinley 1917 Middle Arkansas North- western Wyoming Middle eastern California Middle eastern California Middle California West central Washington Southern Oregon Southern Oklahoma Southern Colorado North- western Montana Northern Colorado Hawaii Northern California vSouth central Alaska 3,348 252 324 249 77 1,534 398 118 distinctive characteristics 46 hot springs possessing curative properties — Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs^ Bathhouses under public control. More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling springs — Mud volcanoes — Petrified forests — Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkable for gorgeous colorin"- — Large lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. Valley of world-famed beauty — Lofty clilTs — Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extraordinary^ height — 3 groves of big trees — Large areas of snowy peaks — Waterwheel falls. The Big Tree National Park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter — 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. Sulphur and other springs possessing curative properties — Under Government regiUation. Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric cliff dwellings in United vStates, if not in the world. Rugged mountain region of unsurjiasscd alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty — 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11, 000 to 14,250 feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. Two active volcanoes, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed— A third volcano, Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. 124 Active volcano -Lassen Peak, 10,437 feet in altitude — Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. Highest Mountain in North America— Rises higher above surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903 , vSouth Dakota Large natural cavern. Sullys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS '•"•f.n,^ C^^^Sf-H o.' ii ^"^^V^^^^^«*«4r ^3a>\fA"""""4v T E The m:ip shows the location of all of our National Parks and their principal railroad connections. The traveler may work out his routes to suit himself. Low round-trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Moiuitain re;j;ion and Pacific Coast may be availed of in visitini; the National Parks during their respective seasims, thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental throut^h trains anil branch lines make the Parks easy of access from all jiarts of the United vStates. I'or schedules and excursion fares to and betweeu the National Parks apply to your local railway ticket othce or to any excursion agency, or write to the Passenger Departments of the railroads which apjiear on the above map, as follows: Arizom.\ Eastbkn R.MLROAn Tucson, Ariz. Atchison, TopijKA & ,Sant.\ Fi; Raii,w.\y n 19 Railway Exchange, Chioasro. 111. Cnic.\i;o & NoKTn VVestijrn Railw.w 226 West Jackson Houlovanl. Chicago. 111. Chic.\go, BUKi,iNC.T(JN & QuiNCY Raiuroai) Co 547 West Jackson Honlcvard. Chicago. 111. Chic.\oo, MiuwAUKEi; & .St. I'aui, Railway Railway E.xclian«e, Chicago. 111. Chkwco. Rock Island & Pacific Railway Co lya Salle Street Station. Cliicajjo. 111. Colorado & SouTiii!KN Railway Railway Iv.tchanKe Hiiilding. Denver Colo. DijNVijR & Rio C.RANDK Railro.\d Co Eqiiital)le HniUlini;, Denver. Colo. Gre.\t NoRTHRRN Railway R.iilroul Hnililin^;. Eourt,h and Jackson Streets, St. Paul, Minn. Gulf. Colorado & S.\NT.\ Ee Railway Galveston, Tex. Illinois Centr.vl Railro.\d Centril Station. ChieaKo. 111. Missouri Pacific Railw.w Railway Exchainje Building. St. Louis. Mo. Northern PacificRailw.w Railroad Building, Eiftli and Jackson Streets, St. Paul. Minn. San Pedro, I,os AnoelEs & S.\lt Lake Railro.vd .... Pacific Electric Building, Los Angeles, Cal. Southern Pacific Co Flood Building, San Francisco, Cal. Union Pacific Sy.stem Garland Building, qS East Washington Street, Chicago, 111. Wahash Railway Railway Exchange Building, St. Louis, Mo. Western Pacific Railway Mills Building, San Francisco, Cal. For information aliout sojourning and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park tir Parks in which you are interested. R KM KM BE R THAT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THKY ARKTIIKGRKAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OK THE AMKRICAN PKOPLE KOR WHOM THEY ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR ,, WASHINGTON : GOVEKNMBNT PRINTI.Nc; OiriCE : 1017 THE MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Phototinith hyC M . Can- Government Road to the Celekrati d rREnisTOKic Ruins Slunvmg the wooils which jiKstily the title Mesa Verde (Green Mesa) Pkoloijraph by /•'. C. Jt(!p YliSTiiKDAY AND To-IJAY CITIES OF THE PAST NIv December day in 1888 Richard and Alfred Wetherell, searching for lost cattle on the Mesa Verde near their home at Mancos, Colorado, pushed through dense growths on the edge of a deep canyon and sliouted aloud in astonishment. Across the canyon, tucked into a shelf under the overhanging edge of the opposite brink, were the walls and towers of what seemed to them a palace. They named it Cliff Palace. Forgetting the cattle in their excitement, they searched the edge of the mesa in all directi(jns. Near by, under the overhanging edge of another canyon, they found a similar group, no less majestic, which they named Spruce Tree House because a large spruce grew out of the ruins. Thus was discovered the most elaborate and best-preserved prehistoric ruins in America, if not in the world. A carefid search of the entire Mesa Verde in the years following has resulted in many other finds of interest and importance. In 1906 Congress set aside the region as a national park, h'ven yet its treasures of antiquity are not all known. A remarkaVjle temple to the sun was unearthed in 1915, Y-. ■^ r u. ^/ -1 ^ w . , .'i X •--> r-i O 7- o Photograph by Dr. Hargrove The Exploration ot Newly Discovered Ruins Often Requires .Much Hard and Even Perilous Climbing Photograph by Mrs. C. R. Miller Many Gathered Nightly Around the Camp Fire to Hear Dr. Fevvkes Tell the Story of the Ancient People THE STORY OF THE MESAS HOSK who have traveled through our Southwestern States have seen from the car window innumerable mesas or isolated plateaus rising abruptly for hundreds of feet from the bare and often arid plains. The word mesa is Spanish for table. Once the level of these mesa tops was the level of all of this vast South- western country, but the rains and floods of centuries have washed away the softer earths 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. The Mesa Verde, or green mesa (because it is covered with stunted cedar and pinyon trees in a land where trees are few) , is perhaps most widely known. The Mesa Verde is one of the largest mesas. It is fifteen miles long and eight miles wide. At its foot are masses of broken rocks rising from three hun- dred to five hundred feet above the bare plains. Above these rise the cliffs. The cliff dwellings nestle under its overhanging cliffs near the top. IN THE CLIFF DWELLINGS IFE must have been difficult in this dry country when the ]\Iesa \>rde connuuiiities flourished in the sides of these sandstone cliffs. Game was scarce and hunting arduous. The INIancos River yielded a few fish. The earth contributed berries or nuts. Water was rare and found onlv in sequestered places near the heads of the canyons. Nevertheless, the inhabitants cultivated their farms and raised their com, which thev ground on flat stones called metates. They baked their bread on flat stone griddles. Thev boiled their meat in well-made vessels, some of which were artistically decorated. Their life was difficult, but confidently did they believe that they were dependent upon the gods to make the rain fall and the corn grow. They were a religious people who worshipped the sun as the father of all and tlie earth as the mother who brought them all their material blessings. They pos- sessed no written language and coidd only record their tlioughts by a few sym- bols wliich they painted on tlieir earthenware jars or scratched on tlie rocks. As their sense of beauty was keen, their art, though primitive, was true; rarelv realistic, generally symbolic. Their decoration of cotton fabrics and ceramic work might be called beautiful, even when judged by the highly devel- oped taste of to-day. They fashioned axes, spear points, and rude tools of stone; they wove sandals and made attractive basketry. Thev were not content with rude buildings and had long outgrown the caves that satisfied less civilized Indians farther nortli and south of them. The photographs of Cliff Palace on the following three pages will show not onlv the protection aft'orded by the overhanging cliff's but the general scheme of community li\'ing. The population was composed of a series of units, possibly clans, each of which had its own social organization more or less distinct from the others. Each had ceremonial rooms, called kivas. Each also had living rooms and storerooms. There were twenty-three social units or clans in Cliff' Palace. The kivas were the rooms where tlie men spent most of the time devoted to ceremonies, councils, and other gatherings. The religious fraternities were limited to the men of a clan. Cliff Palace Is the Most Celebrated of the Mesa Verde Ruins Because It Is The Largest and Most Prominent 54590°— MY— 17 2 ^ "^ Photograph hy Ceo. L. Beam. Dcnicr, Colo. Looking Across Cliff Canyon from Cliff Palace; Sun Temple on Extreme Right in Distance on Top of Cliff Photograph by Arthur Chapman The Square Tower of Cliff Palace Pholuijrapli by Arthur Cliapinan Speaker Chief's House, Cliff Palace The Svn Temfle* Looiung Northeast. Shqwinc at Left the Tblcisk J^ Tree With ooO Rincs Which was Ci r Down Diri.no txc^ AVATION Photograph by F. C. Jeep Constructive Detail of South \\'ai.i.. Sun Tfmhle DISCOVERY OF SUN TEMPLE NTIL the summer of 191 5 no structures had been discovered in the Mesa Verde except those of the cliff-dwelling type. Then the Department of the Interior explored a mound on the top of the mesa opposite Cliff' Palace and unearthed Sun Temple. Dr. J. Walter Fewkes, who conducted the exploration, believes that tliis was built about 1300 A. D. and marks the ffnal stage in Mesa Verde development, Sini Temple was a most important discovery. It marked a long advance toward civilization. It occupied a commanding position convenient to many large inhabited cliff dwellings. Its masonry showed groAvth in the art of con- struction. Its walls were embellished by geometrical figures carved in rock. A fossil palm leaf, which the Cliff" Dwellers supposed to be a divinelv carved image of the sun, is embedded in the temple's walls. Ip^Ji^ li.,.