Go back in time to a land shrouded in mist and jungles and swamps.  A time hundreds of millions of years before T-Rexes stalked the Earth, growling and rumbling and crashing through thick forests.  A time before Pterodactyls soared through the skies, shrieking and diving through clouds to capture unsuspecting prey.  It is a land rich with possibilities and emerging life forms.  Water covers large portions of the Earth’s surface and in its depths are fish and sea life of an amazing array, all teeming and eating and reproducing.  Everywhere growth and change are happening in open seas, pristine lakes, and murky swamps across the continents. Some amphibians – or fish – are growing larger, some are growing fangs, and some are growing legs and becoming tetrapods!

Tetrapods are four-legged creatures with vertebras – or spines.  And one of these tetrapods is a murky swamp creature called Crassigyrinus Scoticus – or C. Scoticus – meaning “thick Scottish tadpole.”  But don’t let this cute name and fanciful image fool you.  This is no wiggly little tadpole that we think of today – something that we capture in shallow ponds and gurgling streams, giggling with delight as they scamper across our wet palms or shimmy up our sun-drenched arms.  Oh, no, this is a gigantic tadpole – a fierce water hunter measuring anywhere from 6.5 – 10 feet long (or 2-3 meters) with razor-sharp teeth!  Think of an alligator or a crocodile and you get the picture of this amazing tetrapod.  He is the T-Rex of tadpoles! 

So, let’s go back in time and learn more about him.  

THE T-REX OF TADPOLES

The time is 300 million years ago and C. Scoticus, the mighty tadpole, swims through the murky swamp waters of Scotland and West Virginia in North America.  He is a fearsome hunter with a narrow skull, large eyes, two rows of sharp teeth, a slim flexible body, and a long tail.  He swims slowly and stealthily below the muddy water, searching for tasty fish among the swaying reeds.  His powerful body sends out ripples behind him as he swishes his tail to and fro, four little legs floating below him, sometimes treading the water as he slows and eventually stops.  Suddenly, he senses prey – possibly through eyesight, vibrations, or electrical signals – and his powerful body lunges forward.  He spots the fish.  It is bigger than he expected but he knows he can catch it in his strong jaws.  With another thrust of his tail, he opens his massive jaws and snaps!  The fish is caught!  With a few more mighty chomps, his meal is devoured.  

His jaws are his most powerful weapon – without them, he would not survive.  He can open them 60 degrees, much larger than human jaws at a measly 26 degrees.  C. Scoticus’ powerful jaws and sharp teeth give him the ability to capture large amphibians with a single bite.  And this is very handy seeing as everything is large in these prehistoric times.

Also, his big eyes help him see prey in the murky waters, plus his skull has a ridge of lines running from top to bottom, allowing him to feel vibrations in the water.  Sometimes all he has to do is float silently in the shallows waiting for a wiggly fish to swim by.  The moving water ripples over his snout and he knows that dinner is close at hand – and soon in his belly! 

C. Scoticus also sports a gap at the front of his snout. Maybe he needs other organs besides his eyes and teeth to help him hunt.  Possibly this gap contains a rostral organ – a jelly-filled sack with canals leading outside – to help him detect electrical fields underwater.  Or maybe he has a Jacobson’s organ – a smell organ above the roof of his mouth like those in snakes and lizards – to smell chemicals released by his prey.   If he has all these attributes – strong jaws, sharp teeth, fine smell, a rostral organ, and vibration-sensitive ridges – then he is a mighty predator indeed and has no need to go onto land.  

Therefore, his little legs are a mystery.  We know that other tetrapods started moving onto land using newly-sprouted legs around 400 million years ago.  C. Scoticus evolved 70 million years later.  So, during this evolutionary leap did he make it onto land but then return to water full-time – or did he never go onto land at all?  We may never know. 

One thing I DO know for certain: if I lived in Scotland or West Virginia – and maybe other places – during that evolutionary time in history, I would not swim in murky waters and I wouldn’t spend my time searching for tadpoles!

THE SABER-TOOTHED ANCHOVY

Now, let’s jump ahead to 45 million years ago, long after C-Scoticus started to sprout legs and swim through the swamps.  There is another crazy creature – actually two of them – swimming below the ocean’s surface – and they each have a long, menacing fang or saber-tooth!  Don’t believe me?  Well, I can understand that because there has never been a creature before – or since – that looks like these two.  And what are they?  Well, they are actually super large anchovies!  Yes, those things come in little cans that you put on pizzas or crackers.  But these anchovies are huge – one is almost a foot long (about 29 centimeters) and the other is 3 feet long (or 3 meters)!

So, let’s head back 65 million years in time to learn about the start of the saber-toothed anchovy.  

It is a day like any other day – may be sunny, cool, or rainy in various parts of the world.  Dinosaurs roam the land and vast forests carpet the Earth.  The sea brims with all kinds of prehistoric life.  Suddenly, a huge sonic boom shatters the atmosphere and a giant asteroid hurtles towards Earth with a blazing tail of fire and gas.  It smashes into Earth with supersonic speed, causing a massive explosion and spewing fire and ash high into the air.  Raging wildfires erupt, their towering flames filling the sky.  Soon the Earth is on fire and all sunlight is obscured by thick grey clouds of smoke and ash.  Rivers, ponds, and lakes dry up.  Sea life is decimated.  All vegetation burns to the ground.  Many dinosaurs are killed and the rest soon perish due to fire, heat, smoke, and lack of food and water. All seems lost.  Will Earth become a barren planet devoid of all life?  No!

