OCR Text |
Show Remains of indent Ocean Creatures Found in Alaska W A S H I N GTON, D. C The Brooks mountains of northern Alaska Alas-ka remain probably the least explored ex-plored region under the American flag. They are North America's northern north-ern rampart. An exploration of parts of these mountains was carried out last summer. sum-mer. And in the rocks of the mountains moun-tains the explorers found forms of strange sea creatures living 300 million- years ago. Throughout the long, temperate, quiet period of the planet's history, known as the Mississippian, the rocks of these mountains were at the bottom of a shallow sea. Then the dominant or at least the most abundant creatures were crinoi-dea, crinoi-dea, closely related to the sea lilies of the present time. This was the heyday of these curious animals who were, for the most part, attached by stems to the sea bottom's ooze. A thick strata of the mountains are today made up of broken fragments or skeletons of the animals. The explorers found themselves In a region of unexcelled natural beauty. In the mountains are great glacial valleys, their floors covered with mosses and stunted willows. They may be carpeted with flowers during the brief summer when the temperatures range from 30 to 70 degrees fahrenheit. All around tower barren 5,000 foot mountains. Farther south they rise to 7,000 feet. The only human inhabitants are two small groups of Inland Eskimo, the only remnants of these hunting people. Bear and caribou are plentiful. plenti-ful. The Brooks range extends westward west-ward from the Bering sea Into Canada. Can-ada. It has many similarities, paleontologically, with the eastern slopes of the Rockies. It is one of the earth's great Mississippian areai. |