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The 1959 Yellowstone Earthquake
“The Roar Sounded Like the End of the World.” – S.B. Gilstad
In Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming-Montana-Idaho, where i have lived and worked for more than thirty-five years, the 1959 earthquake is still remembered and revered by park employees and many visitors as a major event in both cultural history and natural history. With its epicenter on Grayling Creek just inside to the northwest boundary of the park, “the 7.5 quake – still the largest ever recorded in the Rocky Mountains – struck at 11:37 p.m. and sent 80 million tons of rock thundering down on a campground filled with…men, women, and children.” – Lee H. Whittlesey
Description
The 1959 Yellowstone Earthquake
At 11:37 p.m. on August 17, 1959, a magnitude 7.5 earthquake rocked Montana’s Yellowstone country. In an instant, an entire mountainside fractured and thundered down onto the sites of unsuspecting campers. The mammoth avalanche generated hurricane-force winds ahead of it that ripped clothing from backs and heaved tidal waves in both directions of the Madison River Canyon. More than two hundred vacationers trapped in the canyon feared the dam upstream would burst. As debris and flooding overwhelmed the river, injured victims frantically searched the darkness for friends and family. Acclaimed historian Larry Morris tells the gripping minute-by-minute saga of the survivors who endured the interminable night, the first responders who risked their lives and the families who waited days and weeks for word of their missing loved ones.
ISBN: 978-1-46711-96-2
191 Pages
Softback
6″ x 9″
The History Press, 2016