The days tick by, then weeks, then years, then thousands and millions of years.  During this time, tiny organisms in the sea begin to form again, then grow, change, and evolve.  It is now 15 million years later and the seas are once more home to incredible forms of life.  Fish dart here and there and are food for larger fish, sharks, and whales.  And one of these fish is an 11-inch anchovy with a lower jaw filled with razor-sharp teeth and an upper jaw with one long saber tooth!  He is called Clupeopsis straeleni and he lives in the waters near Belgium.  He evolves in the sea as if through a ripple in time.  He exists for a period of time and then vanishes – never to be seen again.  Why did evolution make this unique sea creature with a saber tooth?  Did he need a large tooth to spear larger fish that he could then bite into smaller bits?  It’s hard to say.  

But C. Straeleni is not alone. He has a larger cousin in Southeast Asia measuring 3 feet (1 meter) long and with the same fierce saber tooth.  This larger anchovy cousin is called Monosmilus chureloides or “single-knife Churel.”  And what is a Churel?  It is a scary fairy tale creature, a shape-shifting demon or vampire with fangs.  

M. Chureloides is no fairytale demon, though. He is an actual fish and he swims in the shallows of the sea searching for prey.  Just like his smaller cousin, he uses his 16 sharp bottom teeth and one long saber tooth to spear and eat his prey.  Periodically, he sheds his teeth as he grows and as they fall out during attacks, but he is constantly growing new ones.  And although he is long by modern-day anchovy standards, he is a small fry on the prehistoric scale.  He must be wary of larger predators like sharks and the four-legged whale known as Dalanistes.  But, like his smaller cousin, the mystery remains.  Why did he evolve and why did he disappear?  We may never know.

Both of these fish have been called a “bizarre, evolutionary experiment,” one that has never occurred before or since in all the seas throughout time.  For some reason, evolution decided that a smaller cousin would thrive – and without the fang! 

As for me, I am grateful that my anchovies are now petite and bite-sized – otherwise, they could certainly take a bite out of me!

So, what do you think of these wacky wonders of the swamps and seas?  Have you ever heard of them before?  I know I haven’t.  Isn’t evolution strange and amazing and unpredictable?  I wonder what life forms will be on Earth millions of years from now.  We’d would love to hear from you and learn what is your favorite dinosaur or prehistoric sea creature.

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When I was a little kid, I took art class in school and one of my projects was to draw a picture of my family.  I was not a great artist so I did the basics: a square house and little stick figures for people. Perhaps you’ve done the same.  Well, imagine if your teacher put a rock on your desk and said, “Carve a picture of your mother out of this rock.”  That would seem impossible!

First of all, to carve a face out of stone, you need special tools, like chisels and hammers.  And you need to know how to carve the stone in the right places to make a nose, eyes, and lips.  It takes a lot of time and practice to get it right – and some really big rocks!  

Well, today, we’re going to talk about some gigantic rock portraits.  You might know some already, like Mt. Rushmore in the United States, The David statue in Italy, or the Terracotta Army in China.  Today we’re going to discover some other rock portraits – faces that look like a surprised Santa, a majestic lion, or a wailing devil!

The Great Sphinx of Giza

One of my favorite stone portraits is the Great Sphinx of Giza, near Cairo, Egypt.  It is a statue of a large, reclining lion with a human head.  It measures 240 feet (73 metres) long and 66 feet (20 metres) high and was carved around 2465 B.C.E.!  And to make it even more amazing, it was carved out of one mammoth piece of limestone!  Scientists estimate it took three years and 100 workers to carve this statue – and then they painted it! Eventually the paint chipped off from sun and heat exposure but it must have looked amazing when it was finished.

And whose face is on the Sphinx?  Well, they’re not sure.  It could be the ancient Pharaoh Khafre.  Others state that Khafre’s older brother had it built to honor their father, Pharoah Khufu.  Whoever it was built for, he must have been amazing.  Unfortunately, it has decayed over time and is now missing its nose.  One legend states that Napoleon ordered the nose blown off with a canon while battling there, but that’s not true – the nose came off long before then.  Others state that the nose was cut off in the 1300’s in protest to idolatry – meaning the worship of false Gods or famous people.  Whatever the truth may be, it is an amazing piece of artwork – and history – and I hope it will remain with us for centuries to come.

Olmec Heads in Mexico

Speaking of kingly faces, I think the Olmec Heads in Mexico are fascinating.  These heads are short and round and depict ancient Olmec rulers.  The smooth faces feature almond-shaped eyes, round noses, and full lips.  On their heads are small caps with simple designs.  These faces were carved out of volcanic rock around 1200-800 B.C., and range in height from 5 to 11 feet.  They weigh a whopping 20 tons.  Unfortunately, the Olmec people vanished from the Earth around 300 B.C. for unknown reasons – maybe war or disease – but these stone statues are a reminder that they were here and were memorialized – or honored – by their talented artists. 

 Nemrut Dag, Turkey

From 700-38 B.C., a king named Antiochus the First ruled in Turkey.  He ordered a sculptor to carve his statue high in the barren Taurus Mountains.  The sculptor carved the king sitting on a throne wearing a stern, majestic face and a tall headdress.  He then carved lions, falcons, and gods seated on either side of the king, protecting him from all enemies – mortal and spiritual.  These magnificent stone gods were depicted as three men and one woman on large thrones wearing pointed hats. A large burial site was built around these statues and contains other stone ancestors and treasures.  This site has decayed over time – possibly due to earthquakes, mudslides, and other weather – but was rediscovered in 1881 and turned into a protected historic site.  

Bayon Temple, Cambodia    

In Cambodia is an amazing Hindu and Buddhist temple called the Bayon Temple that displays over 200 carved faces!  This jaw-dropping temple – more like a vast, stone city – was built around the time of King Jayavarman VII’s reign from 1181 to 1218 and shows buildings with spiked towers, tall pillars and massive stone staircases leading into cavernous rooms.  Outside the temple, a large, smiling face is carved into a stone tower, supposedly of the king.  This king looks incredibly friendly, with full lips curved into a big smile and eyes looking downward, as if he is daydreaming.  His nose has fallen off, but he still wears a tall, royal headdress with a creature or bird on top.  To his left is another rock tower with four smiling king faces looking North, South, East, and West.  

