At the beginning of this mighty uplifting the region of the Black Hills was covered by the various layers of sedimentary deposits to a depth of nearly two miles. Slowly this rectangular area was lifted as a dome over the surrounding prairies. We do not know how high above the level lands this dome reached, but we do know that several thousand feet of later deposits overcapped the granite upthrusts which were planted in the fundamental shales. Those granite fingers, which have now been exposed to view, stand from five hundred to four thousand feet above the plains, and thus the original dome may be assumed to have extended from eight to ten thousand feet above our present-day sea level. Almost as soon as this era of upheaval first started, as soon as the first land of the Black Hills was elevated above the great sea, the forces of erosion set to work. Wind and rain worked their terrifying magic on the slowly rising terrain, carving away the softer rocks and the loose dirt and leaving only the granite outcroppings. Down from the sides of the great dome poured the waters of melting snows, gushing springs, and torrential rainfalls, digging out rivers, canyons, and the deep and narrow cuts which characterize this beautiful region. Slowly the land continued to rise and the oceans to fall until at last an equilibrium was reached, a static state of affairs which remained much the same until our own period, when the base of the dome was at last revealed, with the surrounding lands drifting away in every direction on a gentle incline. From that day the structure of the Black Hills has changed but little. The high winds off the Dakota plains and the annual spring run-off and seasonal rains cut their minute etchings in the landscape; but Nature’s greatest effort in the Black Hills part of the world has, it seems, been made. It must be remembered, though, that Nature has had other responsibilities. At the time of the doming of the Black Hills the Alps had not yet been formed, nor the Pyrenees, nor the Caucasus. And on the site of the mountains we know today as the sky-piercing Himalayas, the swampy waters still moldered. CHAPTER THREE The Hills Today It is this writer’s personal opinion that no other resort area in the United States possesses such a wealth of tourist attractions as the Black Hills. This profusion of happy endowments can be separated into three categories, each of which deserves individual study and enjoyment. Two of these, the region’s folklore and its memories of the gold rush, belong to the amazing history of the Hills. But of course the visible landscape and the natural wonders of the area are the primary objects of the tourist’s visits, and it is proper that they be considered immediately and in detail. _Wind Cave_