^^ --^ ■^BHMMI^^^^JI 1 MMBI^H^H^^^^M Drawing Showing Constructive Detail of Sun Temple Stones from Sun Temple Covered With Geometrical and Emblematical Designs THE MESA'S LITTLE PEOPLE NDIANS of to-day shun the ruins of the Mesa Verde. They be- lieve them inhabited by spirits whom they call the Little People. It is vain to tell them that the Little People were their own an- cestors; they refuse to believe it. When the national park telephone line was building in 191 5 the Indians were greatly excited. Coming to the vSupervisor's office to trade, they shook their heads ominously. The poles wouldn't stand up, they declared. Why? Because the Little People wouldn't like such an uncanny thing as a telephone. But poles were standing, the Supervisor pointed out. All right, the Indians replied, but wait. The wires wouldn't talk. Little People wouldn't Hke it. The poles were finally all in and the wires strung. What was more, the wires actually did talk and are still talking. Never mind, say the Indians, with unshaken faith. Never mind. Wait. That's all. It will come. The Little People may stand it — for a while. But wait. The Supervisor is still waiting. Spruce Tree House Hides Under a Huge Overhanging Cliff THE PRINCIPAL DWELLINGS LIFF PALACE is the most celebrated of the Mesa Verde ruins because it is the largest and most prominent. Others are no less interesting and important. Spruce Tree House is next in size; Balcony House and Peabody House are equally well preserv^ed. There are many others; some of which have yet to be thoroughly explored; probably some still undiscovered. Cliff Palace is three hundred feet long; Spruce Tree House two hundred and sixteen. Cliff Palace contained probably two hundred rooms; Spruce Tree House a hundred and fourteen. Spruce Tree House originally had three stories. Its population was probably three hundred and fifty. The Round Tower in Cliff Palace is an object of unusual interest, but the ceremonial kivas, or religious rooms, in all the communities are usually round and often were entered from below. A subterranean entrance to Cliff Palace was recently discovered. Entrance to Lower Floors, Spruce Tree House Photograph by Arthur Chapman Spruce Tree House After Restoration by Dr. Fewkes Plu'U'araph by Mrs. C. R Milhi Photographing One of the Rooms at Balcony House Phiiiuqraphi hv J . L Nusbaum Typical Skulls of Prehistoric Man Found in the Mesa Verde These skulls show an unusual breadth as compared with Indians of to-day, though of the same ethno- logical type. Nordenskiold concludes that the race was fairly robust, with heavy skeletons and strong muscular processes. The facial bones are well developed and lov.er jaw heavy SUMMER UPON MESA VERDE ESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK is in the extreme southwestern corner of Colorado and is reached by two routes from Denver. A night is usually spent en route, and the ruins are reached by wagon, horseback, or automobile from Mancos. Apart from the ruins, the country is one of much beauty and interest. The highest spot on the mesa is Park Point, 8,515 feet in altitude. The mesa's northern edge is a fine bluff two thousand feet above the Montezuma Valley, whose irrigation lakes and brilHantly green fields are set off nobly against the distant Rico Mountains. To the west are the La Salle and Blue Mountains in Utah, with Vte Mountain in the immediate foreground. The views are inspiring, the entire country "different." In the spring the en- tire region blooms. It used to be a country of wild animals and at times deer are still plentiful. There is a fairly comfortable camp near Spruce Tree House, An unusual attraction of the summer of 191 5 was the unearthing of the great mound which covered Sun Temple. Dr. Fewkes maintained a camp near the mound and lectured almost nightly to those who gathered around his camp fire. The same informal custom will probably be resumed during succeeding summers while the exploration of other suggestive mounds is progressing. 'i-^ The Interior of a Sacred Kiva Photograph by Mrs. C. R. Miller Stone Chairs Found at the Cliff Palace THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. national park and Date location AREA in square miles DISTINCTIVE characteristics Hot Springs Res- ervation 1832 Middle Arkansas I '2 46 hot springs possessing curative propeities— Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs^ Bathhouses under public control. Yellowstone 1872 North- western Wyoming 3,348 More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling springs — Mud volcanoes — Petrified forests — Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkable for gorgeous coloring — • Large lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. YOSEMITE 1890 Middle eastern California 1,125 Valley of world-famed beauty— Lofty cliffs— Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extraordinary height — 3 groves of big trees— Large areas of snowy peaks— Waterwheel falls. Sequoia . 1890 Middle eastern California 252 The Big Tree National Park— 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. General Grant 1890 Middle California 4 Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 315 feet in diameter— 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Mount Rainier 1899 West central Washington 324 Largest accessible single-peak glacier system— 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. Crater Lake 1902 Southern Oregon 249 Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. Platt 1904 Southern Oklahoma iK Sulphur and other springs possessing curative properties— Under Government regulation. Mesa Verde 1906 Southern Colorado 77 Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric cliff dwellings in United States, if not in the world. Glacier 1910 North- western Montana 1,534 Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty— 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Rocky Mountain 1915 Northern Colorado 398 Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11,000 to 14,250 feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. Hawaii 1916 Hawaii 118 Two active volcanoes, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed— A third volcano, Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. Lassen Volcanic 1916 Northern California 124 Active volcano— Lassen Peak, 10,437 f^^t in altitude — Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. Mount McKinley 1917 South central Alaska 2, 200 Highest Mountain in North America — Rises higher above surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: Casa Grande Ruin, 18S9, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. SuUys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS Stilinaham The map shows the location of all of our National Parks and their principal railroad connections. The traveler may work out his routes to suit himself. Low round-trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Mountain region and Pacific Coast may be availed of in visiting the National Parks during their respective seasons, thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental through trains and branch lines make the Parks easy of access from all parts of the United States. For schedules and excursion fares to and between the National Parks apply to your local railway ticket office or to any excursion agency, or write to the Passenger Departments of the railroads which appear on the above map, as follows: Arizom.\ E.'Vstern R.\ilro.\d Tucson. Ariz. Atchison, TopRK.\ & S.\NT.\ Fb R.MLW.-VY mg Railway Exchange, Chicago. 111. Cmc.\GO & North Westurn R.\ii,w.\y 226 West Jackson Boulevard. Chicago. 111. Chicago, BURUNGTON & QuixcY R.MLRO.VD Co 547 West Jackson Boulevarti. Chicago. 111. Chic.\go, MiLvv.\UKEE & St. P.vul, R.-vilw.w Railway E.xchange. Chicago. 111. Chicago, Rock Island & P.vcific R.mlw.^y Co La Salle StrcLH .Station. Chicago, 111. CoLOR.VDO & .Southern RAiLW.'vy Railway Exchange Building. Denver. Colo. Denver & Rio Grande Railroad Co Equitable Building, Denver. Colo. Great Northern Railway Railroad Building, Fourth and Jackson Streets, St. Paul, JMinn. Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Galveston, Tex. Illi.nois Central Railroad Central Station. Chicago. 111. Missouri Pacific Railway Railway Exchange Building. St. Louis. Mo. Northern PacificRailway Railroad Building, Fifth and Jackson Streets, St. Paul. Minn. S.VN Pedro. Los Angeles & Salt L.'VKE Railroad .... Pacific Electric Building. Los Angeles. Cal. Southern P.\cific Co Flood Building. San Francisco, Cal. Union Pacific System Garland Building, 58 East Washington Street, Chicago, 111. Wab.\sh Railw.\y Railway Exchange Building. St. Louis, AIo. Western Pacific Railway Mills Building. San Francisco . Cal. For information aVjout sojourning and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park or Parks in which you are interested. REMEMBER THAT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THEY ARE THE GREAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHOM THE^- ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 34 WASHINGTO.N : GOVEK.VME.NT PKINTIXG OFFICE : 1917 GLACIER N A T I O N A T , PARK DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Tin: Si I'KKMic Cu)KY or Tuii: Glacikr National Park Is Its Lakes A y,limpsc of beautiful St. Mary Lake and Going-to-the-Sun Mountain Photograph by U. S. Reclamation Service St. Mary Chalet, Typical of Glacier Architecture AN ALPINE PARADISE OTWITHSTANDING the sixty glaciers from which it derives its name, the Glacier National Park is cliiefly remarkable for its pic- turesquely modeled peaks, the unique quahty of its mountain masses, its gigantic precipices, and the romantic loveliness of its two hundred and fifty lakes. Though most of our national parks possess similar general features in addi- tion to those which sharply differentiate each from every other, the Glacier National Park shows them in special abundance and unusually happy combina- tion. In fact, it is the quite extraordinary, almost sensational, massing of these scenic elements which gives it its marked individuality. The broken and diversified character of this scenery, involving rugged mountain tops bounded by vertical walls sometimes more than four thousand feet high, glaciers perched upon lofty rocky shelves, unexpected waterfalls of peculiar charm, rivers of milky glacier water, lakes unexcelled for sheer beauty by the most celebrated of sunny Italy and snow-topped Switzerland, and grandly timbered slopes sweeping into valley bottoms, offer a continuous yet ever changing series of inspiring vistas not to be found in such luxuriance and per- fection elsewhere. And this rare scenic combination is not alone of one valley of the park, but is characteristic of them all ; so that it is difficult to single out any part of these ^^^^^ • - 1 1 T^ . ^ I-'/ioluijrapIt by Fred 11. Kiscr, Portlmut, Orcnoii Climbing the Upper Reaches ok the Blackfeet Glacier liflccii hundred square miles that is more Ijeautiful, more remarkable, or more strikingly diversified than any other. The Glacier National Park lies in northwestern ]\Iontana, abuttin.c^ the Canadian boundary. It incloses the Continental Divide of the Rocky Mountauis at that point; in fact, from one spot, known as the Triple Divide, waters flow into the Pacific Ocean, Hudson Bay, and the Gulf of Mexico. It is interesting that Glacier's peculiarly rugged topography is practically limited to the park's l)Oundaries. To the north, in Canada, the uKMuitains subside into low, rounded ridges. To the south and west, though still fine, they lose the quality of majesty. Easterly lie the Plains. The transcontinental railway traveler skirts the park without hint of the su])reme beauty so near at hand. But let him stop at Glacier Park station or at Belton and, after swift rides in autostages, see something of the beauties of Lake St. Mary, Lake McDermott, or Lake McDonald, and he will instantly understand the attractive force which draws thousands across the continent, and will some day draw tliousands across the seas, to stand spellbound before these awe-inspiring examples of nature's noblest handiwork. Photograph by Fred H. Kiser. Portland. Oregon You Seem Menaced by Glaciers and Waterfalls upon Every Side Avalanche Lake, fed from the Sperry Glacier above, lies in a cirque whose precipices rise thousands of feet Photoiiraph by Naiiontd Park Service SWIFTCURRKNT PaSS ON A SnOVVY SePTEMIU'R AfTKRNOON Photograph by George V. Dauchy Tnt GuNSiGHT Trail, just East ok the Pass Showinc Gunsight Lake; Going-to-the-Sln Mountain in Left Distance MAKING A NATIONAL PARK low nature, just how many millions of years ago no man can csti- Hmate, made the Glacier National Park is a stirrini]; story. Once this whole region was covered with water, probably the J sea. The earthy sediments deposited by this water hardened into rocky strata. If you were in the park to-day you would see broad horizontal streaks of variously colored rock in the mountain masses thousands of feet above you. They are discernible in the photographs in this book. They are the very strata that the waters de])osited in their depths in those far-away ages. How they got from the seas' bottoms to the mountains' tops is the story. According to one fa- mous theory of creation, the earth has been contracting through unnumbered cycles of time. Just as the squeezed orange bulges in places, so this region was forced vip- ward. Then it cracked and the western edge was thrust far over the eastern edge. The edge thus thrust over was many thousands of feet thick and disclosed all the geological strata which had been deposited at that time. In the many centuries of centuries since that time all these strata except the next to the oldest in the earth's history have been washed away, disclos- ing here rocks which geolo- gists think are at least eighty millions of years old. Under this incalculal)le pressure from its sides and below, the bottom of the sea gradually rose and be- came dry land. The