Also in this temple are 200 additional faces, as well as scenes showing Cambodian life.  Statues of large Hindu gods sit on thrones lining the paths to the temple, looking mean and menacing, unlike the smiling king.  This site is truly fascinating – like something out of an Indiana Jones movie – and I would love to explore it one day.  What about you?

The Moai Heads of Easter Island

You may have seen the Moai Heads of Easter Island in the movie, “Night at the Museum.”  They were the large rock heads munching on gum and chanting “Yum, yum.”  The actual heads were discovered on Easter Island in the Pacific Ocean near Chile around 1722.  Carved out of volcanic rock around 1250-1500 A.D., they measure anywhere from 13 feet to 40 feet and weigh 14 tons each.  These massive heads have big brows, long noses, and deep eye sockets that may have had coral for eyes.  Their mouths are carved in a straight line.  Through the years, many of these statues have toppled over – although we don’t know why.  Some say it happened due to earthquakes, others say they were pushed over during tribal battles, and some say that a woman on the island with magical powers struck them down in anger.  

And you may be wondering how 800 massive stone heads were moved across the island.  Archeologists believe this was done by loading the rocks on wooden sleds and rolling the sleds over large logs.  It is thought that the island was once covered with forest, but the trees were cut down to move the stones, which led to the destruction of the island.  The people were no longer able to build houses or make fires and many moved away. 

So, what do these heads mean?  Well, some think they are carvings of ancestors or gods, and have spiritual powers.  Some think they are protectors of the island because they face inland.  Seven are pointed out to sea, maybe to watch for invaders.

You and I may never get to Easter Island to see these amazing statues, but we can view them in museums around the world, including London; Washington, DC; France; New Zealand; Chile; and Belgium.  I would love to see them, but I think I would have a heart attack if they started chanting and chewing bubblegum!

The Devil Heads, Czech Republic 

In the lush green forests of the Czech Republic two ghoulish heads are carved into the side of a mountain, sometimes called the “Czech Mount Rushmore.”  But while Mount Rushmore shows four stately presidents, the Devil Heads show two freaky faces.  One looks like a surprised Santa with bushy eyebrows, a long flowing beard, and an open mouth.  Beside it is another head with a wailing face, furrowed brows, and crooked teeth in a gaping mouth.  It looks like a creature or devil howling in pain.  These faces were carved between 1841 and 1846 by a man who was working as a cook in a nearby castle.  Later, he carved other faces and creatures into nearby rocks, depicting characters from Czech fairytales. Well, even if these heads are a little scary, I think they are fascinating and very creative.  

Decebalus Rex, Romania

And finally, we head to Romania for a stone portrait started in 1993.  Created in honor of King Decebalus who lived around 105 A.D., this carving shows the elderly king’s face jutting out of a grey stone cliff on a wooded mountain.  He wears a bushy beard and mustache, and his mouth is set in a firm, straight line.   On top of his head are the jagged peaks of the mountain, looking like a tall Santa’s hat.  And while the faces on Mount Rushmore in the United States are an impressive 60 feet high, this king’s face is three times that large, or 180 feet, with a 23-foot nose and 14-foot eyes!  King Decebalus was said to have battled a great Roman emperor on this site many centuries ago and was ultimately defeated.  To honor the king’s courage, an Italian sculptor was hired to carve this special memorial.

So, what do you think of all these rocky portraits?  Have you seen any of them?  Some are so old it’s hard to imagine how they were created or how the artists knew how to carve faces on such a large scale.  It just shows that every civilization had its amazing architects, engineers, and artists!  If you could carve anyone to be remembered hundreds of years from now, who would it be?

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Imagine you are walking along a trail in the desert…

You have been walking for many days and are now holding your mother’s hand. Your dog is trotting along beside you. You are of the Pueblo tribe and every year visit a place that is holy to your people. You have been counting down the days and now the steps and the day has finally come. The air is cool this time of year and the sky is clear and blue as far as you can see. Your father and brother are walking ahead with the others and someone calls out “Kaibab! Kaibab!” You leave your mother’s hand and rush ahead with them, faster and faster, trying to beat your brother to the sight. And then suddenly you stop and gasp! Spread out for miles ahead of you is the beauty of what you call Kaibab, the widest and most beautiful of canyons in the world. You hold your breath and slowly take in the wonder of this place that is holy to you and your people. 

Width, Length, and Depth of the Grand Canyon

The Grand Canyon is the widest canyon in the world and is located in Arizona, which also happens to be my home state. It is also considered one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. The Grand Canyon is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide, and over 6,000 feet deep in places. It is very colorful, a combination of reds, browns, whites, and many other colors, because each of the different layers, or strata, was formed at different times during the Earth’s history. The Earth is very, very old, so the Grand Canyon is made up of different rocks from its 2 billion-year-old history.

Formation of the Grand Canyon

Early on the Grand Canyon was actually a mountain, which over time sunk down until it was flat. Then as the earth shifted it became a canyon and over a very long period was even underwater. Eventually, a river started flowing through the canyon, which is now known as The Colorado River. The water in the river was full of rocks, so over millions of years, the river acted like sandpaper shaving down the canyon. This is called erosion. Today when you look at the Grand Canyon you can see the different layers in it, similar to a layered cake. Some of the layers are white limestone, other layers are filled with shells from when it was underwater, and the upper layers are darker and were formed by a volcano. 

