Crater Lake National Park 



By Mark Daniels 

 Former Superintendent of Xational Parks 



MANY people whose repugnance for platitudes is 

 not sufficiently strong to prevail against their in- 

 difference to the value of an extensive vocabulary 

 will describe Crater Lake as the eighth wonder of the 

 world and let it go at that. To many others, myself in- 

 cluded, it is the whole eight, and then some, if one may be 

 permitted to resort to the more expressive vernacular. The 

 sight of it fills one with more conflicting emotions than any 

 other scene with which I am familiar. It is at once weird, 

 fascinating, enchanting, repellent, of exquisite beauty and 

 at times terrifying in its austere dignity and oppressing 

 stillness. In the sparkling sunlight, its iridescent hues 

 are dazzling and bewildering. When a storm is on, it 

 throws terror into the heart of the observer and carries 

 the mind back through the eons when it was born in Titan 

 throes of nature. There are a few other crater lakes in 

 the world. In India, Hawaii and Italy there are some ; 



perhaps there are others in other lands, but there is 

 none known to man that can remotely approximate the 

 transcendant beauty of Crater Lake in Crater Lake 

 Xational Park. 



To appreciate how one might be so profoundly im- 

 pressed by a visit to the Lake, it is necessary to know some- 

 thing of the country and its formation. The Cascade 

 Range of mountains in southern Oregon, in the vicinity 

 of Crater Lake National Park, forms a more or less 

 broad plateau, broken here and there by peaks and vol- 

 canic cones that tower above the surrounding territory. 

 Of these majestic mountains, Shasta, Hood and Mount 

 Rainier form the three most striking and distinctive peaks. 

 At one time, however, many thousands of years ago, 

 Mount Mazama was probably as high and as distinctive 

 in appearance as Mount Rainier. Long before any human 

 being ever set eyes upon the Peak, however, the top 



A BEAUTIFUL VIEW OF CRATER LAKE 



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