pressure continued, and the earth's crust, like the skin of the S(iueezed orange, bulged in long irregular lines. In time these became mountains. Phiilopraph by Flits I'rnilicc Loir Iceberg Lake Where Floes Drift in Auctsr Photograph by L. I). lAivlshy Onh of thk Wildi-st Spots on Kartii Is Ptarmigan Lake Then, when the rocky crust could no longer stand the strain, it cracked. Gradually the western edge of this great crack was forced upward and over the eastern edge. This relieved the internal pressure and the overlapping edge settled into its present position. Geologists call this process faulting. The edge thus thrust over was many thousand feet thick. It disclosed all the geological strata of the earth which had been deposited up to that time. In the many centuries of centuries since, all these strata have been washed away, except the very oldest, those of the Algonkian period, which geologists think are at least eighty millions of years old. It is this ancient rock which gives the Glacier National Park its individuality. Then this remaining edge of rock crumbled into peaks and precipices. Upon these the rains of uncounted centuries of centuries since have fallen, and the ice and the frost and the rushing waters have carved them into the area of distinguished beauty which is to-day the American Switzerland. To picture this region, imagine a chain of very lofty mountains twisting about like a worm, spotted with snow fields, and bearing glistening glaciers. Imagine them flanked everywhere by lesser peaks and tumbled mountain masses of smaller size in whose hollows lie the most beautiful lakes you have ever dreamed of. 54.590'— G— 17 2 o Q •t; ^ /V.,./..,-r,if/, hy /■-;,./■ //. K:.:r. J\;l!,,,:.l . (>u,:. ,: Ir Is THE Romantic. Almost SeiNsational Massing of Extraordinary Scenic Beautiful St. Mary Lake with Going-to-the-Sun Camp in the forei; Iments Which Gives the Glacier National Park Its Marked Individuality Jl. Citadel Mountain in left center, Fusillade Mountain to the right ITS LAKES AND VALLEYS Pholoaraph by Fred II. Kiscr, Porltand. Oriiio J 40 HE supreme glory of the Glacier National Park is its lakes. The world has none to surpass, perhaps few to equal them. Some are valley gems grown to the water's edge with forests. Some are cradled among precipices. Some float ice fields in midsummer. From the Continental Divide seven ]:)rincipal valleys drop precipitously upon the east, twelve sweep down the longer western slopes. Each valley holds between its feet its greater lake to which are tributary many smaller lakes of astonishing wildness. On the east side St. Mary Lake is destined to world-wide celebrity, but so also is Lake McDonald on the west side. These are the largest in the park. But some, perhaps many, of the smaller lakes are candidates for beauty's highest honors. Of these. Lake McDer- mott with its minaretted peaks stands first — perhaps because best known, for here is one of the finest hotels in any national park and a luxurious camp. Upper Two Medicine Lake is an- other east-side candidate widely known because of its accessibility, while far to the north the Belly River A'alley, diffi- cult to reach and seldom seen, holds lakes, fed by eighteen glaciers, which will compare with Switzerland's noblest. The west-side valleys north of Mc- Donald constitute a little-known wil- derness of the earth's choicest scenery, destined to future appreciation. The Continental Divide is usually crossed bv the famous Gunsight Pass Trail, which skirts giant precipices and develops sensational vistas in its ser- pentine course. Photograt'h by I '. S. Rcclamalinu. .S'rr;a- Birth of a Cloud on the Side of Mount Rockwell, Two Medicine Lake Photograph by U, S, Reclamation Service Early Morning Cloud Effects at Two Medicine Lake Romantic Rising-WolF Mountain is seen in middle distance Photoorat>h by U. S. Reclamafimi Senn .Service To THE Victor Bi-i.ong the Spoils Mary Roberts Rinehart lunching after a morning's trouting on Flathead River ft I'hotiujnipli I'yCconjc V. Daucliy Beautiful Lake McDonald, Looking Northeast Mount Cannon, cloud shrouded, is in the middle distance; Mount Brown on the right Photograph by U. S. Uiclain.iluni Service The Comfouiakle Hotel Near the Mead of Lake McDonald Photograph by U. S. Redamatimi Service Clearing After the Storm PURCHASED FROM INDIANS I INCH this region was the favorite hunting ground of the Blackfeet O Indians, whose reservation adjoins it on the east. It was then practically unknown to white men. In 1890 copper was found ^1 and there was a rush of prospectors. To open it for mining pur- poses Congress bought the region from the Indians in 1896, but not enough copper was found to pay for the mining. After the miners left, few persons visited it but big-game hunters until 1910, when it was made a national park. ,| i?A^!^'^ Photograph by National Park Service Mount Oberlin from Granite Park, Showing the Noble South Wall on a Cloudy Day CREATURES OF THE WILI G IvACIIvR, once the favorite hunting g r o 11 n (1 of the Blackfeet and now for fifteen L years strictly pre- kJl served, has a large and grow- ^ C:^ ing population of creatures of ^ '' " the wild. Its rocks and preci- i ' ■ ;■& W' pices lit it especially to be the '"^., home of the Rocky Mountain i sheep and the mountain goat. i i. o Both of these large and I hardy climbers are found in 1 Glacier in great numl^ers. f , j__; ;y ; They constitute a familiar i r M sight in many of the places A most frequented by tourists. 4 Trout lisliing is particu- '^- '-H* ii larl\- line. The trout are of M Wt - half a dozen western vari- i^^ .Jm ■.S5» -,y eties, of which perhaps the ■■mM , ^ r^ cutthroat is the most com- ■r^ i^ji^H i'-.. f mon. In Lake St. Mary the W '' JI^B i^ mf' Mackinaw is caught up to W' «^^^H E '"^ twenty pounds in weight. V- .^^^^1 So widely are they distrib- M«^*^^^' m/M^'j^^^^^ i uted that it is difficult to 'Jr 1 name lakes of special hshiiig f 1 importance. 1 ■ ■ . . . "i'^it-'fVif.' '■ ' 4 ' ^m ' Photograph by Fred H. Riser, Portland, Oregon Summit of Appistoki Mountain ^HE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE umber, 17; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. NATIONAL PARK and Date loT Springs Res- ervation 1832 Yellowstone 1S72 YOSEMITE 1890 Sequoia 1890 General Grant 1890 Mount Rainier 1899 Crater Lake 1902 Platt 1904 Mesa Verde 1906 Glacier 1910 Rocky Mountain 1915 Hawaii 1916 Lassen Volcanic 1916 Mount McKinlry 1917 location Middle Arkansas North- western Wyoming Middle eastern California Middle eastern California Middle California West central Washington Southern Oregon Southern Oklahoma Southern Colorado North- western Montana Northern Colorado Hawaii Northern California South central Alaska AREA square miles 3.348 252 324 249 77 1.534 398 118 124 DISTINCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS 46 hot springs possessing curative properties — Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs — Bathhouses under puljlic control. More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling springs — Mud volcanoes — Petrified forests — Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkable for gorgeous coloring — Large lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhalnted Ijy deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. Valley of world-famed beauty — Lofty cliffs — Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extraordinary height — 3 groves of big trees— Large areas of snowy peaks— Waterwheel falls: The Big Tree National Park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter — 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 stjuarc miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — vSidcs 1,000 feet high. Suljihur and other sj^rings possessing curative properties — Under Government regulation. Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric cliff dwellings in United States, if not in the world. Rugged mountain region of unsurptissed alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty — 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11, 000 to 14,250 feet altitude— Remarkable records of glacial period. Two active volcanoes, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Ivilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed — ■ A third volcano, Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. Active volcano— Lassen Peak, 10,437 feet in altitude- Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. Highest Mountain in North America— Rises higher above surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: asa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. /ind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. ullys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS ■.'^.•:- Nad -J TT i*;^^ — =S-~^vl. Ukd ^•p.jc.tv S DAK ^ ^r- ,-^=5=- Eo-w-^^ fj ^'^7--^^:^, f'"^ t^^^k^"^ The map shows the location of all of our National Parks and their ])rincipal railroad connections. The traveler may work out his routes to suit himself. Low round-trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Motmtain region and Pacific Coiist may be availed of in visiting the National Parks during their respective se;isons, thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental through trains and branch lines make the Parks easy of access from all parts of the United vStates. l'"or schedules and excursion fares to and between the National Parks apply to your local railway ticket otlice or to any excursion agency, or write to the Piissenger Departments of the railroads which appear on the above map, as follows: Arizi)M.\ E.\sti<;km R.\ii,ko.\» Tucson, Ariz. Atchison. Topi5K.\ & S.vNT.v Fi; R.MLWAY ntg Railway ExchanRe, ChicaRO. 111. Chioaco & North WbstivKN R.\iLW.\Y ij6 West J icksoii Boulevard. Chicago. 111. Chkacii. HuKLiNiiTON & QuiNCY Railroad Co 547 West Jack-ioii Boulevard, CliicaRo. 111. Chk\c;<). MiuvvAUKBij & .St. Paul Railway Railway ExchanKC. Chicago. 111. CiiKAi-.o, Rock Island & Pacific Railway Co La Salle vSireci Station, Chicaso. 111. Colorado &SouTiiivRx Railway Railw.i\' Exchmgo Building, Denver. Colo. DiiNVKR & Rio C.rande Railroad Co Etiuilahle Building, Denver, Colo. Grkat Northern Railway Railroad Building, Fourth an 1 Jackson Streets, .St. Paul, Minn. Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Galveston. Tex. Illinois CijNTRAL Railroad Ccntril .Station. Chicago, 111. Mis.soURi Pacific Railway Railway Exchange Building, St. Louis. Mo. Nokthurn PacificRailway Railroad Building, Fifth and Jackson .Streets. St. Paul, Minn. San Pkdro. Los AngislEs & Salt Laku Railroad . . . . Pacific Electric Building, Los Augcles, Cal. SoutiiivRN Pacific Co Flood Building. .San Francisco, Cal. Union P.vcific System Garluul Building, s'^ East Washington Street, Chicago 111. W AiiASH Railway Railway Exchani;c Building, .St. Louis. Mo. \\'EsTicu.N I'.vciFic Railway Mills Building, San Francisco, Cal. For information abimt sojourning and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park or Parks in which you arc interested. RKMKIMBER THAT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THEY ARE THE GREAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHOM THEY ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR ,, WASUINGTO.N : UOVEKNMK.NT I'KI.VTI .NC OFFICE : 1917 THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK Phoioarat>h by Wi'.wall Brother':, Denver DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SERVICE "J !dfuu: .Moonlight on CJrand Lake FlvATURI-: of this Arci^ion is the read ability of its records I of q;lacial action (Uirino; the ages when America was making. In few other spots do these evidences, in ah- their \ariety, make themselves so prominent to the casual eye. There is scarcely any part of the eastern sitle where some enormous moraine does not force itself upon passing atten- tion. One of the valley A-illages. Moraine I'ark, is so named from a moraine built out for miles across the valley's floor by an- cient parallel glaciers. Scarcely less prominent is the long curxiug hill called the Mills INIoraine, after l{nos Mills, the naturalist, who is known in Colorado as "the father of the Rocky Mouulaiu Xational Park." In short, this park is itself a primer of glacial geology whose simple, self-evndent lessons im- mediately disclose the ke^' to one of nature'scliiefest scenic secrets. J-'lwluijniph by Wdlis J\ U I.ONC.S I'l-AK IKIJM BOUI.DKR FlKl-D At the extreme ri<;ht is seen the "Keyhole" through which the simiinit is reached /'holoaraph by Willis T. Lcc Full Course of the Mills Moraine The mighty glacier that heaped it a thousand feet high was born at the foot of Longs Peak precipice. The moraine is four miles long MinwAY ov Tin: Rani.k, I.on(;s I'hak Rkars His Statklv, Souare-Crownf This is the very heart of the Rockies; few phut d; a Vf-ritaiu-k King ok Mountains C'ai.mi.y Ovkrlooking All llib Ki.alm s so fully express the spirit of the Snowy Range Pholoc!raf>h by John King Shrrma n The Chiseled Western Wall of Loch Vale PRECIPICE -WALLED GORGES PIto/oiirath I'V John KingShcrnHin Chasm Lake and Longs Peak DISTINGUISHED fea- Al tiire of the park is its profusion of cliff-cradled, glacier-watered valleys unexcelled for wildness and the g\or\ of their flowers. Here grandeur and romantic beauty compete. These valleys lie in two groups, one north, the other south of Longs Peak, in the angles of the main range ; the northern group called the \\{\d Garden, the southern group called the W^ild Basin. There are few spots, for instance, so impressi\-ely beautiful as Loch A'ale, ^\'ith its three shelved lakes l\ing two thousand feet sheer be- low Taylors Peak. Adjoining is Glacier Gorge at the foot of the precipitous north slope of Longs Peak, holding in rocky embrace its own group of three lakelets. The \\{\(\ Basin, with its wealth of lake and precipice, still remains unexploited and known to few. Few Mountain Gorges Are So Impressively Beautiful as Loch Vale PhoU\jral>h hy Kiios .