32 .? 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Sept. 13, 1913. 
Fossil of Immense Fish Found in Kansas. 
The British Museum has recently acquired 
what is probably the most wonderful fossil of 
a fish ever yet found. The fossil remains are 
fourteen feet long and the fish probably lived 
millions of years ago. It comes out of Kan¬ 
sas. Kansas, it seems, is the best place yet 
found anywhere to fish for these big fossil 
fish. In many other parts of the world por¬ 
tions of the skeletons of such fish have been 
found, but it is only in Kansas that the entire 
skeleton is preserved. 
The reason for this, as assigned by geolo¬ 
gists, is that in earlier geological ages when 
much of the present land surface of the globe 
was submerged, the shallow and tranquil 
waters of the Kansas region permitted the 
remains of these great fish to become buried 
in the mud and sand and turned to fossil form 
entire, whereas in places where the waters 
were deeper and more turbulent, the fish re¬ 
mains were broken up. 
These giant fish, which probably weighed 
up to 500 pounds when alive, belonged to the 
family called Portheus molossus. They are 
now extinct, but what caused their extermina¬ 
tion is not known. They were surely big and 
strong enough to look out for themselves, and 
there appears to have been no shortage of the 
food supply for them. It is thought that pos¬ 
sibly the changes in temperatures brought 
about by geological upheavals were too sud¬ 
den for them to adapt themselves to, and that 
they accordingly died out. But they have left 
their life history and their very bodies pre¬ 
served in the rock for the world to study 
countless centuries afterward. We can imagine 
that if there were human beings on the globe 
at that period, there were lively times when 
a fisherman got a bite from one of these mem¬ 
bers of the Portheus molossus family. 
The specimen has a remarkable history. 
It was found by Professor Sternberg, who has 
achieved a world-wide fame for his discoveries 
of fossil fish and his amazing skill in digging 
his finds from the rock in which they are em¬ 
bedded. This fossil fish was found exposed 
at the surface of the ground and much the 
worse for the wear and tear of wind and rain 
and sun. 
But Professor Sternberg was equal to tlm 
occasion. The resourceful discoverer deter 
mined to get at that other side in the case of 
this very stale fish, for the exposed side was 
useless. 
Accordingly he covered it with a thick 
layer of plaster of Paris, and when this was 
set, he proceeded to dig out the fossil from 
its bed of chalk. This accomplished, he cut 
away the stone from this under surface and 
eventually succeeded in exposing the whole 
fish, which, it will be seen, is in a most mar- 
.velous state of preservation. 
Father Bernard Vaughan Thinks the Grand 
Canyon of Colorado the Most Impressive 
Sight in the World. 
I he Yellowstone canon is wonderfully 
beautiful, says bather Bernard Vaughan, in 
the Sti and Magazine, but the Colorado chasm 
is far_ more wonderfully magnificent. As 
some tew months ago I stood on an elevated 
plain and saw at my feet, and before me, a 
gorge fifteen miles across and stretching east 
and west as far as the eye could travel, I 
found myself looking into another world' a 
world untenanted and voiceless save for the 
sound of the whirling, whistling wind. 
Just imagine the scene. There beiow me, 
a mile deep and fifteen miles across, was this 
yawning gulf. There, in that immense depth, 
stood out before my bewildered and worship¬ 
ping eyes a perfect city in which I could 
recognize every style of classic architecture 
and every period of Gothic—towers, keeps 
and turrets, domes, spires and minarets, 
streets laid out and open spaces, and flights 
of steps to cathedral, capitol, castle and°en- 
circling ramparts. 
Nor was the scene without the life of 
color or the play of light and shade. Every 
hue and tint was there, and every scheme of 
treatment was depicted before my eyes. 
Nothing was wanting to make me feel how 
poor, petty and paltry is all man’s work when 
put into comparison with the wonderful works 
of God! , 
When we came away after having seen 
the great spaces flooded with sunlight, hidden 
in mist, and swept by rain storm, I could not 
help exclaiming to a friend who was with me, 
" This to me is the last word in architecture’ 
m painting and in poetry.” 
At Yellowstone Park my soul broke forth 
into the Magnificat. But here in the presence 
of the Grand Canon of Colorado I felt in¬ 
clined to intone the ‘‘Gloria in Excelsis!” 
To view that canon and to see what 
nature had wrought in this wonderland of 
wonderlands held me spellbound with awe. 
admiration and adoration. And as I stood 
there I offered up a silent prayer to heaven 
for sight and understanding, and for the privi¬ 
lege of being there. 
The steel towers that support electric power 
transmission lines are being increasingly used 
by forest rangers as fire lookout stations on 
national forests. With the harnessing of the 
mountain streams a network of these lines is 
gradually being woven over the forests, and in 
the absence of other convenient lookouts, the 
rangers find the steel towers helpful in their 
fire patrol work. 
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JOSEF HOFMANN, The World’s Greatest Pianist, 
playing Mendelssohn’s “Spring Song.” 
Columbia Record A-l 178—Price $1.00. 
COLUMBIA 
GRAPHOPHONE COMPANY 
Woolworth Building, New York 
