How did such a magnificent viewpoint get such a macabre name? Dead Horse Point was named for a sad but colorful legend concerning a band of wild horses that once roamed the high mesas. The point is really an embryo island separated from the mainland by a narrow neck barely wide enough for the present road. In the early cowboy days the island was used as a natural corral in which wild mustangs were penned up behind a short fence across the neck so that the better ones could be sorted out and driven to mines in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado. A band of horses corralled too long without water allegedly died of thirst within sight of the river 2,000 feet below, hence the name of the point, or at least so one version of the story goes. Some versions allude to the wranglers as cowboys; others, as horsethieves.
To the northeast we can see the Cane Creek anticline—an upward fold of the rocks—behind which loom the La Sal Mountains ([fig. 13]). A cutaway view of a typical anticline is shown in [figure 14]. A better view of the Cane Creek anticline can be seen from Anticline Overlook, as shown in [figure 31]. From our vantage point at Dead Horse Point, we can see much of Hatch Point, including Anticline Overlook, by looking east and southeast. Spectacular views of the northern part of Canyonlands National Park lie to the south, southwest, and east. Looking southwest ([fig. 15]), we see most of the rock formations exposed in Canyonlands—more than can be seen from any other vantage point in or near the park. The names of the visible rock units shown in [figure 15] can be compared with the complete list in the rock column ([fig. 9]). Parts of Shafer dome, a “closed” rounded anticline, are visible in the lower left of [figure 15] and in the lower right of [figure 13]. Its general domelike shape is outlined by the bluish-white Shafer limestone, a marker bed which also caps the bench on the peninsula within the Goose Neck of the river. This limestone, which here forms the top of the Rico Formation, is not shown in the rock column ([fig. 9]) because its exposure is limited to the Shafer dome and the Cane Creek anticline and its name is used only locally by prospectors for oil and gas.
CUTAWAY VIEW OF ANTICLINE, or upfold of the rocks. From Hansen (1969, p. 31). (Fig. 14)
LOOKING SOUTHWEST FROM DEAD HORSE POINT toward Island in the Sky on right skyline, Orange Cliffs on left skyline, Colorado River and White Rim Trail below, and Shafer dome at lower left. Sketch from photograph shows names of rocks. (Compare with [fig. 9].) (Fig. 15)
Note that the White Rim Sandstone Member of the Cutler Formation, referred to hereinafter simply as the White Rim Sandstone, becomes thinner toward the right (northeast) in [figure 15] but is absent entirely in [figure 13], just a short distance to the northeast. The gradual disappearance of recognizable beds of this type toward the northeast, including the disappearance of some limestone beds containing marine fossils, are examples of what geologists call facies changes. Here the changes result from the fact that while strata were being deposited in or near ancient seas that lay to the southwest, beds of different character were being laid down on land by streams emanating from the northeast. This will be gone into in more detail in discussions that accompany illustrations to follow, particularly [figure 27], [fig. 31], and [fig. 35].
NORTH ENTRANCE
The north entrance to the Island in the Sky district of Canyonlands National Park used to be 6 miles south of the junction with the paved road to Dead Horse Point, but since the land additions of November 1971, it is only 4½ miles south of this junction. A temporary trailer-housed entrance station marks the old boundary.