\fi:is "Thk Knd ok TH1-: Tkaii. " PhoiottraPh hy Gtorgc C, Barnard. P, An luEAL Coi'NTRY FOR W'lNTl R SrORTS l< RM l^huionraph by Georpe H . Hariey Grand Lake i-kom -liit Lo:.ii;.l:.j.--.l Uimul Pfi'.y, ir .;.': >■■_, I. . S. Reclamation Service Cache la Poldre Valley at PVxrr of Spfclmen Mountain Photograph by U. S. R. , ; . c.lion Service Odessa Lake Is Almost Fncirci.fd r.v Snow-Spattfrfd Simmits Pholngraph by U. S. Rt-clamalion Scrrice Spkucf-Gikdled Fern Lake, Showing LrnLE Mattekhokn in Middle Distance^ METROPOLIS o/BEAVERLAND Copyright by Wisuall Protlur - ihir.r An Aspen Thicket Tr.ml Is a Path of Delight HK \'isitor mil not forget the aspens in the Rocky Mountain National Park. Their white trunks and branches and their luxuriant bright green foliage are never out of sight. A trail tlirough an aspen thicket is a path of delight. Because of the unusual aspen growths, the region is the favored home of beavers, who make the tender bark their principal food. Beaver dams block countless streams and beaver houses emerge from the still ponds above. In some retired spots the engineering feats of gener- ations of beaver families may be traced in all their considerable range. Nowhere is the picturesqueness of timl)er line more quickly and more easil)- seen. A horse after early breakfast, a steep mountain trail, an hour of unique enjovment, and one may be back for late luncheon. Eleven thousand feet up, the winter struggles between trees and icy gales are grotesquely exhibited. The first sight of luxuriant En- gelmann spruces creeping closely upon the ground instead of rising a hundred and fifty feet straight and true as masts is not soon forgotten. Manv stems strong enough to partly defv the winters' gales grow bent in half circles. Others, starting straight in shelter of some large rock, bend at right angles where they emerge above it. j\Iany succeed in hfting their trunks but not in growing branches except in their lee, thus sug- gesting great evergreen dust brushes. PhotoaraphhyEnos Mills t-> r> , /^ V.,,n,,i i. cq '^rRKAMS Beaver Dams Block LouNiLEbb MREAMb Pliottnjral'hhv I'.ii.-. Mdh Wind-Twisted Trees at Timber Line PhotOi;raph by U. S. Rcddtitation Sen ice The Stanliv IIotil and Manor EASY TO REACH AND TO SEE HI{ accessibility of the Rocky Moiiiitaiii Xalioiial Park is apparent by a glance at any map. Denver is less than thirt\- hours from v'^t. I.ouis and Chicaj^o, two days only from Xcw York. Four hom's from ])enver will put you in Kstes Park. Once there, comfcnlable in one of its many hotels of varying range of tariff, and the snnnnils dud the gorges of this numntain-toi) paradise resolve them- selves into a choice between foot and horseback. There are also a few most C(»mfortablc houses and several somewhat primi- tive camps within the jnuk's boundaries at the verv foot of its noblest scenerv. Longs Pfak Inn; Altitude 9,000 Feet Longs Peak (14,255 feet) in the center of the triple mountain group, flanked by Mount AFeekcr on the left and Mount Lady Washington on the right; across their front is the Mills Moraine THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17 ; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. ARBA NATIONAL PARK , LOCATION J^^^^ and Date square I miles Hot Springs Res- ervation 1832 Yellowstone 1872 Middle Arkansas North- western Wyoming YOSEMITE 1890 Middle eastern California Sequoia 1890 Middle eastern California General Grant 1890 Middle California Mount Rainier 1899 West central Washington Crater Lake 1902 Southern Oregon Platt 1904 Srmthern Oklahoma Mesa Verde 1906 Southern Colorado Glacier 1910 North- western Montana Rocky Mountain N'orthern jgi- Colorado Hawaii 1916 Lassen Volcanic 1916 Mount McKinley 1917 Hawaii Northern California South central Alaska 3,348 1,125 252 324 249 77 1,534 39& distinctive characteristics 46 hot springs possessing curative properties— Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs — P.athhouses under public control. More geysers than in all rest of worUI together — Boiling springs — Mud volcanoes — Petrified forests— Cjrand Canyon of the Yellowstfjnc, remarkable for gorgeous coloring — Large lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, Vnson, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. Valley of world-famed beauty — Lofty cliffs — Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extrar^rdinary- height — 3 groves of big trees — Large areas of snowy peaks — Waterwheel falls. The Big Tree National Park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter — 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. vSulphiir and other springs possessing curative properties — Under Government regulation. Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric clilT dwellings in United States, if not in the world. Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty — 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of. feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11, 000 to 14,250 feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. 118 Two active volcanoes, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lakeof bubbling lava is world famed — ■ A third volcano, Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. 124 Active volcano -Lassen Peak, 10,437 feet in altitude — Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. 2, 200 Highest .Mountain in North America— Rises higher above ' surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. Sullys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS The map shows the location of all of our National Parks and their principal railroad connections. The traveler may work out his routes to suit himself. Low round-trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Mountain region and Pacific Coast may be availed of in visiting the National Parks during their respective seasons, thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental through trains and branch lines make the Parks easy of access from all parts of the United States. For schedules and excursion fares to and between the National Parks apply to your local railway ticket office or to any excursion agency, or write to the Piissenger Departments of the railroads which appear on the above map, as follows: Arizon.\ E.\ster>^ R.\ii,ro.\d Tucson, Ariz. Atchison, TopRK.\ & S.-VNT.\ Fg R.\iL WAY 1 119 Railway Exchange, Chicago. 111. Chicago & North Western R.mlw.w 226 West Jackson Boulevard, Chicago. 111. Chic.\go, Uuri,ini;ton & Quincy R.-mlroad Co 547 West Jackson Boulevard, Chicago. 111. Chicago. ^IiLVVAUKEE & St. P.-^ul Railway Railway E.xchange. Chicago, 111. Chic.\go. Rock Island & Pacific Railway Co La Salle StreL>t .Station, Chicago. 111. Colorado & Southern Railway Railway Exchange Building. Denver. Colo. Denver & Rio Grande Railro.\d Co Equitable Building, Denver. Colo. Great Norther.n Railw.w Railroad Building, Fourth and Jackson Streets, St. Paul. Minn. Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Galveston, Tex. Illinois Central R.'\ilro.\d Central Station. Chicago. 111. Missouri Pacific Railway Railway Exchange Building. St. Louis. Mo. Northern PacificR.mlway Railroad Building. Fifth and J. icksou Streets, St. Paul, Minn. San Pedro. Los Angeles & S.\lt Lake Railroad .... Pacific Elcctrii- Huildiui;. Los Angeles, Cal. Southern Pacific Co Flood Biulliiii:, San Francisco. Cal. Union Pacific System . Garlinl Building. %ii East WashimjtDU Street, Chicago. 111. W.\i)ASH Railway Railway Exchainie Building, St. Louis, Mo. Western Pacific Railway Mills Building. San Francisco. Cal. For information about sojourning and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park or Parks in which you are interested. REMEMBER THAT THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THEY ARE THE GREAT NATIONAL PLAYGROUNDS OE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHOM THEY ARE ADMINISTERED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR ,. WASHINGTON : GOVEUN.MK.NT ruINTIXG Ol'FICE : 1917 • I^I^KS^ %^ >;^ THE HOT SPRINGS of ARKANSAS AND CERTAIN OTHER NATIONAL PARKS AND NATIONAL MONUMENTS DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Franklin K. Lane, Secretary NATIONAL PARK SERVICE m WFa o H < ,r. < "^1^ H O X -^:fi Iti > S < ^ O .S ibi H Main Entrance to thk Hot Springs Rkskrvation SPRINGS OF HEALING 1R0M the slopes of a picturesque wooded hill among the wild and F romantic Ozark Mountains of Arkansas flow springs of hot water whose powers to alleviate certain bodily ills have been recognized - 1 for many generations. Tradition has it that their curative proper- ties were known to the Indians long before the Spanish invasion. It is prob- able that they were known to De Soto, who died in 1542, less than a hundred miles away. It is tradition that Indian warring tribes suspended all hostilities at these healing springs whose neighborhood they called " The Land of Peace." Government analyses of the waters disclose more than twenty chemical constituents, but it is not these nor their combination to which is principally attributed the water's unquestioned helpfulness in many disordered conditions, but to their remarkable radioactivity. The reservation is the oldest national park, having received that status in 1832, forty years before the wonders of the Yellowstone first inspired Congress with the idea that scenery was a national asset deserving of pres- ervation for the use and enjoyment of succeeding generations. No aesthetic consideration was involved in this early act of national conservation. Congress was inspired only by the undoubted, but at that time inexplicable, natural power of these waters to alleviate certain bodily ills. The motive was to retain these unique waters in public possession to be available to all persons for all time at a minimum, even a nominal, cost. Maurice Spring, Hot Strings Reservation This is centrally located and hundreds of j^ersons visit it daily OnF OV IHF. HkST (lOIF CoilRSFS IN THF SoUTH DR. NATURE'S WATER CURE OT SPRINGS has much besides its curative waters to attract and hold the visitor. It has one of the best and most interesting golf courses in the South. The surrounding country is romantically beautiful. Many miles of woodland trail lead the walker and the horseback rider through pine-scented glades and glens and over mountain tops of unusual charm. There is tennis for the young folks, ostrich and alligator farms for the curious, and the gayeties of life in big hotels for all. Hot Springs is not merely a winter resort, as used to be supposed. Climate and conditions are delightful the year around, as increasing throngs are rapidly discovering. It is above all a place for rest and recuperation. More and more winter visitors are remaining through April and May, when the spring is young and glorious and the baths the most