Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1897-01-20
Hliseellaneuus &eadims.
SHIFTING SAND HILLS.
Curious Heaps In the Central Kansas
Prairie Whose Origin Is q Mystery.

SHIFTING SAND HILLS.
Curious Heaps In the Central Kansa.
Prairie Whose Origin Is a Mystery.
The broad expanse of level prairie
which makes up the greater portion oi
Central Kansas is broken in one place
by a range of hills whose origin is a
question that has puzzled scientists
writes New York Tribune cores.
pondent. The prairies are easily ex'
planned ; they are simply the bed of a
vast ocean. The surface contains u.s.
ually limited amount of sand evenly
distributed. This also is to be expect
ed, for the action of waves would
spread uniformly over the seabed the
sand washed down from the bordering
mountains. But here, in the middle
of this vast ocean, is miniature noun
tain chain, as distinct from the sur.
rounding land as if it had dropped
from the skies.
The hills stretch from near Lyon,
Kan, to Hutchinson, distance OF
about 25 miles. They form the arc Of
circle, and are on the average four
miles in width. The curious feature
of them is that they are made up
wholly of sand without the slightest
inter-mixture of any foreign element.
The sand is composed Of fine, diamond.
shaped particles, so light that they
seek new position at every breeze,
and breezes in Kansas are too common
to be noticeable.
These beds of sand are much given
to shifting. A heavy wind will move
whole acres of them. Hills 80 feet in
height will be transferred little by lit
tie a distance of 100 yards, and q
road between two mounds will be found
next day entering the very bowels of a
single hill. There is no limit to the
curious tricks the eddying storms will
play with the sand. The effect can be
compared only to that produced by a
high wind on very fine snow.
In many places, however, a long
period of quiet weather has permitted
turf to form that can Withstand the
action of the elements. In these spots
much fruit is raised, the best of which
| is wild plum renowned throughout
the whole state. But if one digs
through this turf, the sand is found be.
meath, and extends downward to the
old prairie level. At this point begin
the soil, limestone strata end conglo-
merate, exactly the same as in all the
rest of the region.
This fact proves that the hills were
placed here after the surface forma.
ton had been completed, and further
corroboration is found in the substances
buried beneath the hills. Borings have
uncovered great cottonwood trees with
the branches all intact, and bones of
antelope and sandhill crane-two ami
mails which still linger in this unfre.
quented region, though otherwise al
most driven from the state. Even hu-
man bones have been dug up, the re-
mains probably of. early travellers
caught in the dangerous sands during
some unrecorded storm. Under these
conditions, especially if the storm is
rotatory, like the famous tornado this
region forms natural deathtrap.
No satisfactory explanation of the
hills has ever been advanced. Early
and less we'll informed investigators
thought they might be the remnant of
some heavenly body which by chance
had encountered the earth after the
surface formation was practically fin
ished. Some even went so far as to
declare them to be the remnant of the
nucleus of a comet. Later on, when
the cataclysmic school of geologists
was in the ascendant, they suggested
that some mighty prehistoric cyclone,
as it swept through the country, had
collected the sand and had deposited
it here, where the force of the storm
was expended.
Scientists of the present day are
disposed to find a more simple expla-
nation. They say that as the inland
sea subsided this stretch of land may
have been uplifted somewhat so that it
formed an island, and the action OF
the waves collected and deposited the
sand about its borders. Then after
the water had disappeared, the land
sank to level with the surrounding
territory, thus leaving behind it the
heaps of sand in the form of hills.
This theory, although it does not ac-
count for all the phenomena, is per-
haps the most rational yet proposed,
and it will probably be found to have
considerable truth when the complete
history of these hills shall be dis