Why You Should Visit Devils Tower
By Arjay Ruotolo, Iowa Trails Field Crew Member/ AmeriCorps Member
In the Black Hills of Crook County, Wyoming resides the geologic monolith Devils Tower. Like us, the Tower is known by many names such as Bear Lodge, Mato Tiplia, or Bear’s Tipi. Driving in from the rolling plains of central Iowa, the 800-foot National Monument captured our eyes as our beacon of arrival. The Iowa Trails crew partnered up with the NPS crew to tackle an eight day long project dealing with invasive weeds scattered throughout the park. I was hesitant at first to embark on such a long, enduring project, but I was willing and wanting to experience something I hadn’t seen before.
After a ten hour drive, counting up to be a 12+ hour day, we were ready to rest weary heads on the rocky soil at the park’s campsite. With the sun sinking into the horizon, all of us tried to drive our tent stakes into the ground, feeling the resistance of the metal against rocks in the soil. Most of my stakes sat shallowly in favor of sleep.
From our campsite, the South face of Devils Tower stood proudly in the landscape. It’s made up of igneous rock, a crystalline phonolite porphyry, that separates into thick, vertical columns and grooves that crawl up and down the Tower. When the sun rises or falls in the campsites, a reddish orange glow reflects on the tannish-toned Tower. At night, the sky is lit with millions of stars, a glittering touch added to the glory of it all. At any time of day, the Tower coronates the red, sedimentary hills it sits atop of; a glorious crown of cooled magma, solidified into a geologic wonder.
The Trails crew quickly warmed up to the project—in large part due to the magnificence of Devils Tower. I, having never heard or seen it before, was amazed at what could grow from the Earth. Although studies are inconclusive to how and when the Tower was formed, the general consensus says the laccolith, a mass of igneous rock that intrudes in between rock strata in a dome shape, likely intruded anywhere from 145 to 66 million years ago during the late Cretaceous period. I felt like I was standing on land woven with great significance to geologic and anthropologic histories. And there I was, burning my hands cooking spaghetti over a camp stove, listening to prairie dogs yip next door, creating memories in the shadows of the Tower.
Oral histories of Indigenous peoples contribute to this story, adding texture and cultural meaning to the National Monument. Depending on the nation or tribe, the story of the Tower’s creation varies. The Kiowa say bears chased seven little girls who leapt onto a low rock and prayed for the rock to save them. Hearing their pleas, the rock grew towards the sky, but the bears kept scratching after them, creating the grooves that mark the Tower today. The bears’ claws broke but didn’t give up, so the rock kept growing higher leaving the girls in the sky as the Pleiades stars or Seven Sisters. That cluster of stars in the Taurus constellation shone in the night sky as I watched the bolts of lightning in the distance one stormy evening at camp.
One long, sunny day, I found myself crawling along next to Devils Tower, spraying weeds as I went. I stopped and looked out at the scenery before me for a moment. Nothing would ever be the same as that when I looked upon the landscape, decked head to toe in protective equipment, two gallons of herbicide on my back, sweat clogging every pore on my body. Despite the discomfort, I remember vividly the awe. I wonder, now, how many others stood on that same spot at the Tower. Rock climbers enjoying the view; scientists looking curiously at something beneath my feet; folks tying prayer clothes to the pine trees nearby. How many vultures flew by and basked in the splendor. How many summers brought flowers that would come and go. How many rocks tumbled by the spot I stood. Who will stand there after me, at the base of the Tower beneath the sun?