efficacious. But those who remain after March should bring summer clothing, as the temperature then ranges from 65 to 85 degrees. The reservation includes three mountains and a lake, and the tract incloses all the forty-six hot springs. Eleven bathhouses, some of them as complete and luxurious in equipment as any in the world, are in the reservation, and a dozen more in the city, all under Government regulation. There are also cold springs possessing curative properties. There are many hotels, the largest having accommodations for a thousand guests, and several hundred 1)oarding houses, many at very modest prices. Cottages and apartments may be rented for light housekeeping. Hot Springs Mountain, from whose sides flow the cleansing waters, is about fifty miles west by south from Little Rock. TiiK CjOi.f Ci.vn AT IIoi Srui ITS PICTURESQl^E HISTORY ilHIv recorded history of Hot Springs goes back to 1804, when four log T houses accommodated the people who traveled many weary miles of trail to bathe in the waters. The lands adjacent to the springs 'I were claimed by conflicting interests which, as the waters grew in fame, waged legal battles for many years for possession. Then followed a generation of lax law when Hot Springs became the winter gathering place of gamljlers. This was the most picturesque period in its history. In recent years, with the awakening of the public conscience, the uplifting of the public taste, and the enactment of laws prohibiting gambling, Hot Springs has made rapid strides toward its manifest and enviable destiny. There Are Many Hotels; This One, the Arlington, is Onk of the Largest Pholograph by fl. O. Wood, Hawaiian Volcano Observatory The Celebrated " Ballet Dancer " of Mauna Loa, Hawaii A remarkable photograph of the explosion on the flank of Mauna Loa on May 19, 1916 HAWAII'S SMOKING SUMMITS HE Hawaii National Park, created in 191 6, includes three celebrated Hawaiian volcanoes, Kilauea, Mauna Loa, and Haleakala. "The Hawaiian Volcanoes," writes T. A. Jaggar, director of the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory, " are truly a national asset, wholly unique of their kind, the most famous in the world of science and the most continuously, variously, and harmlessly active volcanoes on earth. Kilauea crater has been nearly continuously active, with a lake or lakes of molten lava, for a century. Mauna Loa is the largest active volcano and mountain mass in the world, with eruptions about once a decade, and has poured out more lava during the last century than any other volcano on the globe. Haleakala is a mountain mass ten thousand feet high, with a tremendous crater rift in its summit eight miles in diameter and three thousand feet deep, containing many high lava cones. " Haleakala is probably the largest of all known craters among volcanoes that are technically known as active. It erupted less than two hundred years ago. The crater at sunrise is the grandest volcanic spectacle on earth." The lava lake at Kilauea is the most spectacular feature of tlie new national park. It draws visitors from all over the world. It is a lake of molten, fiery lava a thousand feet long, splashing on its banks with a noise like waves of the sea, while great fountains boil through it fifty feet high. The park also includes gorgeous tropical jungles and fine forests. Sandal- wood, elsewhere extinct, grows there luxuriantly. There are mahogany groves. I'holociraph by J. J. H'llliams, Honolulu Lava Flow of 1881 Cascadinc tnto Pool of Watfr Conk on the Northeast Ridge of Maun a Loa 54590°— IIS— 17 2 Photograph by the Geophysical Laboratory, Carnegie Institution Near View of the Lava Lake of Kilauea in Heavy Smoke Photograph by the (icophysical Laboratory, Carnegie Institution Lava Flow on Floor ok Kilauea Crater, Showing Curious Ropy Formations Photograph by Geophysical Laboratory, Carnegie Insittution The KiLAUEA Lava Lake Close By. Picture Taken by the Light of the Lava Itself During a Period of Great Activity Photograph by Geophysical Laboratory. Carnegie Institution Night Photograph of the Kilauea Lava Lake, New Fountain Just Breaking Through. Period of Moderate Activity < o (i. o as w H is o > y, U MONSTER OF MOUNTAINS OUNT McKinley is the loftiest mountain in America. It towers 20,300 feet above tide. Its gigantic ice-covered bulk rises more than 17,000 feet above the eyes of the observer standing within the national park. It is ice plated 14,000 feet below its glistening summit. Congress created the Mount McKinley National Park in February, 191 7. This enormous mass is the climax of the great Alaskan Range, which extends, roughly, east and west across southeast central Alaska, separating the vast northeni inland from the more populated country whose shores are the Gulf of Alaska. The range parallels the mighty Yukon many miles to its south. The reservation contains 2,200 square miles. Its northern slopes, which overlook the Tanana watershed with its gold-mining industry, are broad valleys inhabited by enormous herds of caribou. Its southern plateau is a winter wilderness through which glaciers of great length and enormous bulk flow into the valleys of the south. In this national park, which the railroad now building by Government into the Alaskan interior will open presently to the public, America possesses Alpine scenery upon a titanic scale. In fact, it matches the Himalayas; as a spectacle Mount McKinley even excels their loftiest peaks. for the altitude of the valleys from which the Himalayas are viewed exceeds by many thousand feet that of the plains from which the awed visitor looks up to McKinley's towering height. hVom the stormy south Mount McKinley is wholly inaccessible. But from the plains of the north valleys of easy grade lead one from another to its very foot. Many attempts to climb it have failed. Only two, however, have met success, and these after almost unendurable hardship. With the completion of the Government railroad, however, this mountain pageant will be within three weeks of New York. The tourist can see all its beauty and sublimity without hardship. "It is an awe-inspiring region of massive mountains and ice-capped peaks," Belmore Browne, of the Camp Fire Club, testified before the Senate Committee on Territories. "The Piedmont Plateau, that follows the range, affords a beau- tiful roadway direct to Mount McKinley, and when you reach the plateau all difficulties vanish and you see a view that is unique on this earth. You see the huge mountain line of perpetual snow rising like a great wall on the southeast. You can ride a pony to where Mount McKinley rises 17,000 feet above you in a glittering wall of snow and ice. It is flanked by stupendous mountains, which make a wonderful setting for the monster." North of the vast mountani, however, is a rolling country dotted with beau- tiful lakes and forests and inhabited by enormous herds of caribou. In fact, the special reason why Congress set apart the region at this time was to con- serve the wild animal life in advance of the invasion of hunters which the new Government railroad will bring hito Alaska, the road as projected running within 20 miles of this greatest of nature's spectacles. Charles Sheldon, of the Boone and Crockett Club, told the Senate commit- tee that several times he has counted as many as 500 mountain sheep in a single day of ordinary travel, and that herds of caribou numbering from twelve to fifteen hundred are frequently seen. As a game refuge and breeding ground the new national park conserves Alaskan game which elsewhere is rapidly disappearing. As in the case of the Yellowstone National Park, the reservation serves as a perpetual center of game supply for large neighboring areas. These animals do not greatly fear man, because they have never been hunted. One can approach the great herds of caribou. There are also many Alaskan bear of great size. **y- If. . ki >• *r- .- . * Jr * f »,/.' ;>■+', "^i?^-/ '-• *!•. ' •-'»••' -.-.-■■r -•• '' ^i-^^ - .' V »> .^■j-v* * v»-. /. Photograph by P. J. Thompson Crater of Lassen Peak After Eruption of 1914 ACTIVE VOLCANO AT HOME ONGRESS created the Lassen Volcanic National Park in August, 19 1 6. A month later this volcano was again in active eruption; it is the only active volcano in the continental United States. It is situated in northern California, and is one of the celebrated series of peaks, including Mount Baker, Mount Rainier, Mount Hood, Mount Shasta, and what was once Mount Mazama (Crater Lake), in the Cascade Range. The region is one of extraordinary interest. Lassen Peak is 10,437 feet in altitude. Cinder Cone, which showed some acti\it\' a few years ago, has an altitude of 6,907 feet. North Peak, Southwest Peak, and Prospect Peak are prominent elevations in the National Park. Other features of interest are the Devils Half Acre, inclosing hot springs and mud geysers, Bumpass and Morgan Hot Springs, lakes of volcanic glass, and ice caves. There are seven lakes, numerous trout streams, and many majestic canyons. There are also forests of yellow and white pine, fir, and lodgepole. "On the whole," writes Prof. Douglas W. Johnson, of Columbia University, "it is difficult to imagine a region where the more striking phenomena of nature are developed on a grander scale." Lassen Phak. in Erlttion, Jllv, 1914 5ia90''— HS— 17 i Cathedral Rocks, Mukuntuweap ; )NAL Monument, Southern Utah OTHER NATIONAL PARKS THE WIND CAVE NATIONAL PARK npHE Black Hills of southwestern South Dakota, scene of Custer's first stand, •■■ famous for many years for Indian fights and frontier lawlessness, are chiefly celebrated in this generation for a limestone cave of large size and interesting decoration. It is called Wind Cave because of the strong currents of air which alternate in and out of its mouth. The walls and ceiling of the various passages and chambers which consti- tute the cave are elaborately covered with the formations common to most caves, which here result in tracery and carvings of the most elaborate and sur- prising description. The park is also a game preserve of unusual merit. THE PLATT NATIONAL PARK 0(KTTIII{RN Oklahoma's famous curative springs were conserved for the *^ public benefit in 1906 by the creation of the Piatt National Park. Sulphur springs predominate, but there are bromide and other springs of medicinal value, besides several line springs nonmineral in character. Altogether they have an approximate discharge of nearly five million gallons daily. Many thousands visit these springs every year. The country is one of great charm and is notable for its bird life. The healing waters are bottled and shipped to many parts of the country. THE CASA GRANDE RUIN /^NE of the best preserved and most interesting ruins in the Southwest ^^^ has been preser\-ed in this reservation, which is near Florence, Arizona. Unlike the neighborhood Indians who fear the superb ruins of the Mesa Verde, the Arizona Pimas claim the Casa Grande as the home of their ancestors; but there is nothing but tradition to substantiate the claim. The structure was once at least four stories high. Many mounds in the neighborhood indicate that it was once one of a large group of dwellings of some importance. The ruin was discovered by the intrepid Jesuit Missionary, Father Eusebio Francisco Kino, at the end of the seventeenth century. SULLYS HILL PARK ' I ^HIS reser\^ation is on the shore of Devils Lake, North Dakota, within two miles of the well-known h^ort Totten Indian School. It is a country of much natural beauty and admirably adapted to the purposes of a game preserve, for which Congress recently made appropriations. THE NATIONAL MONUMENTS THE DIFFERENCE HETWEEN A NATIONAL MONUMENT AND A NATIONAL PARK NATIONAL monuments differ from national parks principally in importance. The monmnent is usually the lesser area, and, the object being merely conservation, little provision is made for its maintenance and development. A national park is created only by act of Congress, and it is expected that thereafter Congress will make yearly appropriations to develop it. A national monument is set aside by Presidential proclamation without appropriations. The name "monument" is clumsy and misleading. THE MUKUNTUWEAP NATIONAL MONUMENT THE Mukuntuweap National Monument, in southwestern Utah, conserves a canyon that for fantastic outline and briUiant and varied coloring