The Wallace miner. [volume] (Wallace, Idaho) 1907-current, 1916-06-15
Yellowstone National Park Description
of Nations Greatest, Most Wonderful
and Most Popular Pleasure Resort.

pared and published by the interior
department as a means of inducing
our ewn people to see America first
Is Of special interest:
The Yellowstone National park,
which lies principally in wyoming Is
the most widely celebrated of all our
national parks because 1t contains
more and greater geysers than all the
rest of the world together The gey-
ser fields next in size are In Iceland
and New Zealand. The rest are IN
conspicuous
Geysers are, roughly speaking, wa
ter volcanoes. They occur only at
places where the internal heat OF the
earth approaches close to the surface.
Their action, for so many years I'M
explained, and even now regarded
with wonder by so many, Is simple
Water from the surface trickling
through cracks in the rocks or water
from subterranean springs collecting
in the bottom of the geyser's crater
down among the strata of intense
heat, becomes itself intensely heated
and gives off steam, which expands
and forces upward the cooler water
that lies above it.
1t Is then that the water at the
surface of the geyser begins to bubble
and give off clouds of steam, the sign
to the watchers above that the geyser
Is about to play.
At last the water in the bottom
reaches so great an expansion under
continued heat that the less heated
water above can no longer weigh 1t
down, so it bursts upward with great
violence, rising many feet In the air
and continuing to play until practie-
ally all the water in the crater has
been expelled, The water, cooled and
falling back to the ground, again
seeps through the surface to gather
as before In the craters depth, and IN
greater or less time, according to
difficulties in the way of it's return
becomes reheated to the bursting
point when the geyser spouts again.
One may make q geyser with test
tube and Bunsen burner
The Hot Water Phenomena.
Nearly the entire Yellowstone re-
gion, covering an area of about 5000
square miles, is remarkable for its
hot water phenomena. The geysers
are confined to three basins lying near
each other in the middle west side of
the park, but other hot water mani
festations occur at more widely sep
arated points. Maryelously colored
hot springs, mud volcanoes, and 9TH
er strange phenomena are frequent. AT
Mammoth at Norris and at Thumb
the hot water has brought to the sur
face quantities of white mineral de-
posits which build terraces of beauti-
fully incrusted basins high up in the
air, often engulfing trees of consider
able size. over the edges Of these
carved basins pours the hot water
Microscopic plants called algae grow
on the edges and sides of these basins
assisting the deposition of the min
eral matter and painting them hues
of red and pink and blush gray, which
in warm weather glow brilliantly, but
In cold weather almost disappear, AT
many other points lesser hot springs
occur, introducing strange, almost UNI
canny elements into wooded and 9TH
erwise quite normal landscapes.
A tour of these hot water formations
and spouting geysers is an experience
never to be forgotten, Some of the
geysers play at quite regular inter-
walls For many years the celebrated
Old Faithful played with great regu-
larity every seventy minutes, but dur
ing the summer of 1915 the interval
heightened to about So minutes due,
1t is supposed, to the smaller snow
fall and consequent lessened water
supply of the preceding winter. Some
of the largest geysers play at irregular
intervals of days, weeks or months.
Some very small ones play every few
minutes. Many bubbling hot springs,
which throw water two or three feet
into the air once or twice a minute,
are really small, imperfectly formed
geysers.
The hot spring terraces are also a
rather awe-inspiring spectacle when
seen for the first time. The visitor
may climb upon them and pick his
way around among the steaming
pools. In certain lights the surface
of these pools appears wildly colored.
The deeper hot pools are often in
tensely green. The incrustations are
often beautifully crystallized. Clumps
of grass and even flowers which have
been submerged in the charged waters
become exquisitely plated as If with
frosted silver.
But the geysers and hot water for g.
nations are by no means the only
wonders in the Yellowstone. Indeed
the entire park is a wonderland. Tine
Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone af-
fords a spectacle worthy of a national
park were there no geysers. But you
must not confuse your grand canyons
of which there are several in our
wonderful western country OF these
by far the largest and most impressive
Is the grand CANYON of the Colora do