Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
explosions—2.1 million, 1.3 million, and 640,000 years ago—spewed gases and hot ash
across North America. Some experts suggest the most recent blast alone was more than
10,000 times larger than the well-known 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington.
Geothermal forces are still at work underneath Yellowstone's surface, giving the park its
trademark geysers, hot springs, fumaroles, and mud pots, making it the earth's most active
geothermal area.
Wyoming is also a hotbed for dinosaur fossils. A fossil of a giant
Allosaurus
—among
the first meat-eating dinosaurs—was found in 1991, providing valuable insight into this
carnivore that roamed the earth during the Jurassic period 130-190 million years ago. The
excellent Wyoming Dinosaur Museum (
www.wyodino.org
) in Thermopolis features more
than 200 displays and more than 30 mounted skeletons of various dinosaurs. Fossils of fish,
insects, birds, plants, and reptiles are on display at the Fossil Butte National Monument,
a 50-million-year-old lake bed near Kemmerer that holds the largest deposit of freshwater
fish fossils in the western hemisphere.
By most accounts, humans have inhabited what is now Wyoming for at least 13,000
years. Stone fossils have been found that indicate the presence of early human cultures, in-
cluding the Plano, a tribe of hunter-gatherers that inhabited the Great Plains 9,000-6,000
BC. There is also evidence of the Clovis culture, people that lived in the area nearly 13,000
years ago. Their distinctive bone and ivory “Clovis points” have been found in both Wyom-
ing and Montana.
An interesting discovery in Wyoming was the Bighorn Medicine Wheel in the north-
central part of the state. This giant stone ring was sacred to indigenous people and is be-
lieved to have been used for astronomical, teaching, and healing purposes. Constructed
between 900 and 700 years ago, the Bighorn wheel is 80 feet in diameter and is one of the
best-preserved stone rings in the world.
Native Americans and Mountain Men
As in Montana, Plains Indians didn't move into the area until the early 1600s, when Native
Americans around the Great Lakes and Canadian plains were forced west. The arrival of
horses and rifles created nomadic hunters who followed the massive herds of buffalo, and
the culture began to change as villages grew larger and tribes had more interaction. Indian
society grew more turbulent by the 19th century, and it was soon greeted by early American
explorers who sought control of the state's vast geographic and natural resources.
Although French explorers crossed into northern Wyoming in the mid-1700s, two of the
most famous names in Wyoming's early history are John Colter and Jim Bridger. Colter,
