86 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TERRITORIES. 



EEPOET OF N. P. LANGFORD ON THE RESOURCES OF 



SNAKE RIVER VALLEY. 



Dear Sir: In con){)liai)ce with your request, I lierewitb submit for 

 your use n couuected rei)Oit of tlio ouscrviitions I Mas enabled to make 

 while aecoiupanyiiig" that ])ortiou of the geoloi;ical survey uuder the 

 superintendence of Mr. James Stevenson, from Fort Hall, Idaho, to the 

 Geyser Basin, Fire-Hole River, and theuee down the Yellowstone and 

 on to the Three Forks of the jMissouri. The only knowledge' that could 

 be obtained of the country through which we were to pass was derived 

 from old trappers, and such accounts as, upon the faith of his informants, 

 Mr. Irving had incori)orated in his interesting volumes of Astoria and 

 Bonneville's Adventures, neither of them very flattering ])ictures. 



One grand object of the survey, next to a topographical description 

 of the country, was to ascertain its adaptability for wagon-road and 

 railroad improvements and its industrial resources. If it could be made 

 accessible by these means, it would present a new, practicable, and 

 much shorter route for travel from the Union and Central Pacific Rail- 

 roads to the settled portions of Montana Territory and to the great 

 wonders of the Upper Yellowstone ; and it was especially with a view 

 to determine this question that I noted the general appearance and 

 character of the country. 



To any one who has ever read iu the writings of Mr. Irving the 

 various descriptions of the Upper Valley of Snake River, the idea of 

 penetrating it by a railroad would seem ludicrous in the extreme ; but 

 in these days, when railroads go everywhere that civilization goes, we 

 may venture the conlident assertion that the day is not far distant 

 when the obstructions of this hitherto unpromising region will be wholly 

 subdued by them. 



On that*^ part of our route lying between Fort Hall and the North 

 Fork of Snake River, the country is in a great measure barren, being, 

 for most of the distance, a sandy plain. There are a few rocky eminen- 

 ces between Snake River Bridge and the North Fork of the river ; none, 

 however, which would require a grade of over 50 feet to the mile or 

 any great deviation from an air-line. Any road along this part of the 

 route would follow the general course of the river, crossing its mean- 

 ders, which are neither numerous nor large. Much of the Upper Valley 

 of Snake River presents on either shore a level table of trap-rock, 

 which could be utilized as a road-bed with great advantage. The most 

 difficult part of the entire route, as I conceive, would be between 

 Market Lake and the mouth of the North Fork. Our party deflected on 

 this route from a direct course of travel so as to visit the Three Tetons, 

 the famous mountain land-marks of Snake River Valley. This journey 

 took us some twenty-two miles out of our course. Soon after crossing 

 the North Fork, we' began to meet with evidences of a more promising 

 country. Bunch- grass was found in the richest prolusion, and after a 

 few days' travel we entered the Teton Basin, which lay spread out 

 before us like the land which Lot saw when he parted from Abraham. 

 This basin is more than eight hundred square miles in extent, is cov- 

 ered vrith i)erennial grasses, well watered by large streams fringed with 

 an abumlant growth of cottonwood, furnishing sufiicient timber for all 

 the practical purposes of life, while the adjacent mountains are covered 

 with tall pines, furnishing the finest timber in the world. The soil, 