probably equals any spot on this continent. Recent visitors have called it "the desert Yosemite;" others, "the mimic Grand Canyon." It inevitably suggests both. "You can't see it without shouting," reports one recent explorer. The Mormons of a former generation chose this valley for a refuge in the event of being driven from Zion, as they called Salt Lake City, and named it Little Zion. It is locally called Zion Canyon to-day. The north fork of the muddy Virgin River flows through it, and in the spring streams cascade from the lofty walls. The canyon is a mightv cleft, as if the mountain had been violently divided to obtain a segment. The walls are inconceivably carved into domes, half domes, colonnades, and temples. One gigantic cliff suggests a battleship, and is locally called "Steamboat." The faces of some of the walls contain thousands of square feet of plane surface, upon which the elements have sketched various figures. At one point may be seen the picture of a woman, a horse, and a pig, forming a distinct group. At another an eagle perches, true to this noble bird's instinct, high upon the cliffs. At other points crypts have been formed in the walls by the shelling off of the stone surface. Nature seems to have fashioned here a fine art gallery of stupendous proportions. The coloring is beyond description. Glistening white is the basic color. Below this a strip of maroon-colored sandstone has weathered into formations resembling those of the Grand Canyon. There are thousands of feet of polished white sandstone streaked with vermillion, like a Roman sash. The canyon is more than fifteen miles long and varies from fifty feet wide in the narrows to twenty-five hundred feet wide in Zion proper. The neigh- borhood is rich in striking phenomena. There are natural bridges of great size and beauty. The country was settled by Mormons many years ago, and possesses much historical interest. Old-time Mormon customs obtain in the prosperous villages. Mukuntuweap may be reached by automobile and horse- back from Lund, Utah. A Glimpse of thk Beautiful Muir Woods IN THE FOREST PRIMEVAL ITHIN ten miles of the city of San Francisco, in Marin County, California, lies one of the noblest forests of primeval Redwood in America. That it stands to-day is due first to the fact that its outlet to the sea instead of to San Francisco Bay made it unprofitable to lumber in the days when redwoods grew like grain on California's hills. The Muir Woods National Monument contains three hundred acres. In- terspersed with the superb Redwood, the Sequoia sempervirens, sister to the Giant Sequoia of the Sierra, are many fine specimens of Douglas fir, Madrona, CaHfornia Bay, and Mountain Oak. The forest blends into the surrounding wooded country. It is essentially typical of the redwood growth, with a rich stream-watered bottom carpeted with ferns, violets, oxaHs, and azalea. Many of the redwoods are magnificent specimens and some have extraor- dinary size. Cathedral Grove, and Bohemian Grove, where the famous revels of the Bohemian club were held before the club purchased its own permanent grove, are unexcelled in luxuriant beauty. This splendid area of forest primeval was named by its donors, Mr. and Mrs. WilHam Kent, in honor of the celebrated naturalist of the Sierra, John Muir. It is so near San Francisco that thousands are able to enjoy its cathedral aisles of noble trees. It is One of the Noblest Forests of Redwood Saved From the Axe as O < X a: < o H o g S o o h-1 hi^^J^ o '1'here Are lixQuisiTE Lakes, Also, in the Sieur de Monts National Monument SEA AND MOUNTAINS MEET ilY proclamation of Jiilv 8, 191 6, creating the Sieur de Monts National B Monument, President Wilson extended the national park service for the first time to the Atlantic coast. The area which enjoys this i| honor is one of fascinating historical association as well as majestic natural V)eauty. It embraces more than five thousand acres of rugged mountain, directly south of Bar Harbor. In fact, its northern boundary lies within a mile of that famous resort. On the east it touches the Schoonerhead Road. On its south it approaches within a mile of vSeal Harbor. It lies less than a mile northeast of Northeast Harbor. It is surrounded, in short, b}' a large summer population. This area includes four lakes and no less than ten mountains. The lakes are Jordan Pond, Ragle Lake, Bubble Pond, and Sargent Mountain Pond. The Bowl Hes just outside the boundary line. The mountains, several of wliich are widely celebrated, are Green Mountain. Dry Mountain, Picket Mountain, White Cap, Newport Mountain, Pemetic Mountain, The Tryad, Jordan Mountain, The Bubbles, and Sargent Mountain. The lands included in the Sieur de Monts National Monum.ent have never formed a part of the public domain, but, through the patriotism and generosity of the former owners, known collectively as the Hancock County Trustees of Public Reservations, were presented to the United States. The trustees were represented in the matter by Mr. George B. Dorr, of Boston, who. in the creation of this national monument, attained the object of years of public-spirited endeavor. Montezuma Castle MONTEZUMA CASTLE NATIONAL MONUMENT nPHIS remarkable relic of a prehistoric race is the principal feature of a ■'• well-preserved group of cliff dwellings in the northeastern part of Yavapai Coiuitv, Arizona, known as the Montezuma Castle National Monument. The imique position and size of the ruin gives it the appearance of an ancient castle; hence its name. The structure is about liftv feet iu height by sixty feet in width, built in the form of a crescent, with the convex part against the cliff. It is live stories high, the fifth story being back under the cliff and protected by a masonry wall four feet high, so that it is not visible from the outside. The walls of the structure arc of masonry and adobe, plastered over on the inside and outside with mud. DEVILS TOWER NATIONAL MONUMENT ' I 'HIS extraordinary mass of igneous rock is one of the most conspicuous •*• features in the Black Hills region of Wyoming. The tower is a steep-sided shaft rising six hundred feet above a rounded ridge of sedimentary rocks, about six hundred feet high, on the west bank of the Belle Fourche River. Its nearly fiat top is elliptical in outHne. Its sides are strongly fluted by the great columns of igneous rock, and are nearly per- pendicular, except near the top, where there is some rounding; and near the bottom, where there is considerable outward flare. The tower has been scaled in the past bv means of special apparatus, but only at considerable risk. The great columns of which the tower consists are mostly pentagonal in shape, but some are four or six sided. The Devils Tower, Wyoming d V ^ >> G a '^ 'E, 03 a > 3 u (U . T^^V^^L iiJ - -^ k> ^r^B v-i *" ^ 5 jrfjfl X ^ ""3 ^ c/T l^^^^l O U^ C V- c ^"^ -^ ]-^ ^ ^^^^^^^1 g - C — 1-- "x -fj ^^I^H •^ a Ei S S c3 »— t H < ^ c >, — "P ii ' — biO a 3 bJO ^H ^^^B^l ■< <:: •— ^ ^ tr. 3 ^^ MH ^ 1—1 3 ^ 4J u d HS < > ^ ^ HhB z '5 ^ t3 ->-' H^V 1 5 ^ Si C Q ""5 "^ a C > 1-1 yT V J^^^l^^l c^ •r! <^ ^ 5 O OJ B x\ ^^H ^ 4-1 2:; c ^ -fj +j if'- < 1 ^ :/2 *^ > >. c 4-> •If H H < 5^ be OS 'in IT [be P^mI c V5 K&ti ^ « rt ^^■^■n^^H ^ 5 c Si a > 4-) IM ^ _, "-1 a; C/5 0-. Lm ' H s 13 1 ^Ui. ' ^H . Be'JS^ JH "H X CJ • 1-1 RH H rVHI li E -M c c %A 5 1 m'^^ cj bo c X. *c iim — 1 '5 ^ 3 "^ C 3 ^ THE CHACO CANYON NATIONAL MONUMENT T^HE Chaco Canyon National Monument preserves remarkable relics of a pre- '■ historic people once inhabiting New Mexico. Here are found numerous communal or pueblo dwellings built of stone, among which is the ruin known as Puel^lo Bonito, containing, as it originally stood, twelve hundred rooms. It is the largest preliistoric ruin in the Southwest. So dixTicult are tliey of access that little excavation has Vjeen done. SHOSHONE CAVERN NATIONAL MONUMENT A FEW miles east of the celebrated Shoshone Dam. in Wyoming, is found ^"^ the entrance to the picturesque cave to ])reserve which the vShoshone Cavern National ^Monument was created. Some of the rooms are a hundred and hftv feet long and forty or fifty feet liigh, and all are remarkably encrusted with limestone crystals. The passages through the cavern are most intricate, twisting, turning, doubling back, and descending so abruptly that ladders are often necessary. COLORADO NATIONAL MONUMENT T^HIS area, near Grand Junction, Colorado, is similar to that of the Garden ■*• of the Gods at Colorado Springs, only much more beautiful and picturesque. With possibly two exceptions it exhibits probably as highly colored, magnifi- cent, and impressive examples of erosion, particularly of lofty monoliths, as may be found any>vhere in the West. These monoliths are located in several tributary canyons. vSome of tliem are of gigantic size; one ov-er four hundred feet liigh is almost circular and a hundred feet in diameter at base. Some have not yet been explored. LEWIS AND CLARK CAVERN NATIONAL MONUMENT T^HE feature of this national monument is a limestone cavern of great ■'■ scientific interest because of its length and because of the number of large vaulted chambers it contains. It is of historic interest, also, because it overlooks for more than fifty miles the Montana trail of Lewis and Clark. The vaults of the cavern are magnificently decorated with stalactite and stalagmite formations of great variety of size, form, and color, the equal of, if not rivaling, the similar formations in the well-known Luray caves in \'irginia. The cavern has been closed on account of depredations of vandals. THE DINOSAUR NATIONAL MONUMENT "T^HE Dinosaur National Monument in Northeastern Utah was created to *■ preserve remarkable fossil deposits of extinct reptiles of great size. The reservation contains eighty acres of Juratrias rock. For vears prospectors and residents had been finding large bones in the neighborhood, and in 1909 Prof. Earl B. Douglass of the Carnegie Museum of Pittsburgh, under a permit from the Department of the Interior, imdertook a scientific investigation. The results exceeded all expectation. Remains of many enormous animals which once inhabited what is now our Southwestern States have been unearthed in a state of fine preservation. These include complete and perfect skeletons of large dinosaurs The chief find was the perfect skeleton of a brontosaurus eighty-five feet long and sixteen feet high which may have weighed, when living, twenty tons Unearthing the Skeleton of a Giant Dinosaur of Prehistoric Days T RAINBOW BRIDGE NATIONAL MONUMENT HIS natural bridge is located within the Navajo Indian Reservation, near the southern boundary of Utah, and spans a canyon and small stream which drains the northwestern slopes of Navajo Mountain. It is of great scientific interest as an example of eccentric stream erosion. Among the known extraordinary natural bridges of the world, this bridge is unique in that it is not only a symmetrical arch below Vjut presents also a curved surface above, thus suggesting roughly a rainbow. Its height above the surface of the water is three hundred and nine feet and its span is two hun- dred and seventy-eight feet. The existence of this natural wonder was first disclosed to William B. Douglass, an examiner of surveys of the General Land Office, on August 14, 1909, by a Piute Indian called "Mike's boy," later "Jim," who was employed in connection with the survey of the natural bridges in White Canyon, Utah. THE PAPAGO SAGUARO NATIONAL MONUMENT WITHIX this national monument, which Hes about nine miles east of Phoenix, Arizona, and less than a dozen miles from the Apache Trail, grow splendid examples of characteristic desert flora, including many striking specimens of giant cactus (saguaro) and many other interesting species of cacti, such as the prickly pear and cholla. There are also line examples of the yucca. All here attain great size and perfection. The saguaro is that variety of cactus which grows in a cylindrical form to a lieight of thirty or thirty-five feet. There are also prehistoric pictographs upon the rocks. EL MORRO NATIONAL MONUMENT EL ^lORRO, or Inscription Rock, in western central Xew Mexico, is an enor- mous sandstone rock rising a couple of hundred feet out of the plain and eroded in such fantastic form as to give it the appearance of a great castle. A small spring of water at the rock made it a