The Warner weekly sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1885, 1885-01-09
THE BAD LANDS.
An Interesting Description OF their
Origin, Appearance, etc.


There are doubtless many readers
of the Journal who would read with
interest a brief description Of the bad
lands Of Dakota. They are situated
principally along the Cheyenne and
Grand Rivers and the Little Missouri.
They are from two or three to say
twenty-five miles III width. In the
long ago the valley Of these streams
must have been filed with drift wood.
Then followed period Of drift which
buried the accumulation Of wood under
two or three hundred feet Of sediment,
sand and gravel. The buried wood in
time became coal, the veins being in
some instances twenty odd feet in
depth. Either i'll spontaneous COM
bustion, or from electricity, fires were
started in these veins, and they gradu-
ally burned out, restoring in part the
old watercourses by means of the over
flow from the accumulation of water
in the newly formed basins. ANY one
familiar with the country can realize
how quickly the gullies thus formed
would be widened SO as to embrace the
vast tract now covered by the Bad
Lands. Sully describes them as re-
sembling "the bottom of hell with the
fires put out" Looking upon them,
you see patches Of Stag, there great
boulders, showing rnmistakeable evi-
dences of great heat. and on every
hand scori@ or burned clay, resembl-
| ing broken brick. Where the fire was
checked by the caving earth and
the coal did not burn, mounds
| two or three hundred feet stand. Some
! of the mounds are cone-shaped, and
some resemble old castles or monas-
tries in ruins. AT other points they
are simply huge piles Of clay, and at
others great bars Of gravel, gravel seorie
and sand, without particle Of yegeta-
ton. At some points the craters
formed by the burning coal beds have
been filled with drift and wash, and
you find from ten to forty acres Of the
richest patches of pasture lands. Stand
| ing upon the table-lands you look
down upon the bad lands, and Il you
see them in moonlight you are re-
mined of a city in ruins. You notice
the resemblance to broken walls and
tottering chimneys, and blackened
piles OF rubbish, the broken brick and
mortar with occasional grass plats.
AS you contemplate the scene and
take in the grandeur, you cannot fail
to see how they have been formed.
Perhaps some one acquainted with the
country will take you to the burning
buttes where you can watch the pro-
cess Of bad land formation. Within
| the writer's knowledge those near Me-
dora have been burning for the past
eleven years, and during that time
only a few hundred feet Of butte has
disappeared. The butte or bluff has
been burned up, carried away in dust
BY the wind, or washed away, leaving
an additional section Of bad lands,
presenting all the characteristics of
those formed ages ago. Where the
mounds are, the coal did not burn, and
may now be mined. The Bad Lands
are full Of rich plateaus and afford the
best shelter for stock.
They were the favorite haunts of
wild game, and are now occupied by
probably half a million head Of cattle
that have been driven to them during
the past five years. They have proven
to be anything but @bad" to the stock
growers Of the plains. Bismarck
Journal.
A BoRr PorrmcrAN. $50 you say you can
not help rnc got tho posiosfice. .