In 1906 Congress established Mesa Verde National Park, the first to expand the parks concept beyond exclusively preserving scenic natural wonders (like Yellowstone), to include the “works of man.” In 1888 the Wetherills, a local ranching family, stumbled upon magnificent and mysterious cliff dwellings perched in caves up Mesa Verde’s canyon walls. Throughout the 1890s [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Mesa Verde NP’
Far View
Posted in Colorado, Four Corners, Parks & Monuments, Western Photography, Western Travel Writing, tagged Ancestral Puebloan Ruins, Ancestral Puebloans, Cliff Palace, Far View, Mesa Verde NP, SW Anthropology on December 7, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Winter’s Closing In
Posted in Colorado, Four Corners, Parks & Monuments, Western Travel Writing, tagged Ancestral Puebloan Ruins, Cliff Palace, Mesa Verde NP, Spruce Tree House on October 30, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
This afternoon it is snowing here in Albuquerque. It’s at least an inch deep in my backyard. Just after 3:00 pm, it’s 27°. This is not standard end-of-October weather. Today’s average temperature is 65°. Yesterday, I sat in front of our first-of-the-season fire, reading up on Mesa Verde in southwestern Colorado, where we’d taken a [...]
Where Have All the Aspens Gone?
Posted in Colorado, Environment, Four Corners, Natural History, Parks & Monuments, Western Photography, Western Travel Writing, tagged Ancestral Puebloan Ruins, Climate Change, Copenhagen Climate Meeting, Mesa Verde NP, Politics on October 26, 2009 | 1 Comment »
Last week we visited Mesa Verde in Southwestern Colorado. The homeplace to thousands of Ancestral Puebloans for 600 years, the mesatop stone cities and cliff palaces carved into canyon cliff walls were abandoned over the course of the final quarter of the 13th century. Why did they leave? A question with too many answers—extended drought, [...]
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