Mammoth Hot Springs Terraces, Yellowstone National Park, circa 1940

About this postcard

The card shows the travertine terraces of Mammoth Hot Springs in Yellowstone National Park, with pale pink, orange and cream mineral cascades stepping down toward the foreground and a pool of pale blue water on the upper terrace; the Fort Yellowstone buildings and green hillside appear at right beneath blue mountains. Mammoth Hot Springs is formed as hot water saturated with calcium carbonate cools and deposits travertine, building the terraces a few inches a year. The nearby settlement grew around Fort Yellowstone, the U.S. Army post that administered the park from 1886 until the National Park Service took over in 1918. The Haynes Studios of Bozeman, Montana, were long-time official photographers of Yellowstone and issued many such views.