Unusual Sandstone Formations on the Upper Missouri

Description

Beyond Soft Shell Turtle Creek on August 2, Maximilian observed that in a side valley "individual sandstone figures with flat, broad heads were standing like tables on a broad pedestal. The entire region is full of strange, novel formations which cannot be described." Several of Bodmer's views correspond to this written notation. The rendering reproduced here was probably made at about this time as the keelboat approached the region known locally as the Mauvaises Terres (Badlands), an area of the Missouri basin characterized by bare gray mountains and wind-worn peaks almost totally devoid of vegetation.