Ancestral Puebloans

After The Grand Canyon was formed into what it looks like today, around 3000 years ago, native people who we now called the Ancestral Puebloans lived near the Grand Canyon. They build homes out of stone and farmed corn, squash, and beans. They made carvings and paintings on canyon walls, which is one way we know they lived there. Another group who lived there was called the Cohonina, who are the ancestors of the modern Yuma, Havasupai, and Hualapai people, who still live around the Grand Canyon. The native people call The Grand Canyon Kaibab, which means “mountain on its side.” The ancient people believed The Grand Canyon was a holy place and often visited from miles around to experience its wonder.

European Discovery of the Grand Canyon

After Europeans discovered The New World, Francisco Vazquez de Coronado and a group of Spanish explorers were in the area searching for the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola. In 1540 Coronado ordered Captain Garcia Lopez de Cardenas and his soldiers to explore the area. They and their Hopi native guides were the first Europeans to see the wonders of The Grand Canyon. They were amazed at its size and vastness. Two hundred years passed until another European visited the canyon.

In 1776 two Spanish Priests, Francisco Dominguez and Silvestre de Escalante explored southern Utah and the north rim of the Grand Canyon. 

In the 1850s they were followed by Jacob Hamblin, a Mormon explorer sent by Brigham Young to find a way to cross the river. They made friends with the Hualapai tribe and found the crossing discovered by the Spanish Priests, which later became Lees Ferry. A ferry is a place where a flat boat helps wagons and people cross a river. 

John Wesley Powell

Then in 1869, Major John Wesley Powell led the first expedition down into the canyon. He had set out to explore the Colorado River and The Grand Canyon. They rode down the river on a boat and survived the dangerous rapids and finally ended up in what is now known as Moab, Utah. John Wesley Powell later became famous for the founding of the Boy Scouts of America. 

National Park

In 1903 President Theodore Roosevelt visited The Grand Canyon and marveled at its beauty. Teddy Roosevelt was known for his love of nature and spent much of his time outdoors. In awe at the Grand Canyon, he did everything he could to help preserve its natural wonder. They worked to make it a national monument and believed places like The Grand Canyon should be preserved so people all over the world could enjoy it. While Roosevelt was president he formed the National Parks Association to help save places like The Grand Canyon. 

Tourism

Today The Grand Canyon is one of the most famous places to visit in the world with about five million visitors every year who come from all over to see and explore it. Most people just come to look out over the vast canyon. I’ve been there a few times with my family, it’s about a 4-hour drive for us from where we live near Phoenix, Arizona. The last time I went we brought our 4 young kids, who also looked out over it in awe. We had to hold them close to us because the canyon is a very steep drop below, which made us pretty nervous.

Havasupai

When I was in high school our family and a group of other families hiked down into a part of the Grand Canyon known as Havasupai. We drove there early in the morning and had all of our camping gear and food loaded onto the back of mules, then we hiked about 4 hours down into the canyon. At the bottom of the trail are huge, picturesque Havasu Falls. You can swim at the bottom of the falls, jump off cliffs and hike further in to see and swim in the other waterfalls. Our trip was very fun but took a turn for the worse when one of the days I slipped on a rock and twisted my ankle pretty badly. The next day we were supposed to hike out, so my close friend and I got up early and started hiking out. I limped most of the way, even up the steep switchbacks. It was a rough hike out, but the waterfalls and swimming holes made it worth it anyway. 

In addition to hiking, people take helicopter tours over The Grand Canyon and love to raft the wild Colorado River. People also take horseback tours down into the canyon and it’s very popular to hike it from rim to rim — my sisters and their friends did this recently. Another main attraction is the Grand Canyon Skywalk, which lets you walk on a glass-bottomed path out over the canyon, so you can look at the drop far below.

Conclusion

Do you have any natural wonders near you? It may be mountains, a beautiful river, or the ocean. Spending time in nature is good for you. It helps relax your mind and body. I know I always feel better when I spend time outside or on a hike. Just this last week my kids and I spent some time hiking and visiting a stream nearby. Spend time thinking about what places in nature near you you can visit. And if you’re ever in Arizona, definitely be sure to visit the amazing Grand Canyon! 

Recommended Books

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Imagine yourself in paleolithic times, also called the stone age.  You are one of a group of early people living in the mountains.  You and your family have been traveling higher and higher each year into the mountains to try to find elk and deer to hunt.  You traveled along well-worn trails in the hills.  These trails are made by animals and now you are stalking them.  You come upon a bush with some berries and stop with your people to pick and eat some.  In a nearby stream, you scoop a drink of water with your hands.  You look around and appreciate the beautiful mountains and nature around you.  You are in the Rocky Mountains! 

The Rocky Mountains are a mountain range that runs through Colorado and north all the way to Canada. Within the mountain range, there is a national park called the Rocky Mountain National Park.  The Park is in north-central Colorado and is full of mountains, alpine lakes, and many different types of animals. 

Formation of the Rocky Mountains

Over many centuries, which are sets of 100 years, massive glaciers shaped the rocky mountain range.  A glacier is a large piece of ice that forms over time from snowfall. It builds up and then slowly moves over hundreds and thousands of years!  While glaciers covered the Rockies, nothing could grow in the area.  It wasn’t until about 11,000 years ago, that the Rocky Mountain glaciers warmed up and moved far enough that plants began to grow and animals began to visit the area.  After this, humans in the area began exploring the valleys and mountains.  We know this because researchers have found spearheads made out of rocks along the trails in the area.  Historians, people who study history, can tell how long people have lived in an area by looking at how old their tools in the area are.

The Utes

The first people who lived in the area were called the Ute tribe.  There they survived by hunting mammoths. Mammoths were gigantic, harry animals with long tusks.  The Ute people did not live in the Rocky Mountains all year long.  Instead, they lived close by near the base of the mountain range in the winter.  In the summer, when it was warm enough, the Ute people traveled into the green valleys and beautiful lakes of the mountain range.  

