632 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIX. No. 1006 



offices for staff, a stenographer's room, a wait- 

 ing room, a meteorological tower, with a labo- 

 ratory, a work room and an office, three dark 

 rooms, a goniometer room, a microphotographie 

 room, a room for liquid separation of minerals, 

 five storage rooms, five storage closets con- 

 nected with class rooms, cloak rooms, lockers 

 an.d four toilet rooms. The ventilation will be 

 forced by an electric fan in the basement sup- 

 ported by a suction fan near the roof. The 

 exterior of the building will be ornamented 

 with symbolic bas-reliefs representing subjects 

 appropriate to the earth sciences, as well as 

 some of the great leaders in special phases of 

 the science. The contract calls for the com- 

 pletion of the building by the first of Novem- 

 ber. The paleontologic work will remain in 

 Walker Museum and the two buildings will be 

 used in close relationship. 



The water supply of the great Missouri 

 River drainage area is the subject of a pub- 

 lication recently issued by the United States 

 Geological Survey, entitled " Surface Water 

 Supply of the Missouri River Basin, 1911," 

 by W. A. Lamb, W. B. Freeman and Raymond 

 Richards. This report contains the records of 

 flow at 130 permanent stations of the survey 

 during the year 1911, data which are necessary 

 to every form of water development, whether 

 it be water power, navigation, irrigation or 

 domestic water supply. Some of the tributary 

 streams are exceedingly variable in flow; 

 others, like the Niobrara in Nebraska, are re- 

 markably uniform. A systematic study of 

 Missouri River and its tributaries is being 

 carried on by the United States Geological 

 Survey. Considering the varied character of 

 the streams of the Missouri River basin and 

 their great economic importance for irriga- 

 tion, power and other purposes, the investiga- 

 tion is one of importance. The Missouri 

 proper is formed in southwestern Montana by 

 the junction of three streams which were dis- 

 covered by Lewis and Clark in 1806 and were 

 named by them Jefferson, Madison and Galla- 

 tin Rivers. Of these three Jefferson River 

 drains the largest area and is considered the 

 continuation of the main stream. This part 

 of Montana is mountainous and affords many 



excellent water-power sites. Among the prin- 

 cipal tributaries of the Missouri are the 

 Marias, Musselshell, Yellowstone, Cheyenne, 

 Platte and Kansas. The western part of the 

 basin is in the arid belt and the eastern part 

 is in the semiarid and humid regions. Ten 

 states are drained in part by Missouri River. 

 Rising at the Red Rock Lakes, at an elevation 

 of 6,700 feet above sea level, this stream de- 

 scends through the Rocky Mountains and 

 emerges on the broad prairie land a few miles 

 below the city of Great Falls, Mont. From 

 that point it is accounted a navigable stream 

 with an easy grade, and in passing through the 

 Dakotas and along the borders of Nebraska, 

 Kansas and Iowa it receives the flow of great 

 tributaries, so that as it crosses the State of 

 Missouri and joins the Mississippi a short 

 distance above St. Louis, it becomes one of the 

 large rivers of the world. Its total drainage 

 area is about 492,000 square miles in extent 

 and comprises, in addition to the states above 

 mentioned, large areas in Wyoming and Colo- 

 rado and a smaller area in the southwestern 

 part of Minnesota. On Shoshone River in 

 Wyoming, a tributary of the Bighorn, which 

 in turn is tributary to the Yellowstone, which 

 joins the Missouri in eastern Montana, is lo- 

 cated the Shoshone dam, the highest struc- 

 ture of its kind in the world, 328 feet from 

 foundation to capstone. This structure was 

 erected by the government to impound water 

 for irrigation on the arid lands in the valley 

 of Shoshone River below. Another great 

 structure of a similar kind is located in Wyom- 

 ing on North Platte River, which joins the 

 Missouri near Omaha, Nebr. This is known 

 as the Pathfinder dam, and was also erected by 

 the government to impound water for use in 

 the irrigation of lands in Wyoming and Ne- 

 braska. Another notable engineering struc- 

 ture in the drainage basin of the Missouri 

 River is the Belle Fourche dam, erected across 

 the river of the same name in South Dakota 

 by the government to impound water for irri- 

 gation. This dam is an earth embankment 

 155 feet high and one and one fifth miles long, 

 containing 1,600,000 cubic yards of earth fill. 

 This is the largest earth dam in existence. 



