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Show Farfy Climbs the Hot Plug aid Takes Over a Hundred Pictures of Interest To Show in Lantern Slides to Others "Fumarole" is a Spanish word, meaning fumes, giving off fumes, vapors rising from an object. And connected with that freak of nature nat-ure is the further, fact that the butte has residual heat, or is supplied sup-plied with heat by convection from the subterarrean source of heat below be-low which supplies the Hot Spring with its scalding water. Gilbert treats it exhaustively in his volume vol-ume LAKE BONNEVILLE, where the facts are set out in detail. We call this phenomenon of nature, "The Hot Plug," on Crater Bench, signifying to us that it is slightly warm. Scientifically the groat mass of reddish lava is Fumarole Butte; locally it is the "Hot Plug." Last Sunday John Ko.ina took H. B. Waters, Frank Bockwith, Sr., and Edward J. Harris, Junior, as his guests to the spot, and we spent all day. I took notes, and recorded items of interest; Mr. Waters took colored pictures; Ted took some eighty pictures in, all, using two cameras, one for black and white and one for color; 1 took an even dozen in black and while.- I feel that this is the best trip afoot I have taken to this spot. John had visited it many times, knew the country, and led us to each point of interest. This was my third trip, once from the east, once from the west, piloted by John, and this visitation. We climbed Crater Bench from the south, entering a draw; in a-bout a-bout a mile we found the survey monument, which read ',4 Sec. 30 31, and four miles farther north, we found another survey monument monu-ment reading; Range 9 W; Sec. 12; 7; Sec. 13 18. This dated 1934. The Hot Plug was slightly more than a half mile northwest from this latter lat-ter survey point. There was a walk of about 4'j miles, hard going rough, rocky, but not severe. John pointed out antelope tracks to us, made since the last storm of a week ago. We ran across a horned toad, of the most unusual color I have ever seen. We were among the reddish purple basalt rocks of the region, and this horned toad, chafhelion-like, chafhelion-like, had assumed the coloration of its surroundings, and was a deep purplish red, mottled, a perfect camouflage to its enemies in that environment. This is the first time I have ever seen such protective coloration in a horned toad, and Ted took a color picture of it while held in my hand, to make record of this unusual fact. Later the picture pic-ture turned out perfect, and Ted has a prize shot of that animal Later in the day, on the return trip, we ran into another horned toad of the usual neutral gray characteristic charac-teristic of those little fellows. Fad one: Horned toads of deep, dull purplish red, the color of their environment. en-vironment. (Query; can he change back again to neutral gray, if living liv-ing on the basalt rocks? An interesting in-teresting query.) Now if this horned hor-ned toad can put on or off his Joseph-coat of many colors, or neutral neu-tral gray at will, and be dressed up, it is of intense interest. We found plenty of clumps of "Brigham Tea," but we older fellows fel-lows knew it was no good to us, and passed it up. On one of the basalt boulders 1 found a small petroglyph, of a deer, size about five inches high; nearby, a man with possibly another an-other man by his side. Poorly done, small, as though my prehistoric brown-skinned brother had run out of lunch while doing his stunt. As we had left town about half past five, we got to the Hot Plug early, in good slanting sun, lots of contrast, and found conditions just right for imnumerable pictures. High lights and deep shadows, which would't have been present at a higher and later sun. We were just right in timing, and made the most of it. We judged the height of the Plug to be about 200 feet; Gilbert says 160, but it would be according accord-ing to what should be considered the base of the thing. John was ahead of the rest of us to find the best way up, and Ted got a color picture of him, a tiny dot, up on the very top of this great mass, hardly distinguishable, so high was it. We all climbed up to the top of the Plug. John got out his compass, com-pass, which seemed not to be affected af-fected magnetically by any iron in the mass, but by hunting around carefully he found a chunk of rock which would deflect the needle wildly. So, we had found the presence pre-sence of iron in some of the lava eruption. Fine Bonneville water terraces on a lava flow about a mile or more to the northeast of us; I had already taken a picture of that from the air. Ted took a picture of distant Topaz Mountain to our west, hut it is far, and the distance dis-tance cut down clarity; it is a record re-cord picture for him. He also took a snap at Drum Mountains, with better results. We estimated the diameter of this nearly circular plug of lava, a "neck," or supply pipe to the lava below, and