BRVCE CANYON N A T I O N A vTAli UNITED STATES Historic Events Bryce DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR Canyon Harold L. Ickes, Secretary 1866 James Andrus and party of Indian SEASON fighters from St. George, Utah, passed MAY 1 TO through the Bryce region. NATIONAL PARK NOVEMBER 1 19 40 UTAH 1872 Bryce Canyon visited by A. H. NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Thompson, E. S. Dcllenbaugh, and BRYCE TEMPLE. Arno B. Cammerer, Director party on geological mission. C OJ\JEJ\JS RYCE CANYON NATIONAL extending down a thousand feet 1875 The settlements of Escalante and Can- PARK includes some of the through its pink and white marly lime­ Natural Bridge .... Cover nonville established. Ebenezer Bryce, most interesting exposures of stone. The character of the area is for whom the park is named, settled B General Information Relating the Pink Cliffs formation, whose rocks well indicated by the Paiute Indian at lower gateway to Bryce Canyon. to Geology of Zion and are among the most colorful of any name,"Unka-timpe-wa-wince-pock-ich," Bryce Canyon National forming the earth's crust. The major which is translated as, "red rocks stand­ beauty spots of the area are found ing like men in a bowl-shaped can­ Parks 4 1876 First written description of Bryce Can­ where forces of erosion have cut back yon." This amphitheater is 3 miles How to Reach Bryce ... 8 yon made by T. C. Bailey, U. S. dep­ into the plateau, forming amphitheaters long and about 2 miles wide, and is Roads and Trails .... 10 uty surveyor, who viewed the canyon or wide canyons filled with pinnacles filled to the brim with myriads of fan­ from Sunset Point. and grotesque forms. tastic figures cut by weathering in­ Administration 10 The entire park area, with some 30 fluences, chiefly by running water, wind, Naturalist Services .... 10 miles of Pink Cliffs, can be seen from and changes in temperature. Domes, Rainbow Mountain, at the southern spires, and temples predominate, dec­ Accommodations and 1923 Bryce Canyon National Monument cre­ end of the park. Included in this orated in all the colors of the spectrum, ated by Presidential proclamation. Expenses 10 panorama are such beautiful amphi­ but principally with reds, pinks, and Free Public Campgrounds . 12 theaters as Black Birch Canyon, Agua creams. Canyon, and Willis Creek. In addition, The park was established September Transportation 12 1924 Act of Congress authorized the crea­ there are magnificent views across "the 15, 1928, under authority of the acts Saddle Horses 13 tion of Utah National Park. land of the purple sage" to Navajo of Congress approved June 7, 1924, and Post Office and Communi­ Mountain, 80 miles to the east, and February 25, 1928. Under the former to the Kaibab Plateau and the Trum­ cation Service 13 act, authority was given for the creation bull Mountains to the south, the latter of the Utah National Park, to take in 1928 Bryce Canyon National Park formally Miscellaneous Services ... 13 99 miles distant. the area then included in the Bryce created by Presidential proclamation. In reality Bryce is not a canyon; Canyon National Monument, condition­ Cedar Breaks National Act of Congress changed name from rather it is a great horseshoe-shaped ed upon the transfer of all private Monument 15 Utah National Park to Bryce Canyon. bowl or amphitheater cut by water ero­ land holdings within the proposed park sion into the Paunsaugunt Plateau and boundaries to the Federal Government. 2 Bryce Canyon National Bar\ . Utah Bryce Canyon National Part\ . Utah 3 Before these conditions were met Con­ exposed that the region seems made up gress passed its 1928 act changing the of gorges, cliffs, and mesas intimately name of the park to Bryce Canyon Na­ associated with a marvelous variety of tional Park and nearly doubling the minor erosion forms. The parks might area contained in the monument. The be considered as mountainous regions canyon had been reserved as the Bryce in which departures of many thousand Canyon National Monument by Presi­ feet from a general surface are down­ dential proclamation June 8, 1923, ward rather than upward. pending consideration for national-park The canyons and adjoining terraces status and the passing of the necessary are spectacular illustrations of erosion. legislation to effect this. Under con­ They show with diagrammatic clear­ gressional authority of June 15, 1930, ness the work of running water, rain, President Hoover by proclamations frost, and wind, of ground water and dated January 5, 1931, and May 4, chemical agencies active throughout a 1931, added 22,320 acres to the park. long period of time. The horizontal The total area is now 35,980 acres, tables and benches, broken by vertical or 56 square miles. lines that in distant view appear to GENERAL INFORMATION RE­ dominate the landscape, are normal LATING TO GEOLOGY OF ZION features of erosion of plateau lands in AND BRYCE CANYON NA­ an arid climate. The tabular forms TIONAL PARKS1 are the edges and surfaces of hard strata from which softer layers have been RECIONAL FEATURES.