My family and I went to Devils Tower, in Wyoming, on July 8, 2019. Devils Tower is a butte composed of igneous rock and is a national monument in Crook County Wyoming.
The tower has had multiple names, but currently, it’s called Devils Tower, which came from scientists in the 1800s. Native American names for the monolith include: “Bear’s House”, “Bear’s Lodge”, “Bear’s Tipi”, “Home of the Bear”, and “Bear’s Lair”. Cheyenne, Lakota, Crow, and Kiowa tribes have named it “Home of Bears”, “Aloft on a Rock”, “Tree Rock”, “Great Gray Horn”, and “Brown Buffalo Horn”.
If you go to Devils Tower, you should make sure to see the Sacred Sculpture of Smoke, and if you stand right in front of it, the sculpture perfectly frames the tower.
The Devils Tower’s summit is 5,112 feet above sea level. The tower is formed of a rare igneous rock, phonolite porphyry, and is the biggest example of columnar jointing in the world.
Devils Tower was the first national monument of the United States of America. In 1906 President Theodore Roosevelt brought national attention to Devils Tower by using the authority of the Antiquities Act.
The main animal to see at Devils Tower is the black-tailed prairie dogs that make their homes underground.
The first people to climb to the top were two local cowboys who built a wooden ladder on the side of the tower and parts of it still remain on that side of the tower.
This is the trailhead of tower trail its the most popular hike in the park. It’s a paved 1.3 mile loop around the tower. It goes through the ponderosa pine forest and the boulder field.
This is the trailhead of tower trail its the most popular hike in the park. It’s a paved 1.3 mile loop around the tower. It goes through the ponderosa pine forest and the boulder field.
This is a picture from an overlook on tower trail. It overlooks a valley and you can see the ponderosa pines.
There was an avid climber, Fritz Wiessner, who used to use climbing gear to climb up the tower. He became used to climbing up it with gear, so he attempted to free climb without any gear. He made it to the top. He was the first one to free climb devils tower and make it to the top in 1937.
My family and I have flown over Devils Tower before, and at that time we didn’t know what it was, but now when we fly over it, we remember all the fun memories we had there. My family and I have been to several national monuments, but if Devils Tower never became a national monument, then we wouldn’t have any of the other national monuments that we have today.
Morelands On The Loose 