found it to be about 200 feet in diameter the longest way, and about lfiO to 175 the short way, deeply "dished". Higher High-er at the east edge than to the west; the lava flow more to the west. Ejected material a brilliant 1 red, pumaceous in character, light and frothy, much pitted and honeycombed honey-combed wih bubbles, so light that samples I brought back will actually ac-tually float on water until the bubbles bub-bles begin filling with water, when it will then slowly sink in the water. wat-er. Very interesting. We stujjied the lava flow around us. There were probably several fissure flows to make up the great mass of Crater Bench; but this one place of a conduit, neck, or vent; the softer material of eruption had eroded away, leaving this plug standing up alone, a silent witness to the enormous heat of below, to melt a solid plug of lava 200 feet in diameter, and a couple of hundred hund-red feet high. Black lava, of lower melting point, first to become plastic, and as heat continued, finally the red lava, acid kind, which was scattered scat-tered for hundreds of yards around the Plug, toning the landscape a delicate and rich pink. Ted gave me a slide in color of this, which is perfect. I highly prize it and will show it to audiences with a thrill of pleasure. We found fissures on the plug which gave forth a mild current of rising warm, moist air, with moss and water drops congealed on the moss. Also, a band of vegetation r in the rocks getting its water from other moist and warm air : from below. A warning to Waters r and Ted of what awaits them hereafter, down below where the ' fires are hot, if they don't correct their ways. Of course, John and I don't need to. Halos and harps for us. We estimated the "dish" of the Plug on the top was about 40 feet. 1 Very interesting. Ted and Waters took a number of .pictures from on top; and of the party on the top. Pahvant , Butte was almost hid in the haze, in the far distance, lost to the camera. When we clambered down, John took us to a fault about a mile away, where the lava had broken, and in the deep fissures or clefts, we found moss, and I clambered down into each, and in some found currents of air which would flutter my handkerchief, suspended in the draft. I went down the biggest for about 35 feet; but it was not as good for air currents as the more restricted, narrower ones. The big one was like a refrigerator, cool and damp, a gentle air current arising. John then took us around to the wide expanse of the flats on the old lake bed south of the Hot Springs, Spr-ings, where we searched hard for arrowheads, but didn't find a single sing-le specimen. And that in the area where Mrs. Beckwith and I found many hundreds in the years of long ago, and where Lin Ashby had got a big collection; also the Japs had roamed it over thoroughly thorough-ly in parties, and to us nothing was left for that day. Disappointing. John then took us around to Hot Springs, where once manganese of iron was mined by Hon Steele and Frank Pratt; pires of red ore lay around us. They had dug it much. Later activities were abandoned there, and attention given to the deposits in Drum, to the west. We noted some buildings, a trailer house on wheels, a bath house with cement tub, where the hot water could be flowed in, got to the right heat, and the bather derive de-rive the benefits of the medicinal qualities. After a few more drinks, we saw a pavilion, a paved road from Delta, girls desporting in . briefest of bathing togs, iced drinks and dancing, a resort, but whiskey ran out about then, and 1 all that was left to us was a bar-; bar-; ren flat, some hot water, and a lot of emptiness. " Waters was very much interested ' in the remains of the old smelter 1 near, and pinned us down for its 1 story how Pete Black and Oscai ' Warnick and others hauled or from the Fish Springs mine to the ' Hot Sprines, smelted it down in concentration, and then continued 1 the haul to the railroad at Oasis for shipment to the big smelter in Salt Lake. We met Pete when we ) got to Delta, and he told Waters ; all about his old experiences, haul- ing that ore for $11 a ton, and the 1 final playing out of the mine, whifii it was told to me was because be-cause water got into the diggings We studied the lava mass of Crater Bench from the flat valley floor, noted its height, which we estimated at about 200 feet at the first rise, and the Hot Plug up a-bout a-bout 750 feet or so above the valley val-ley floor (estimates only). We had walked about 12 miles a stren-eous stren-eous hike and did we paralize that lunch! We felt thpt John had given us a rare treat, and I for one knew that it was the best trip afoot 1 . had taken to the Hot Plug. We got home about five-thirty, tired but satisfied. (Ted developed his Ansco color pictures that evening and before bed time he had mounted for me color slides of excellent quality of the trip immediate service possible pos-sible by that form of film.) |