The Utes first started traveling along what is now known as the Trail Ridge Road in the Rocky Mountain National Park.  They were hunting and foraging for food.  Foraging means to get food by hunting, fishing, or gathering wild plants. 

The Ute people were the main group of humans in the Rocky Mountain area for thousands of years until the late 1700s.  Can you imagine how long that is?  A very, very long time. Sometimes we tend to forget how very long Native American people lived in North America before their first contact with Europeans. 

Spanish Explorers

In the 1700s, European people who had come to America started to travel farther west and explore the Rocky Mountain area. This included Spanish explorers and French fur trappers who had gone around the mountain range in their travels. Later European immigrants started to explore the mountain range. It took many years for European explorers to make their way through the Rocky Mountains since back then, people did not have the technology and winter supplies and equipment that we have today that would make exploring much easier.

Purchase by the U.S. Government

In 1803, the U.S. government bought the land now known as Rocky Mountain National Park as part of the famous deal called the Louisiana Purchase.  In 1820, an army major named Stephen H. Long decided he would explore the mountain range further and so he set out on an expedition with a group of climbers. He was able to see parts of the Rocky Mountain range that others hadn’t made it to.  And he even named a mountain after himself: Long’s Peak.  When he returned home, he wrote about his travels.  

Because of the excitement that Long’s expedition caused and the opportunities that the west offered, white settlers began arriving in the area in the mid-1800s.  As more and more white people came to the area, many Native Americans who lived there started to be displaced.  This means having to move because you don’t have anywhere to live. Most Native Americans in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado ended up leaving the area or moving to reservations.

Gold Rush

In 1859, there was a gold rush at Pikes Peak.  Many people from all over America came to the Rockies to look for gold.  Much like the California gold rush, they hoped to strike it rich.  But only a few people ended up getting wealthy.  Many more came out but never found gold.  They often stayed in the area and built houses and settled down. By the late 1860s, this meant that there were lots of new settlers now living in the area and lots of small homes built in the Rocky Mountain ranges. 

The winters in the Rockies are very harsh and cold.  This made it difficult for people to live and find food high in the mountain areas. This meant that people usually lived lower down from the peaks, where there are more bears, deer, wolves, and elk.  The area is very beautiful, so word started to spread back to the eastern states in the USA about the Rockies.  Soon more Easterners started moving out to the area to live.

Also, there were rumors and superstitions that the water that came from the mountain streams and rivers had healing qualities.  This means that people thought that if you drank the water, it could heal you if you were sick or disabled.   The mountain water became more precious than gold in that it could also be diverted, or redirected, using dams and barriers to help bring water to fields for farming cattle and crops. 

Following the growth in ranchers, hunters, and miners in the area, the next group that started to arrive in the Rocky Mountain area was tourists.  

Conservation

By 1900, a group of local people, or people who lived in the Rocky Mountain area, started to organize together to try to turn part of the Rocky Mountain range into a protected park.  This was part of a conservation effort, which means an effort to protect an area of land.  This effort was supported by president Teddy Roosevelt.

In 1909, a nature guide and lodge owner in the Rockies named Enos Mills started to work for the creation of a national Rocky Mountain park.  Enos believed that a big part of the Rocky Mountain range should be saved as parkland so that families in the future could continue to enjoy its beauty.  He was afraid that if it was not made into a protected park, then eventually people would buy the land in the Rocky Mountain area and log it as a source of wood and turn the forests there into farmland and the mountains into mines for silver. 

Enos set out on a mission to gain support for this idea.  He spent several years traveling across the United States teaching people about the Rocky Mountains and writing thousands of letters to convince other people to support the plan for a federal park in the area.  A federal park means an area of land that would be owned and protected by the US government and could not be damaged by logging and mining or other human activities. Most government leaders that Enos spoke to liked the idea, but many people that worked in mining, logging, and farming opposed it.  To oppose means to stand in the way of doing something and try to stop it.  In 1915, however, Enos was successful in his efforts when President Woodrow Wilson signed the Rocky Mountain National Park Act. The Rocky Mountain area of Colorado was now a protected area!

In 1915, there were a few private lands throughout the park.  Private lands mean that they were owned by individual people or families and not the government.  These private lands often had lodges, or basic houses, on them and the owners of these lodges would host guests for sightseeing. The lodge keepers maintained the roads, built trails, and guided visitors on which routes to take in their adventures. 

With the new park status in place, the government appointed a park “Superintendent” to oversee the park and its uses.  When the first Superintendent arrived, he started building things to support visitors.   This included buildings and roads and trails.  The earliest managers of the park were not given a lot of money to work with, so they had to be very careful about not spending too much. They just built a few buildings and improved roads and trails. 

Tourism

By the 1920s however, there was a big increase in the number of tourists who were coming to visit the park.  This was because World War I had ended and people had more time and money to travel and sightsee again. The park facilities and private lodges in Rocky Mountain park were not enough to support the increased number of tourists.  So throughout the 1920s, there was a big increase in building lodges in the park. Rangers built comfort stations, museums, and better trails.  The park also saw the construction of new roads to make it easier for tourists to visit.  The biggest road project during that time was the construction of the Trail Ridge Road to Fall River Pass, which was completed from 1929 to 1932.

During the Great Depression of the 1930s, millions of Americans did not have jobs.  Because there were a lot of men out of work and looking for jobs, Rocky Mountain park hired additional men to help build more roads, trails and buildings.  They were set up into six camps throughout the Rockies to do this work.  They also helped put out wildfires, planted trees, and managed predators, or dangerous animals. It was with the help of these additional men that the Trail Ridge Road was completed. 

Road building was a high priority for the park because, unlike other western national parks, most tourists came to Rocky Mountain National Park by car.  A railroad never was built to serve the mountain area, like it did in Yellowstone, Glacier and Grand Canyon parks.  So road building was important for the Rockies to be successful.

