94 PUBLIC PARKS OF IOWA 



THE PALISADES SHOULD BE A STATE PARK. 

 By James H. Lees, Geologist. 



Of all the beautiful places in Iowa which may claim the attention of 

 the conservationists few are entitled to a larger share than the Pali- 

 sades of the Cedar river. Rising sheer from the water's depth, decked 

 with the everlasting green of the conifers which find root and resting 

 place upon their perpendicular faces, they offer a never ending delight 

 to all the aesthetic senses as well by their massive dignity and majesty 

 as by the peaceful beauties of the scene of which they form so con- 

 spicuous a part. For a space of two miles or thereabouts these rugged 

 rock walls border the river, in the upper part of their extent chiefly 

 on the east bank, in the lower part largely on the opposite side. The 

 Palisades have always enjoyed a just popularity, with the country folk 

 round about as well as with the people of the nearby towns, Cedar 

 Rapids, Mount Vernon and others, and the building of the interurban 

 railway between Lisbon and Cedar Rapids, with its Palisade station only 

 about a mile from the Upper Palisades, has increased this popularity in a 

 degree commensurate with the increased ease of access. 



The Palisades are cut in limestone and dolomite of Silurian age, 

 and the rough, rather coarse texture of the rock lends itself admirably 

 to the handiwork of nature in carving out the massive, irregular walls 

 which form the river gorge at this point. Bedding planes are almost 

 absent and the entire face seems to be a solid, homogeneous escarp- 

 ment, broken only by a cavern here and there or by minor etchings of 

 the graving tools of time. Probably this homogeneity has been an im- 

 portant factor (in preserving the Palisades from destruction or burial by 

 the breaking down of masses of rock which would tend to conceal the 

 bases, at least, of the vertical walls. Instead of this in many and in- 

 deed in most parts of their extent the Palisades rise directly out of 

 the water, above which they stand at heights of thirty, fifty and as much 

 as eighty feet. The Palisades are not continuous walls but are broken 

 here and there by lateral ravines which have been cut by wet weather 

 streamlets rising in the uplands and the h-ill country above the river 

 valley. These ravines and gullies afford means of easy approach to the 

 river and some of the larger have been utilized as building sites for some 

 of the numerous summer cottages which dot the banks on either side 

 of the river. Opposite the Upper Palisades and across the river, there 

 is a low flood plain backed by fairly gemtly rising hills. Across the 

 stream from the Lower Palisades a narrow rock platform stands rather 

 high above the water and behind it rise the hills, either as smooth slopes 

 or broken by low brown walls of jutting rock. To the south this platform 

 descends to a low flat. In places it is absent and the cottages here 

 are built on the high slope which breaks off abruptly at the summit 

 of the vertical river wall. 



Much of the country adjacent to the Palisades is still timber cov- 

 ered, although of course little or none of it is primitive forest. A good 

 deal of cutting is being carried on and as it is safe to say that adequate 

 steps toward reforestation are not being taken there is danger that 



