Your National Parks, with Detailed Information for Tourists
John Stuart Mill · en
Lack of an appropriation for the care and protection of the Park makes
it necessary (1917) for the Superintendent of the Government
Industrial School for Indians, which is about one mile east of Fort
Totten, to act as Superintendent of the Park. It is badly in need of
conveniences--as roads, trails, clearings, etc. Although money has
been appropriated for the establishment and maintenance of a game
preserve on the tract, not a cent has ever been set aside for
development and improvement.
It is well wooded and has many rugged hills, including Sully's Hill.
Another of its natural beauties is Sweet Water Lake. The Park is
popular as a picnic-ground and Devil's Lake affords a good
bathing-beach and fine opportunities for yachting. It is one of the
beauty-spots of North Dakota, and its scenery is of the restful and
delightful character.
3. CASA GRANDE RUIN RESERVATION
The most important prehistoric Indian ruin of its type in the
Southwest is now protected and preserved, for the study and enjoyment
of the people, in the Casa Grande Ruin Reservation. This contains four
hundred and eighty acres, set aside in 1892. It is near Florence,
Arizona, about eighteen miles northeast of Casa Grande railroad
station. The ruins are of undetermined antiquity. A Jesuit missionary
discovered them in 1694. As excavated so far, a great house built of
puddled mud moulded into walls and dried in the sun is the main
structure of the group. As it is of perishable character, the walls
have been gradually disintegrating, and a corrugated iron roof has
been put over the ruins to protect them from the elements so far as
possible. Considerable more repair and protection work is needed.
The main building was originally five or six stories in height and
covered a space fifty-nine by forty-three feet. Surrounding Casa
Grande proper is a rectangular walled inclosure. A number of buildings
or clusters of rooms have been excavated in this, and others as yet
unexcavated are known to be there. One hundred rooms with plazas and
surrounding walls now open on the ground floor of the reservation.
These ruins are of great historic and scientific interest, and have
strong claims for archæological study, repair, and preservation.
4. HOT SPRINGS RESERVATION
Although the Yellowstone was our first scenic National Park, the honor
of being the oldest national recreation place falls to the Hot
Springs Reservation, in the mountains of central Arkansas. It was
created in 1832. Forty-six springs of hot water possessing radioactive
properties, and also some cold-water springs of curative value, are
embraced within the tract of nine hundred and twelve acres, fifty
miles west by south from the city of Little Rock. The waters flow from
the sides of Hot Springs Mountain. Rheumatism and other bodily ills
are relieved or remedied by the waters. Eleven bathhouses on the
reservation, and a dozen more within the little city of Hot Springs,
are under government regulation.