Bryce Canyon National Park, UT
At Bryce Canyon National Park, years and years of water running through the area has formed colorful Claron limestones, sandstones, and mudstones into thousands of spires, fins, pinnacles, and mazes. Hoodoos formed over thousands of years by the very same processes that form the qualities of surrounding parks. Water, ice (at varying periods) and gravity are the forces which formed Bryce Canyon.
Dolomite, limestone and siltstone are very difficult and form the most protective caprock on most of the spires. Erosional force breaks apart the more difficult rocks, a process called Frost Wedging. Mudstone is the softest rock in a hoodoo and is easily identified because it creates the narrowest portion of the pinnacles. Every time it rains the stucco is renewed. Eolian or wind forces erode at slow rates. If wind doesn't hamper the stucco layer quickly enough it will revive before eolian erosion affects the stone.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints sent him because his skill as a carpenter would be needed in settling this region. Bryce built a path to the plateau top to retrieve firewood and timber. He also constructed an irrigation canal to raise crops and animals. Local people called the canyon with all the odd rock formations near Ebenezer's house "Bryce's Canyon". The Bryces moved to Arizona in 1880, the title remained.
As southern Utah became more and more developed, Reuben Syrett and his wife--who homesteaded just outside the present park boundaries--invited their buddies to see the weathered rock formations. By popular demand, they developed sleeping and eating facilities in the lake rim. They called their institution, "Tourist's Rest." After the area was set aside as a national monument in 1923, the Union Pacific Railroad purchased out the Syrett's pursuits and started to assemble Bryce Canyon Lodge intending to create the Bryce Canyon area part of their newest "Loop Tour" of the southwest. The Syrett's then built "Ruby's Inn" in their own property just north of the park.