convenient camping place for the Spanish explorers of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, and its smooth face well adapted it to receive the inscriptions of the conquerors. The earliest inscription is dated February iS, 1526. Historically the most important inscription is that of Juan de Ofiate. a colonizer of Xew Mexico and the founder of the city of Santa Fe. in 1606. It was in this year that Onate visited El Morro and carved this inscription on his return from a trip to the head of the Gulf of California. There are nineteen other Spanish inscriptions, among them that of Don Diego de \'argas, who in 1692 reconquered the Pueblo Indians after their rebelHon against Spanish authority in 16S0. T PINNACLES NATIONAL MONUMENT HE spires, domes, caves, and subterranean passages of the Pinnacles National Monument in San Benito County, California, are awe-inspiring on close inspection, and are well worth a visit by tourists and lovers of natural phenomena. The name is derived from the spirelike formations arising from six hundred to a thousand feet from the floor of the canyon, forming a landmark visible manv miles in every direction. Many of the rocks can not be scaled. A series of caves, opening one into the other, lie under each of the groups of rock. These vary greatly in size, one in particular, known as the Banquet Hall, being about a hundred feet square, with a ceiling thirty feet high. CAPULIN MOUNTAIN NATIONAL MONUMENT /'^APULIX MOUXTAIX is a volcanic cinder cone of recent origin, six miles ^-^ southwest of Folsom, X. Mex. It is the most magnificent specimen for a considerable group of craters. Capulin has an altitude of eight thousand feet, rising fifteen hundred feet above the surrounding plain. It is almost a perfect cone. THE PETRIFIED FOREST OF ARIZONA THE Petrified Forest of Arizona lies in the area between the Little Colorado River and the Rio Puerco, fifteen miles east of their junction. This area is of interest because of the abundance of petrified coniferous trees. It has exceptional scenic features, also. The trees lie scattered about in great profusion; none, however, stands erect in its original place of growth, as in the Yellowstone National Park. The trees probably at one time grew beside an inland sea; after falling thev became water-logged, and during decomposition the cell structure of the wood was entirely replaced by silica from sandstone in the surrounding land. SITKA NATIONAL MONUMENT, ALASKA T^HIvS monument reservation is situated about a mile from tlie steamboat •^ landing at Sitka, Alaska. Upon this ground was located formerly the village of a warlike tribe — the Kik-Siti Indians — where the Russians under Baranoff in 1802 fought and won the "decisive battle of Alaska" against the Indians and effected the lodgment that offset the then active attempts of Great Britain to possess this part of the country. The Russian title thus acquired to the Alexander Archipelago was later transferred to the United States. A celebrated "witch tree" of the natives and sixteen totem poles, several of which are examples of the best work of the savage genealogists of the Alaska clans, stand sentrylike along the beach. THE TUMACACORI NATIONAL MONUMENT npHK Tumacacori National Monument in Santa Cruz County, Arizona, was *■ created to preserve a very ancient Spanish mission ruin dating;, it is thought, from the hitter part of the sixteenth century. It wlis built by Jesuit priests from Spain and operated by them for over a century. After the vear 1 769 priests belonging to the order of Franciscan Fathers took charge of the mission and repaired its crumbUng walls, maintaining peace- able possession for about sixty years, until driven out by Apache Indians. GRAN QUIVIRA NATIONAL MONUMENT. THE Gran Ouivira has long been recognized as one of the most important of the earliest Spanish church or mission ruins in the Southwest. It is in Central Xew ]\Iexico. Near by are numerous Indian pueblo ruins, occupying an area manv acres in extent, which also, with sufiicient land to protect them, was reserved. The outside dimensions of the church ruin, which is in the form of a short-arm cross, are about forty-eight by one hundred and forty feet, and its walls are from four to six feet thick and from twehe to twentv feet high. NAVAJO NATIONAL MONUMENT THIS tract encloses three interesting and extensive prehistoric pueblos or cliff-dwelUng ruins in an excellent state of preservation. These are known as the Betata Kin, the Keet Seel, and Inscription House. Inscription House Ruin, on Navajo Creek, is regarded as extraordinary, not onlv because of its good state of preservation, but because of the fact that upon the walls of its rooms are found inscriptions written in Spanish by early explorers and plainly dated 1661. T\{1\ NA'JIONAL i^ARKS A J A (tI^ANCE Number, 17, Totul Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in i1j<- ortl'r <,( their creation NATIO.N'AI- I'AKIC and lJal^ 77 1,534 398 118 DISTINCTI VE CHAK ACTKRISTICS 46 hot sj>rings i>ossessing curative j^roperties Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs — Jiathliouses under jjublic control. More geysers than in all rest of world together — iVjiling springs — Mud volcanoes —Petrified forests— <^irand Canyon of the Yellowstcjne, remarkable for gorgcjus coloring — Ivarge lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bisfjn, mse, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. Valley of world-famed Vjeauty — Lofty cliffs — Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extrarjrdinary height — 3 groves of big trees — Large areas of snowy peaks — Waterwheel falls. The Big Tree National Park — 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, Sfjme 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created ix) preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter — 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, Sfjme of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable suVjalpine wild-fiower fields. Lake of extraitjrdinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. vSulphur and other springs possessing curative projjerties — Under Government regulation. Most notable and best-preserved prchistrjric cliff dwellings in United States, if not in the world. Rugged mountiiin region of unsurpassed alpine character — 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty — 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands of feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11,000 to 14,250 feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. Two active volcamxts, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed — A third volcano, Haleakala, whfjse crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cfjnes. 1 124 Active volcano — Lassen Peak, 10,437 ^^^t in altitude — Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. 2, 200 Highest Mountain in North America Rises higher above surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are: Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, South Dakota Large natural cavern. Sullys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. 36 HS HOW TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS Pi-.--' ^• T»C M\n«IHN 1SL.*NPS \ 1 The map shows tlic location of all of our Xational Parks iuid their principal railroad connections. The traveler may work out his n.iutes to snit himself. Low roinui-trip excursion fares to the Americm Ri.vky Mountain region and Paeitic Coast may be availed of iti visiting the National Parks dxiring their respective seasi.ms. thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinent.il through trains and br.mch lines make the Parks e.isy of access from all p.irts of the United St.ites. l'\>r schedules and excursion fares to iuid between tlie National Parks apply to your loc.il railway ticket otVice or to anv excursion agency, or write to the P;vssenger Departments of tjie railroads which appe.ir on the above map, as follows: .■VRizo>f.\ E.vsTBRX R-VRRo.vp Tiu-sou. Ari;, Atchison*. ToPKK.\ & S.\NT.\ Fi: Railwav iiig R.iilw.iy Kxoliaii.cv, ChuMco. 111. CHic.VliO & North Wu^tkkx R.vilwav .•.-:< West .l.u-ksou HouU'v.irJ, Cliica.co. 111. Chicago. BcKUNCTON" & Qeix^Y RviLKOAi! Co 547 West J.ioksou Binilo\-.»rvi. Chiciso. 111. Chicago. MiLWACKBB & St. Tauu Railway R.iihv.jy E.\oluini;c, Cliii-iiKo.IU. Chic.\c.o. Rock I.. Cal. Uxiox Pacific System GarUnd Buildini;. 5S East Washington Street. ChioaKo. 111. W.vB.vsH R.\ilw.vv Railway Exoh.mce Building. St. I.onis. Mo. Wbstern P.vcific R.\ilw.\v Mills Building. Stm Francisco . Ca I. For information about stijouming and traveling within the National Parks write to the Department of tlie Interior for the Information circuUir of the Park or P;irks in which you are interested. Ri-Mi"Mr>KR rirvr THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO VOU THEY ARE THE GRK.xr NVIIONAI. PL.WGROUNDS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR WHcm THEY .\REA0M1MSTKRED 15YTHE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 38 HS WASUIXCTO.N : UOVER.XMENT rKIXTl.Nl.; OKKICK : 191T THE GRAND CANYON OF THE COLORADO RIVER IN ARIZONA Y Jar (HI-. J\I';vi Scjii.iMh o^ Ai.i. J-.akiiii.y .Si-kctacij-.s." — Chari.ks Dldlfy Warner I S S U h D BY T H E DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICK Photonraph by George R. King "\t Is Beyond Comparison— Beyond Description; Absolutely Unparalleled Throughout the Wide World." — Theodore Roosevelt PItoloyraph by U. S. Reclamation Service Leaving El Tovar for a Scenic Rim Drive COLOSSUS OF CANYONS ORE mysterious in its depth than the Himalayas in their height," writes Professor John C. Van Dyke, "the Grand Canyon remains not the eighth but the first wonder of the world. There is nothing Uke it." Even the most superficial description of this enormous spectacle may not be put in words. The wanderer upon the rim overlooks a thousand square miles of pyramids and minarets carved from the painted depths. Many miles away and more than a mile below the level of his feet he sees a tiny silver thread which he knows is the giant Colorado. He is numbed by the spectacle. At first he can not comprehend it. There is no measure, nothing which the eye can grasp, the mind fathom. It may be hours before he can even slightly adjust himself to the titanic spectacle, before it ceases to be utter chaos; and not until then does he begin to exclaim in rapture. And he never wholly adjusts himself, for with dawning appreciation comes growing wonder. Comprehension lies always just beyond his reach. The Colorado River is formed by the confluence of the Grand and the Green Rivers. Together they gather the waters of three hundred thousand square miles. Their many canyons reach this magnificent climax in northern Arizona. The Grand Canyon is a national monument administered by the Department of Agriculture. J -iinuiii/iij'h by JJiniy i- W.nnann The Rim Road Affords Many Glorious \'ik\vs BY SUNSET AND MOONRISE HEN the light falls into it, harsh, direct, and searching," writes Hamlin Garland, "it is great, but not beautiful. The lines are chaotic, disturbing — but wait! The clouds and the sunset, the moonrise and the storm, will transform it into a splendor no mountain range can surpass. Peaks will shift and glow, walls darken, crags take fire, and gray-green mesas, dimly seen, take on the gleam of opalescent lakes of mountain water." ^J$i Cot^yTight by Fred Harvey Hermit's Resi. Near the Head of the Her.mh Trail io the River J'hulu(/rapk by U. S. Rcclamaluin Service "Is Any Fifty Miles of Mother Earth as Fearful, or Any Fart as Fearful, as Full of Glory, as Full of God ?"