The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1910-07-24

Did you know that there was nook
in mainland United States where sixty
live and creeping glaciers were tucked
away among the eternal snows9 Did
YOU know that hundreds of crystal lakes
frineed with giant spruce and visited
constantly by grizzly and moose ana
caribou. were dotted about among these
glaciers? Did you know that there
was region IN this country compar-
able to the Alps yet so uninhabited that
not half a dozen settlers have made
homes in its million acres7 Did you
know that the recent congress had con-
vcrted such a spot into n national park
ond The people OF the present and fu-
iure are to have another great play
ground in which to get back to nature
IN her most stupendous aspectsI
Such are the facts. for the Glacier
{. National park of Montana has come
sinto being and tins summer the strenu.
Gus of the vacationers from all over the
land are hurrying thither to see TOT
themselves what Uncle Sam has set
aside for them and their children. Ihey
are finding Il region absolutely unsul-
lied by the touch of man where the
Snow OF a chaos of high mountains
pushes itself down U-shaped canyons
in huge glaciers, where thousand -ioot
cliffs fling back the defy to the noun
tain climber and where the things. OF
the wild still roam as they did before
the westward march of empire began
to take its way,
Glacier National Forest.
The Glacier National forest is on the
northern border of Montana where the
Rocky mountains push from this coun-
try into Canada. 1t is region conslu-
crlbly larger than the state OF RHODE
Island and is the very skyllght OF the
nation. From it the waters flow north
into Hudson bay. west into the Paclhc,
east into the Mississippi for 1T is
threc-sided watershed. The Muscallonge
of thSvc streams that flow into Can,
ada, the picl5erel and bass of those or
the Mississippi basin, the salmon and
trout of the Pacific streams, all hnd
their ways into the headwaters OF the
streams Of the new park, yet, through
,the ages have been barred by narrow
Iridges and are things apart.
l The great mountains rise PERCEPTIONS
from level plain which extends for
thousand miles to the east. The Great
Northern railway skirts them on the
south but the people it brings into the
west have not dared the wilds OF the
great chaos into which the Rockies
break themselves before plunglng INTO
Canada But here is one of the most
beautiful mountain regions in the world.
To the east Of the mountains stretches
the great plain region drained by the
Missouri and the Saskatchewan rivers
mile upon mile of open grass region
practically treelcss, Sheer upright from
this plain rise the mighty mountains,
which, seen at distance, present
rock wall of great steepness, extending
without an apparent break into the lin.
itless north This the eastern face of
the range, is in reality cut by deep o.
shaped canyons, carved out in this par
ticular form by the glaciers which of
-fld came all the way to the plain.
= Roaring Streams in Canyons.
In these canyons today arc roaring
streams which now find their sources at
the snouts of the glaciers which have re-
tired to the wilds of greater attitudes:
These waters run through a score Of
placid lakes in the valleys above, plunge
through the steep gorges, broaden out
into the arroyos of the plains and finally
flow into the Missouri. Between the
canyons, the long fnger-ike ridges, tim
ber covered. climb upward and are lost
against the precipitous cliffs.
The canyons crowd further into the
mountains. Until finally they terminate
at the face of great ~lacier forming
heroic amphitheater, rising in ice
cliffs one over the other in tre-
mendous stairway. Above this is the