—In Zion and stripped. The vertical lines mark the Bryce Canyon National Parks the type position of fractures (joints)—lines of of scenery peculiar to the plateaus of weakness which erosion enlarges into southern Utah and northern Arizona grooves and miniature canyons. As they attains its most complete expression. entrench themselves in horizontal lay­ Layer upon layer of shales and sand­ ers of rock that vary in resistance to stones have been carved into architec­ erosion, the master streams and their tural forms, astonishingly alike for size tributaries are developing stairlike pro­ and color. The long stretches of even files on their enclosing walls. Cliffs skyline seen on approaching the parks in resistant rocks and slopes in weak from Cedar City (west), Panguitch rock constitute risers and treads that (north), and Grand Canyon (south) vary in steepness and height with the give an impression of extensive flat thickness of the strata involved. Thus surfaces that terminate in lines of cliffs, near the south entrance to Zion Park but viewpoints within the parks reveal the edge of a layer of hard conglomer­ a ruggedness possessed by few other ate is a vertical cliff, its top a platform. regions. The canyons are so narrow, Above this platform a long slope of so deep, and so thickly interlaced, and shales, broken by many benches de­ the edges of the strata so continuously veloped in hard beds, extends upward to the great cliff faces of West Temple 1 Condensed from an article by H. E. Gregory, Grant photo U. S. Geological Survey. and the Watchman. In front of Zion LIBERTY CASTLE AND WINDOW FROM PEEK-A-BOO CANYON. 4 Bryce Canyon National Part\ . Utah Bryce Canyon National Part\ . Utah 5 Lodge a slope of weak shales leads up­ the extensive areas of bare rock are begins. The rocks exposed in these rectangular blocks by north-south frac­ ward to a cliff of resistant sandstone maintained by the rapid down-cutting three national parks incorporate the tures or faults. Three of these great above which a slope of shale extends and prompt removal of rock waste. The records of a billion years. faults can be seen in the vicinity of the to the vertical wall of Lady Mountain. resulting land forms reflect the aridity A study of the rocks of Zion and parks: the Hurricane fault in the Hurri­ In Bryce Canyon the rim road is on and the topographic youth of southern Bryce Canyon shows that during the cane Cliffs, west of Zion; the Paun- the highest tread of a giant rock stair­ Utah and contrast strongly with the last 200,000,000 years the region com­ saugunt fault in the cliffs of Bryce; way that as viewed from Rainbow rounded hills, the broad valleys, the prising the parks has witnessed many and the Sevier fault along the Mount Point leads downward in steps 30 to plant-covered slopes, and the deep soils changes in landscape and climate. At Carmel Road between the two parks. 400 feet high to the flat lands 3,000 feet of more humid regions. times it was covered by the sea, at other In consequence of the uplift the third below. GEOLOGIC HISTORY.—A large part of times broad rivers traversed its surface, major event, the present cycle of ero­ The streams at work in the parks, geologic history is revealed in the can­ and at still other times it was swept by sion, was initiated. The streams became though relatively small, have steep yon walls of Zion and Bryce Canyon desert winds. Most of the rocks were strong and swift and so were able to gradients, including rapids and water­ National Parks. Just as Grand Canyon laid down by water as gravel, sand, cut deeply into the underlying rock falls, and are supplied with disinte­ is the best known record of ancient mud, and limy ooze. They have been and carry away the land waste. In this grated rock material swept from the geologic history, Zion Canyon records converted into solid rock by the weight process the streams have removed many ledges by torrential rains about as fast most clearly the events of medieval of layers above them and by lime, cubic miles of rocks which if replaced as formed. They are therefore powerful geological time, and Bryce reveals much silica, and the iron that cement their would fill the present canyons and agents of erosion, especially in times of of modern geologic history. The story grains. Embedded in the rocks are build up their bordering land to the flood.