The canyon before you was once traversed by Native Americans making their way from camps on the bluffs where they prepared grass seeds for flour. At the Snake River's Salmon Falls, about one-half mile behind you, they fished with traps, hooks, and . . . — — Map (db m139607) HM
Idaho was a very different place during the Pliocene Epoch (three to four million years ago). Like much of the planet, this area was warmer and more humid, with annual rain fall of 20 inches. Studies of ancient pollen found in the sand and clay . . . — — Map (db m139552) HM
Can you find traces of the three ancient lakes that helped form Hagerman Valley and preserved the fossils found here? The first, known as Lake Idaho, covered most of present-day southwestern Idaho about three to eight million years ago. Over time, . . . — — Map (db m139556) HM
Two related panels are found at the monument:
Between the close of the Civil War and the end of World War I the sheep industry played a major role in southern Idaho history. During the Civil War, precious metals were discovered in the . . . — — Map (db m139615) HM
Malad History
If eating food somewhere made you sick, how would you warn others of the danger? Fur trappers and traders named the Malad River the Riviere Aux Malad, or “sickly river,” after becoming hill from eating beaver . . . — — Map (db m71603) HM
It is ... our manifest destiny to overspread and to possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of liberty." John L. O'Sullivan, columnist, New York Morning News, . . . — — Map (db m139613) HM
A trained eye, persistence - and a good deal of luck - often lead paleontologist to new fossil discoveries.
New fossil localities are discovered every year. Currently Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument monitors over 600 fossil bearing . . . — — Map (db m139609) HM
The rock layers in the bluff across the river are made of sediments - particles of sand, silt, and clay. These layers, called strata, were carried here by the ancient Snake River and were deposited as the river entered an ancient lake. This process . . . — — Map (db m139554) HM
Never in history had so many moved voluntarily over such a distance. Look at the wagon wheel ruts in front of you. During the Great Western Migration more than 400,000 people packed up their goods and dreams and headed out over wagon roads like . . . — — Map (db m139608) HM
The features before you testify to a fiery volcanic past. Distant hills, called buttes, are actually "shield" volcanoes. Named for their shape, these shield volcanoes formed when lava flowed from cracks, or vents, in the earth's crust. Over the past . . . — — Map (db m139611) HM
Step back in time, three to four million years, and imagine a place were zebra-like horses, ground sloths, mastodons, and other amazing creatures roamed. Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument is filled with fossil evidence of their existence in . . . — — Map (db m139551) HM
When John C. Fremont came this way mapping emigrant roads in 1843, he found an important Indian village at Fishing Falls (Kanaka rapids) about 4 miles above here. He reported that native salmon spearers there were "unusually gay...fond of laughter; . . . — — Map (db m31652) HM
A scow powered by oarsmen let Oregon Trail wagons cross Snake River here from 1852 to 1870. Then Overland Stage service from Boise to a rail terminal in Kelton, Utah was moved to this crossing, and M.E. Payne installed a large (14 by 60 foot) new . . . — — Map (db m31653) HM
In 1812, Joseph Miller found 100 lodges of Indians spearing thousands of salmon each afternoon at a cascade below here. Each summer they dried a year's supply. After 1842, they also traded salmon to Oregon Trail emigrants. John C. Fremont marveled . . . — — Map (db m31597) HM
Old lava flow changed the geologic structure of this area and thus created a multitude of famous springs here. Over thousands of years, volcanic activity repeatedly spread lava over the Snake River plain, slowly forcing the river southward in a . . . — — Map (db m31595) HM