During World War II, tourism to all national parks dropped significantly.  People did not have time or money to travel and sightsee in the Rockies, so there was less development and care taken in the area and many of the buildings and trails stopped being maintained. However, after WWII, there were many new young families in the United States.  This time in America was called a “baby boom” because families were reunited and had a lot of wealth again and so the number and size of families grew quickly. 

The government launched a new program around this time called the “Mission 66” program.  The aim of Mission 66 was to improve the facilities in the national parks by 1966, which was the date of the 50th anniversary of the National Park Service. There were three large new buildings were a visitor center in the Rocky Mountain park.  At these new facilities, tourists could watch a movie about animals and nature in the area, they could talk to a ranger, and get oriented to the park.  Oriented means getting directed and knowing where you are and where you’re going. During Mission 66, the National Park Service bought many of the old guest lodges within the park boundaries, removed old buildings that were falling apart, and built new campgrounds and parking lots. 

By the late 1960s and early 1970s, many tourists were visiting Rocky Mountain park and other federal parks each year.  Because so many people were now visiting, there was damage done to the local plants and animals in the area.  Some campers would drive off-road into the back-country, or out-of-bounds areas.  Hikers crushed wildflowers and with the predators in the area all gone, the elk population grew too big.  There were also a lot of forest fires that caused damage to the area.  

In the 1970s, Park Superintendents started to try to manage the area better to help preserve it for future generations. To preserve means to keep something in good condition.  Park rangers started to teach tourists to be good to the parks and take better care of them.  And More signs started to be put up to help direct tourists. 

Today, many people visit Rocky Mountain National Park every year.  In fact, the park is one of the most visited parks in the National Park System, ranking as the third most visited national park in 2015.  Wouldn’t that be an amazing place to visit?  If you get a chance to go there, you will see beautiful nature, including mountains, tundra, and wildlife.  And you can learn from education rangers about the animals, plants, and landscapes in the area and how the park is maintained. We hope you get the chance to go one day!

The post History of The Rocky Mountains for Kids appeared first on Bedtime History: Podcast and Videos For Kids.

Do you have a piggy bank? Or maybe you have a glass jar in your house full of coins? You’ve probably seen your parents pay for something at the store with dollar bills – or maybe have yourself? Have you seen your parents use a credit card or pay with something using their phone and wonder how it works? How can they use a card or their phone to pay for something without actual coins and bills?? If you have any of these questions, you’re just like me, because I was very curious about how money came to be.

So take your mind back to time of the earliest people on earth. They were probably like you imagine, wearing animal skins and living in tribes, sometimes in caves or in little stick and mud huts they’d built to keep off the cold and rain. When these people needed something they didn’t have, they’d try and figure out how to make it or grow it or hunt for it themselves, but sometimes it was just easier to trade. You’ve probably traded something with a sibling or a friend before, right? I’ll give you this if you give me that. I used to do it with baseball cards. Well, these early humans would do it for things they really needed like blankets made from animal furs. They’d meet with other tribes in the area and make deals. They’d trade. Another word for this is bartering. They’d say “hey, I’ll give you five arrowheads for 3 furs? How does that sound?” The other tribe would would discuss the trade and maybe come back with, “How about six arrowheads for 3 furs?” The first tribe might agree that’s fair and then the deal would be complete and they’d swap items and everyone was happy. 

Way back in 6,000 B.C. the people of Mesopotamia became known for their bartering skills and introduced trade to the Phoenicians. Over time it became more and more popular, but it’s more than likely bartering happened long before the Mesopotamians.

Bartering worked well down through history and people even do it today, but over time humans began to see the problems with bartering and began to think of other ways to “trade” goods. What if instead of trading things like arrowheads and furs directly, we can use a different object to make the deal happen. The problem with bartering is you had to move the thing you wanted to trade all over the place. So if I wanted to trade with a tribe all the way across the valley, I’d have to load all of my goods in a cart or a horse or a wagon and haul them there. Kind of a pain, right? Also, what if we couldn’t agree on arrowheads for furs and 3 ½ arrowheads made more sense than 4. You can’t break an arrowhead in half, then it wouldn’t be any good. 

So ancient people came up with the idea to use valuable objects IN PLACE of goods. One of the early examples of what became money were shells. This is also called currency, a way to use one object to exchange for other objects. In China around 1,000 B.C. Asians began using a special type of shell called a Cowrie shell in exchange for other goods. So for example, I’d go to the market with a beautiful new dress I’d woven. There, a store owner might offer me 10 cowrie shells for the dress. They’d give me the cowrie shells, I’d give them the dress, and now I have shells, which are the equal value of the dress in my pocket. A lot easier to carry around than the dress. And then I can keep the shells, maybe go to another market later that week, and use the cowrie shells to buy my family wheat and rice for the rest of the month. Cowrie shells became a very popular form of money in China and spread throughout the region, including Africa .

Shell money was common in other places, too, like Australia, the Middle East, and North America. In North American indigenous people of the Iroquois Confederacy and Algonquin tribes, took shells they found in the ocean and ground them into beads called wampum. These white and purple beads were then strung into necklaces that could be used as money to exchange for other items. Soon European settlers also used wampum as money and it was used in the exchange for beaver pelts which were a very popular item at the time. 

So you’re probably wondering why we’re still not using cowrie shells and wampum beads today? Well, that’s because once groups of people realized how money could be used some groups started creating their own money out of hard metals. Civilizations like those in China who worked in metals were able to create the first money out of gold, silver, bronze and other precious metals. This is called minting. What’s funny is some of this first metal money was shaped like cowry shells, their favorite money system of the past. They also stamped these early coins with a symbol to show that it was made by their people. This is important because a value is attached to money that sort of has to be agreed upon by everyone using it. And the value of money can change over time! We’ll talk about that in a few minutes. So with China minting money and creating coins, the really cool thing is that trade moved faster. People that have access to money, can exchange things easier, and the money moves throughout the empire and everyone is more prosperous because of it. Also, around this time metal coins were especially important because long trade roads were forming between Asia and Europe such as the famous Silk Road. Europeans and Asians traded goods along these roads and also by water.

