The Geologic Story of Canyonlands National Park

LOOKING NORTH FROM EAST WALL OF DEVILS LANE, just south of the Silver Stairs. Needles are Cedar Mesa Sandstone. Junction Butte and Grand View Point lie across Colorado River in background.
By S. W. Lohman Graphics by John R. Stacy
GEOLOGICAL SURVEY BULLETIN 1327
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR ROGERS C. B. MORTON, Secretary
GEOLOGICAL SURVEY V. E. McKelvey, Director
Library of Congress catalog-card No. 74-600043
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1974
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Washington, D.C. 20402—Price $2.65 (paper covers) Stock Number 2401-02498
On September 12, 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed an act of Congress establishing Canyonlands as our thirty-second national park, the first addition to the park system since 1956.
The birth of Canyonlands National Park was not without labor pains. In the 1930’s virtually all the vast canyon country between Moab, Utah, and Grand Canyon, Ariz., was studied for a projected Escalante National Park. But Escalante failed to get off the ground, even when a second attempt was made in the 1950’s. Not until another proposal had been made and legislative compromises had been worked out did the park materialize, this time under a new name—Canyonlands. Among the many dignitaries who witnessed the signature on September 12 was one of the men most responsible for the park’s creation, park superintendent Bates E. Wilson, who did the pioneer spade work in the field.
At this writing (1973) the park is still in its infancy, with most of the planned developments and improvements awaiting time and money, but a good start has been made. In 1960 my family and I first traversed Island in the Sky to Grand View Point over a rough jeep trail; now it is reached with ease over a good graded road which eventually will be paved. A temporary trailer-housed entrance station near The Neck will be replaced by permanent headquarters for the Island in the Sky district after water is piped up from wells drilled near the mouth of Taylor Canyon.