— Joaquin Miller Photniirtil'li by U. S. Reclamation Service Still Farthkr Down thk Hfrmit I'rail PAINTED IN MAGIC COLORS — ~-i|HK blues and the grays and the maiives and the reds are second Tin glory only to the canyon's size and sculpture. The colors change with every changing hour. The morning and the evening l| shadows play magicians' tricks. "It seems like a gigantic statement for even Nature to make all in one" mighty stone word," writes John Muir. "Wildness so Godful, cosmic, prime- val, bestows a new sense of earth's beauty and size. . . . But the colors, tlie living, rejoicing colors, chanting morning and evening in chorus to heaven! Whose brush or pencil, however lovingly inspired, can give us these? In the supreme flaming glory of sunset the whole canvon is transfigured, as if the life and light of centuries of sunshine stored up in the rocks was now being poured forth as from one glorious fountain, flooding both earth and sky." iNlar the Bottom, Showing Hermit Camp at the I^oot of a Lofty Monument This photograph was taken several years ago. The camp has since been greatly enlarged, affording most comfortable entertainment overnight ri^riQW —r.C — 17 9. Pholouiaph by J- . A. Lathe The Profound Abyss ROMANTIC INDIAN LEGEND HE Indians believed the Grand Canyon the road to heaven, A great chief mourned the death of his wife. To him came the god Ta-vwoats and offered to prove that his wife was in a happier land by taking him there to look upon her happiness. Ta-vwoats then made a trail through tlie protecting mountains and led the chief to the happy land. Thus was created the canyon gorge of the Colorado, On their return, lest the unworthy should fmd this happy land, Ta-vwoats rolled through the trail a wild, surging river. Thus was created the Colorado, Photograph by U . S. forest Service The CioRGE Near the Mouth of Shinumo C'keek Copyn,jl:t t'v /•';<<: JIaruy Sunset from Pima Point. "Peaks Will Shift and Glow, Walls Darken, Crags Take Hamlin AND Gray-Green Mesas, Dimly Seen, Take on the Gleam of Opalescent Lakes." — LAND 13 QC Photoaraphby U.S. K-.clamation Scr:-icc The Lookout at the Head of the Bright Angel Trail Near El Tovar Waiting for the Signal to Start Down Bright Angel Frail One may descend to the river's edge and back in one day by this trail Copyright by Fred Harvey The Celebrated Jacob's Ladder on the Bright Anc;el Trah, The photograph shows how broad and safe are the Grand Canvon trails. There is no danger in the descent Copyright by Fred Harvey When Clouds and Canyon Meet and Merge MASTERPIECE OF EROSION ilHE rain falling in the plowed field forms rivulets in the furrows. The T rivulets unite in a muddy torrent in the roadside gutter. With suc- ceeding showers the gutter wears an ever-deepening channel in the l | soft soil. With the passing season the gutter becomes a gully. Here and there, in places, its banks undermine and fall in. Here and there the rivulets from the field wear tiny tributary gullies. Between the breaks in the banks and the tributaries irregular masses of earth remain standing, sometimes resembling mimic cHffs, sometimes washed and worn into mimic peaks and spires. Such roadside erosion is familiar to us all. A hundred times we have idly noted the fantastic water-carved walls and minaretted slopes of these ditches. But seldom, perhaps, have we realized that the muddy roadside ditch and the world-famous Grand Canyon of the Colorado are, from nature's stand- point, identical; that they differ only in soil and size. The arid States of our great Southwest constitute an enormous plateau or table-land from four to eight thousand feet above sea level. Rivers gather into a few desert water systems. The largest of these is that which, in its lower courses, has, in unnumbered ages, worn the mighty chasm of the Colorado. PhMograph by V. S. Forest Service On the IMighty River's Brink A Quiet Stretch between Two Rapids Within tlie Canyon the livcr is crossed by cars suspended on wire cables, and also, in quiet reaches, by boats; there are no bridges N*5s^; Cupyriiilil hy I- rid Ilariiy Where the River Rests Below the Celebrated Marble Canyon Before Taking Its Plunge Into the Gigantic Canyon Below The Colorado rolls through many miles of vast canyons before it reaches Grand Canyon POWELL'S GREAT ADVENTURE i HH Grand Canvon was the culniinatiui^ scene of one of the most stirring adventures in tlie history of American exploration. For hundreds of miles the Colorado and its tributaries form a mightv network of mighty chasms wliich few had venture*.! even to enter. Of tlie Grand Canyon, deepest and hugest of all, tales were ciurcnt of wliirlpools, of hundreds of miles of iniderground passage, and of giant falls whose roaring music could be heard on distant mountain summits. The Indians feared it. Hven the hardiest of frontiersmen refused it. It remained for a geologist and a scliool-teacher, a one-armed veteran of the Civil War, John Wesley Powell, afterwards director of tlie I'nited States Geological Surs-ey, to dare and to accomplish. This was in 1S69. Nine men accompanied him in foiu' boats. There proved to be no impassable wliirlpools in the Grand Canyon, no underground passages, and no cataracts. But tlie tiip was hazardous in tlie extreme. The adventurers faced tlie unknoA\'n at ever}' bend, daily — some- times several times daily — embarking upon swift rapids ^^-itll0ut guessing upon what rocks or in what great falls tliey might terminate. Continually tliey upset. Thev were unable to build tires sometimes for days at a stretch. Four men deserted, hoping to climb tlie walls, and were never heard from again — and tliis happened tlie very day before Major Powell and his faitliful half dozen floated clear of the Grand Canvon into safetv. Pkoio^aph by I- ■ S. GtdccKd Sur-.ey Two OF THE Boats Used ev ^Ujor Powell in Exploring the C.\nyon Photograph by El Tovar Studio Memorial Just Erected by the Department of the Interior to Major John Wesley Powell It stands on the rim at Sentinel Point. Upon the ahar which crowns it will blaze ceremonial fires EASY TO REACH AND TO SEE ilT is possible to get a glimpse of the Grand Canyon by lengthening I your transcontinental trip one day, but this day must be spent either on the rim or in one hasty rush down the Bright Angel Trail I to the river's edge; one can not do both the same day. Two ardu- ous days, therefore, will give you a rapid glance at the general features. Three days will enable you to substitute the newer Hermit Trail, with a night in the canyon, for the Bright Angel Trail. Four or five days will enable you to see the Grand Canyon; but after you see it you will want to live with it awhile. There are two other trails, the Bass Trail and the Grand View. The canyon should be seen first from the rim. Hours, days, may be spent in emotional contemplation of this vast abyss. Navajo Point, Grand View, vShoshone Point, El Tovar, Hopi Point, Sentinel Point, Pima Point, Yuma Point, the Hermit Rim — these are a few only of many spots of inspiration. An altogether different experience is the descent into the abyss. This is done on mule-back over trails which zigzag steeply but safely down the cliffs. The hotels, camps, and facilities for getting around are admirable. Your sleeper brings you to the very rim of the canyon. Copyright bv l-'rcd 1 1 amy Hopi House at El Tovar, RiirRODUCKD from a»n Anciknt Hon Community Dwelling THE NATIONAL PARKS AT A GLANCE Number, 17; Total Area, 9,774 Square Miles. Arranged chronologically in the order of their creation. NATIONAL PARK and Date Hot Springs Res- ekvation Yellowstone 1872 YosEMiTE Sequoia General Grant 1890 Mount Rainier Crater Lake 1902 Platt 1904 Mesa Verde 1906 Glacier 1910 Rocky Mountain 191S Hawaii 1916 Lassen Volcanic 1916 Mount McKinley 1917 LOCATION AREA square miles Middle Arkansas North- western Wyoming Middle eastern California Middle eastern California Middle California West central Washington Southern Oregon Southern Oklahoma Southern Colorado North- western Montana Northern Colorado Hawaii Northern California South central Alaska 3,348 252 324 249 i;^ 77 1.534 398 118 124 DISTINCTIVE CHARACTERISTICS 46 hot springs possessing curative properties — Many hotels and boarding houses in adjacent city of Hot Springs- Bathhouses under ])ublic control. More geysers than in all rest of world together — Boiling springs— Mud volcanoes— Petrified forests— Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, remarkaljle for gorgeous colorint)- Large lakes and waterfalls — Vast wilderness inhabited by deer, elk, bison, moose, antelope, bear, mountain sheep, etc.; greatest wild bird and animal preserve in world. Valley of world-famed beauty— Lofty cliffs— Romantic vis- tas — Waterfalls of extraordinar>' height — 3 groves of big trees— I,arge areas of snowy peaks— Waterwheel falls. The Big Tree National Park— 12,000 sequoia trees over 10 feet in diameter, some 25 to 36 feet in diameter. Created to preserve the celebrated General Grant Tree, 35 feet in diameter— 6 miles from Sequoia National Park. Largest accessible single-peak glacier system — 28 glaciers, some of large size — 48 square miles of glacier, 50 to 1,000 feet thick — Remarkable subalpine wild-flower fields. Lake of extraordinary blue in crater of extinct volcano, no visible inlet, or outlet — Sides 1,000 feet high. Sulphur and other springs possessing curative properties — Under Government regulation. Most notable and best-preserved prehistoric cliff dwellings in United vStates, if not in the world. Rugged mountain region of unsurpassed alpine character— 250 glacier-fed lakes of romantic beauty — 60 small gla- ciers — Peaks of unusual shape — Precipices thousands ol feet deep — Fine trout fishing. Heart of the Rockies — Snowy Range, peaks 11,000 to 14,250 feet altitude — Remarkable records of glacial period. Two active volcanoes, Mauna Loa, largest in the world, and Kilauea, whose lake of bubbling lava is world famed — A third volcano, Haleakala, whose crater, 8 miles wide, contains many cones. Active volcano- Lassen Peak, 10,437 feet in altitude — Cinder Cone, 6,907 feet — Hot springs — Mud geysers. Highest Mountain in North America -Rises higher above surrounding country than any mountain in the world. National Parks of less popular interest are : Casa Grande Ruin, 1889, Arizona Prehistoric Indian ruin. Wind Cave, 1903, vSouth Dakota Large natural cavern. SuUys Hill, 1904, North Dakota Wooded hilly tract on Devils Lake. HOW^ TO REACH THE NATIONAL PARKS The map shows tlae location of all of our National P;irks ivnd their principvU raila>ad connections. The traveler may work out his amies to suit himself. Low n.>und-trip excursion fares to the American Rocky Mountain region ;md Pacitic Coast may be availed of in visiting the National Parks during their respective seas^ms. thus materially reducing the cost of the trip. Transcontinental through trains and branch lines make tlie P.irks e.isy of access from all parts of the United States. l-\>r scheilules a:id excursion fares to and between the National Parks applv to your local railwav ticket othce or to any excursion agency, ur write to tlie P^issenger Departments of the railroads which appear on tlie above map. as follows: .\rizon-a Eastern' Railroao Tucson. Ariz. Arcmsox, ToPEKA & San-ta Fk Railway ing Railway Exchange. Chiaigo, 111. Chicago & North Wg^tbr.^ R.vilwav .-.o West Jackson Boale\-anl, Chii-aso. 111. Chic.\go. BuRUNC.Tox & Qi'iNvv Railroad Co 5 1; West Jackson Boulevanl, Chicaso. 111. Chic.\c;o. 'MiLWACKKE & i^T. Tai-l Railway "... . R.ulway Exchange. Chii-ago. 111. Chicago. Rock IsuwD & Pacific Railway Co Ui &Ule Street Station. Chit-;»go. III. Colorado & SovTHijKN R-MLWAV Railway E.vch.mge BniUlin^. I">cnvcr.CoIo. Denver & Rio Grande R.ulkoad Co Equitable BuiKlin;;. I>cnvir. Colo. Great XoRTHERX R.VILWAV R.iilro.id BniUing. Fourth ani J.ickson Strci-ts. St. Paul. Minn. Gulf. Colorado & Santa Fe Railway Galveston. Tex. iLLiN'ois Central Railroad Centril St ition. Chicago. 111. Mis.souRi Pacific Railway Railway E.xchange BuiMing. St. Louis. Mo. NoRTiiBRX PacificRailway Railroad Building. Filth and Jackson Strtvts. St. Paul. Minn. S.\N Pedro. Los .A.NC.BLES & .~^ alt Lake R.ulro.vd . . . . Pacific Electric Building. Lo< .■Viigclcs. Cal. SoiTHERV Pacific Co Flood Building. SvUi Fr.mcisiv. Cal. Union Pacific System Garhnd Building. ^-^ East Washington Street. Chicago. 111. Wab.\sh R.ULW.w Railway E.-cehango Building. St Louis. Mo. Western P.^apio R.vilway Mills Building. S.ui Franci. Cal. For information about sojonming and traveling within the National Parks write to the Dep;irtment of the Interior for the Information circular of the Park or Parks in which vou are interested. RKMKMl^.KR TH.\T THE NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO YOU THEY ARE THE GRE.\T X.VnONAl. PI.AYGROINDS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FOR \VHOM THE^- ARE AEff^^ljFERQy^Y Tilt aWAR TMENT OF THE INTERIOR l« KJ \J 'waShBBtO.N : OOVEUNME.NX rUlNTlXi; OFFICE : 1917 - .^^ ^^ •'.'^^^\^* -^.^ "^ • h,"- "^V <^^ * S^ • %^ ^ ♦ - '•■ ^^'% '• <^ .Co • .V^ *^ '^"-o ^,0 ^ "^ ^V '^O' ♦^ ; ^,_ ■or