Around this time, the Greeks also learned about minting money and started minting their own. The Athenians were minting their own silver coins by 500 B.C. and this practice later spread to the Roman Empire. Over time, minting became more and more common and as you know it’s in use by the United States and countries all over the world who have their own mints and their own coins. Growing up, I loved collecting coins with different dates and pictures on them and sometimes coins from other countries. I always thought it was interesting why they decided to put certain symbols and words on each of their own coins. 

Paper money also was first invented by the Chinese, since they were also the first inventors of paper. Over time, paper money became easier to carry around than heavy metal coins. Imagine if you had to carry $100 worth of coins with you every time you went grocery shopping. Imagine $1,000 if you had to buy a bigger item. Paper money was also used by Charlemagne during his reign in Europe and of course is in use today with the dollar bill in the United States and each country with their unique bills. Do you know the names of money in different countries? Maybe you know a few. I’ll list some of the ones I know. The British Pound, the European Euro, the Japanese Yen, the Indian Rupee, Mexico’s peso, the Russian ruble. So If you get a chance be sure to look up these different currencies and what they look like. Sometimes you can even find them at hobby shops nearby.

You’ll notice with currency in different countries, they also differ in value. So 1 U.S. dollar is equal to about 113 Japanese yen. This value changes over time. The dollar today can buy less than it could 50 years ago. For example, in 1970 the cost of a candy bar was 10 cents! Just ten pennies! Today the cost of a candy bar is more like 1 or 2 dollars. 

In modern times, countries are very careful with how they mint money. This is because counterfeiting is a widespread crime. Counterfeiting is when people try and make fake money and use it. This problem has existed for a very long time going back even 1500 years ago. People would mix other metals with gold or silver to make it appear that a coin was made of that metal. Today, counterfeiters use complex designs and machines to make paper bills that look like the real ones. If you hold bills up to the light and look closely at them, especially the big ones like a $20 or $100 dollar bill, you’ll notice complex watermarks inside the bills and strips of paper that are hard to duplicate. Whenever new money is printed the United States Treasury is trying to develop new ways to outsmart counterfeiters. And counterfeiters do the same, so it’s a never ending game of cat and mouse to keep money safe.   

To get an idea of how much new money is printed every year in 2020, the United States Treasury printed over 1 million $100 dollar bills and around 2 and a half billion $1 dollar bills. 

In the modern day, new modes of money have become popular. You’ve probably seen your parents swipe a credit card at the store or type in the numbers when buying something online. The first credit cards became available in the 1950s and grew in popularity over the years. What can be hard to understand, is that you can spend money on credit cards that you don’t even have yet. It’s what is called a loan. You spend a certain amount of money that the credit card company lets you borrow, and then you pay it off. Credit cards are a nice convenience but people also have to be careful not to spend too much on a credit card, because if you can’t pay it off by the next month it can cost you even more money.

Digital payments have also become very popular. This means that rather than having dollar bills or coins in your pocket, you can use your computer or phone to pay for things. All of the money spent using computers is tracked on a bank’s computer. It’s kind of hard to imagine that things are bought and sold and just tracked on computers now, but it is very convenient not to have to worry about having actual money in your wallet. For example, when I get paid by my job, the money just shows up in my bank account. And then I pay bills using my bank account and it just sends the transactions to pay for my house and my car and my electricity bill. And when people donate to Bedtime History, I get an email and then can use that to pay for expenses for the podcast. Pretty crazy, right? Using services like PayPal, Venmo, and Apple Payments, now you just bring up an app on your phone and send people and businesses money that way. It’s definitely revolutionized the way money can be used.

The last really interesting new form of money in the modern age I want to talk about is called cryptocurrency. If you’ve ever heard of Bitcoin, it’s the first cryptocurrency. The cool thing about cryptocurrencies is they aren’t managed by a government or bank like all of the other money. They live on the Internet and can be used by people all over the world, regardless of where they live. Cryptocurrency, also called “crypto” for short, started in 2008, when someone on the Internet using the fake name Satoshi Nakamoto wrote a paper about how crypto could work. Crypt uses a technology called a blockchain that keeps track of every payment (also called a transaction) made using Bitcoin. The blockchain is highly secure and anonymous, which means no one can hack into it and see who is using the money and what they are doing with it. It’s become an entirely new kind of money. When the first Bitcoin was released it was worth a few cents, but now it’s worth over $35,000 dollars. Of course, its value rises and falls and there are other cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum and there is debate over how important crypto will be in the future.

It’s pretty crazy to think back about how money started out, at basic trading or bartering for goods and where it is now, with complex digital payments systems and cryptocurrencies. The world has changed so much in the last few thousand years and one of the reasons I love history. To try and better understand where we are and how we got here. The world is a vibrant and rapidly changing place and knowing it’s history can help us better know how the world and people work and also what we can do to make it a better place. I hope you enjoyed learning about the history of money like I did! 

The post History of Money, Bartering, and Cryptocurrency for Kids appeared first on Bedtime History: Podcast and Videos For Kids.

Close your eyes and imagine you are walking through the forest. You hear birds whistling in the air and watch a squirrel scurry up a tree trunk. You look down at your feet. They are bare! And your clothes are rough and made out of deer skin. You move around the forest looking for berries and nuts. You suddenly see some and shout for joy. You pick as many as you can, place them in a leather sack, and then run along a path out into an open meadow. In the meadow are brown huts made out of sticks and mud and clay. Smoke from campfires rise above the meadow and the people of your tribe are busy roasting fish and nuts. You find your family and show them your find of berries and nuts. Your mother and father are very happy and gets to work smashing them up for dinner. This is what it may have been like to live as a child during the Stone Age.

