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But all this is recent history. Take a brief look at the amazing past of Yellowstone. Millions of years ago, the present high plateau was a parched, arid plain sheltered behind the buttresses of the continent’s two great mountain ranges—Appalachia in the East and Cascadia in the West. Slowly, the land sank and Yellowstone was buried a hundred fathoms deep under the arctic waters of the Sundance Sea. As the invading waters retreated, a shift in temperature changed Yellowstone into a huge subtropical marsh where giant dinosaurs drowsed and fed in the green half-light that filtered down through jungle trees.

The next great geologic change saw Yellowstone thrust skyward by the slow buckling of earth’s crust ... scorched and shaken by a million years of volcanic activity ... covered by a vast sea of molten rhyolite. The hot lava slowly cooled and was in turn engulfed by creeping rivers of blue-green glacial ice.

As this new ice age withdrew, countless sediment-bearing streams roared down from the melting glaciers and, aided by the bitter winds of high places, began carving Yellowstone into its present form.

The Cathedrals are natural Gothic spires of hard stone that resisted erosion by the river when it carved the deep gorge of Gallatin Canyon. These formations are especially beautiful under a Montana moon.

Even today, Yellowstone is a “young” land that is undergoing relatively rapid changes. The subterranean heat that causes its geyser activity is slowly subsiding.

Old geysers die out and new ones grow in power and regularity. Imperceptibly, the canyons deepen, and erosion carves new patterns on rocky walls.

This is the land ... rich in forests and wild life, and gemmed with sparkling mountain lakes ... that has been set aside for the perpetual enjoyment of our people. This is Yellowstone, oldest and greatest of America’s National Parks.

Your trip to Yellowstone via The Milwaukee Road takes you through the most spectacular of all entrances—Gallatin Gateway.

You leave the train at Three Forks, Montana, on the main transcontinental line of The Milwaukee Road. Just outside of town the Gallatin, Madison and Jefferson rivers flow together to form the headwaters of the mighty Missouri.

Lewis and Clark’s expedition camped here in 1805 on their way to the Pacific Northwest. There is a bronze tablet in the town park dedicated to Sacajawea, the Indian girl who guided the explorers. Three Forks was established as a trading post for the Missouri Fur Company in 1810.

Pale shades of gray, buff, yellow and orange-red give rich color to the face of Sheep Mountain in Gallatin Canyon. Dark conifers cling to the lower slopes.

Leaving the train, you board a motor coach for a delightful drive of a little over an hour to Gallatin Gateway Inn.

Accurately carved by a strange quirk of nature, Pulpit Rock towers high above the Gallatin Valley. Formations of this kind are not too unusual, and result when a core of hard rock is surrounded by softer material.

Yellowstone-bound, a Park motor coach starts up the Gallatin Valley with Castle Rock in the background. The comfortable buses have roll-back tops that permit full views of the surrounding rocky walls.

Riverside Geyser is an irregular performer that sends its plume-like jet diagonally out over the Firehole River. Higher up, the Firehole is a good fishing stream, but here its waters are strongly charged with minerals from the geysers and hot springs.

A bus load of visitors has stopped for a look at Old Faithful shooting its mighty column skyward.

The Ranger at the far right indicates one of the hundreds of tinted pools that dot the geyser basins.

First Stop ... Geyserland

One of the chief attractions of entering Yellowstone via Gallatin Gateway is the 80 mile motor trip through glorious mountain country that you enjoy without extra charge.

Promptly after lunch, you leave Gallatin Gateway Inn in one of the luxurious motor coaches of the Yellowstone Park Company and begin the trip southward.

In a short time you enter spectacular Gallatin Canyon. Just beyond Roaring Creek lie the huge, eroded battlements of Castle and Cathedral Rocks, majestic cliffs that dwarf the tiny river flowing swiftly at their base. This is the famed Montana dude ranch country, and you glimpse many of the ranches in the innumerable little valleys that are tributary to the Gallatin.

You’ll see Sagebrush Point where the Gallatin flows in a graceful S-curve hundreds of feet below the road ... the broad cone of Lone Mountain rising to a height of ten thousand feet and Pulpit Rock, oddly and accurately carved by some freak of Nature.