Like this child, if you had been born 10,000 or more years ago your life would have been very different! Would you like to live during this time? Or not? 

In our last episode, we learned all about the first human cities. We talked a little about what life was life was like before cities. Most humans lived in small tribes and wandered for their food. And groups of humans lived like this for a very, very long time. This was a time known as the Stone Age because the best tools people had were made out of stone. The Stone Age was divided into the Paleolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic Age. During much of this time, the earth was very cold during what was known as the Ice Age.  

As you can imagine, during this time the main purpose of these early humans was to just survive. This means finding food to eat and staying safe. Their world was very dangerous. They had to worry about staying warm, keeping the bad weather off, and avoiding dangerous animals. And getting enough to eat, of course. So they spent most of their time looking for food and trying to stay safe. Stone Age humans found food in many different ways. One of those ways was by gathering it. They looked high and low for berries to eat, roots, mushrooms, seeds, edible plants, nuts, grasses, and really anything that would give their body nutrition. The children probably spent most of the time just trying to gather anything their tribe could eat. They used their stone tools to smash whatever they gathered in stone bowls until it was easier to eat or cooked it into soups. They also ate meat. If they lived near a river they speared fish or at certain times of the year they hunted larger animals. When they did kill animals to eat, they often had big feasts and ate as much as they could because they weren’t sure when it would be until they could find meat again. And they didn’t only eat the meat, but used every part of the animal possible to stay alive. For example, when they killed a mammoth they used the hides for clothing and for their homes and the tusks for tools. Through the Ice Age humans relied on the big mammoths. If you haven’t seen a picture of a wooly mammoth before, they are similar to elepaphants but are hairier with longer tusks. 

They also hunted deer, bison, pig, and any other type of animal that would give them meat. A very long time ago, huge animals such as the wooly mammoth roamed the earth. The other big animals were saber tooth tigers which were like modern day tigers, but bigger and had had huge curved teeth. 

Stone Age humans were able to survive because they had found ways to sharpen stone tools and use very strong stones such as flint. Flint tools allowed them to chop meat and cut hides into clothing. They made arrowheads and spears out of flint, which gave them an advantage over animals. Eventually they developed hunting tools like a slingshot and bow and arrow. They also made harpoons for fishing out of ivory, which was the tusks of mammoths and hammers out of the hard stones they found.

Eventually, after the Ice Age, humans also found ways to start some basic farming, by planting their own seeds, and by domesticating animals. This means keeping animals in a fenced area and using them to make more animals. They domesticated goats, pigs, chickens, and other animals. 

Through the Ice Age humans were only able to survive becaus they used animal skins and furs to keep themselves warm and build shelters. Their shelters were like tents when they needed to be on the move or were huts made out of strong sticks and mud and clay with straw roofs. Often they also found deep caves that kept them warm. They had also learned how to start fires by striking flint in order to create a spark. This spark was struck into kindling, which was then used to build a fire. Fire kept humans warm through the winter and was also used to cook and preserve meat. It was also used in other ways to make food. With all of these special skills, many tribes of humans were able to survive the long Ice Age until the earth warmed. Once the earth warmed humans were able to grow faster and settle in places like rivers. This is around the same time the megafauna like the Wooly Mammoth died out. We aren’t sure whether this happened because of the change in the weather or because they were hunted to extinction by humans. But with the good weather, humans moved into the period called the Neolithic where they farmed more, domesticated more animals, and didn’t have to move so much like their ancestors. 

Stone Age humans spent most of their time eating and staying safe, but they also spent some time creating the first art. Paintings can be found in caves and on rock from thousands of years ago. Rock drawings are called petroglyphs. They carved pictures of the animals around them and human shapes that look like some of the stick figures you or your brothers or sisters might draw. Very ancient cave paintings were found in a cave in France near a town called Altimira nearly 14,000 years ago. These people also found ways to play music using very early flutes and drums. Our Stone Age ancestors were creative we are today. They probably sang and danced and told stories around the fire at night. Because they hadn’t figured out how to write stories down, the people who told stories had to memorize them or make them up. Then these stories were passed down. This is also called an oral tradition. The stories were about their lives, their hunts, or the gods they believed in that caused mysterious things to happen like the change in weather. They didn’t understand why things happened, so they made up stories to explain them. This is called mythology and each group probably had different gods and explanations for why things happened. 

Often large groups of tribes had the same beliefs and constructed the first basic temples to their gods. In some sites, large stones have been found standing in a circle. It must have taken many humans pulling on ropes to make these hugs rocks called megoliths to stand upright. It was here that together they worshiped their gods. When their loved ones died, they created grave sites and buried them with their things. They found way to memorialize, or remember them, after they passed away.

Over time, humans began to gather into communities and then into towns and eventually large cities. Be sure to check out our episode about The First Cities to learn more about Bronze Age humans. But even though many people turned into city-dwellers, many other humans lived like Stone Age humans for a long time after this. Even today there are small tribes that live deep in the jungles of places like the Amazon and still use stone tools and hunting and gathering to survive. Isn’t that wild!? 

Would you like to live like our Stone Age ancestors, or do you like living like we do today? If so, why? Are there things better about their lives in some ways? And in what ways is your life better? Think about some of the things you have to be grateful for that they didn’t have. We usually have more food to eat and are safer than they were. We have many modern conveniences to be grateful for. When I asked my kids, they said some things about Stone Age life sounded fun. Like being able to be outside and roam around in nature all day. Like many things are ups and downs to all ways of life. Spend some time thinking about what it would be like if you lived during their day.

Thanks for listening to this episode about the Stone Age and be sure to tune in next Monday for a brand, new episode!

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