Arthur O. Wheeler

“ During the warm summer days the roar of ice falling from these upper glaciers is incessant.
The Gold range, situated westward beyond the Columbia river on its southern course, resembles the Selkirk range, but here the great ice-plough of a by-gone age has done more serious work, and the sharp peaks and jagged edges of the Selkirks give place, as a rule, to rounded domes and elevated plateaus, covered most of the year by snow. The rock formation is more purely achæan and consists chiefly of grey gneisses, varying from massive to schistose, and highly micaceous. ”

“ The accompanying illustration shows the dividing rock embossment surrounded by moraine and the wildly broken séracs extending across the glacier. The action of the glacier as an irresistible plane, shaving off the mountain side, is well depicted on the left hand. The main stream of the Yoho river issues from a fine cave which it has hollowed out in the ice-tongue. The front of the forefoot is precipitous, rising sharply about 150 feet. The slope then assumes a more gentle phase, and walking on the ice between the crevasses, which are here longitudinal, is an easy matter. ”

“ In a new and as yet inadequately mapped country, such as Canada, it is impossible to do more than approximate the area that may be described as "alpine." Roughly speaking, it can be placed at 250,000 square miles. This area is embodied by the Cordilleran or Rocky Mountain chain, embracing four principal ranges of mountains and numerous sub-ranges and groups. Enumerating from east to west, we have the Rocky Mountain or Main range, the Selkirk range, the so-called Gold range, and finally the Coast range, lying along the Pacific ocean. ”

“ The Selkirk range lies west of the Main range. It is practically a vast island of rock, ice and snow, insulated by giant loops of the Columbia and Kootenay rivers. The material composing it is of a much older and harder formation, consisting chiefly of archæan rocks: grey, pink, green and white quartzites, glittering mica-schists, argillites and rocks of gneissic character. The valleys are narrow, and the mountain masses rise swiftly up, their sides scored and seamed by giant scaurs. The fantastically carved limestone shapes of the Main range are lacking. ”

“ This field alone, embracing from 20,000 to 25,000 square miles, the finest alpine country of the entire Continent, is sufficient to supply an alpine club with work, both scientific and athletic, for many years to come. In the Selkirks, north of Mt. Rogers and south of Mt. Purity, lie unknown tracts, with peaks, towers, pyramids and pinnacles, rising from wide snow-fields, that are unknown, unnamed, and unmapped, and have only been seen from Selkirk summits near the railway and from the more distant Rockies. ”

“ An Alpine Club is one that has for its field of operations a tract of country fulfilling the above conditions. And herein lies the difference between an Alpine and a Mountain club: while any mountain tract will supply the requirements of the latter, those of the former can only be satisfied by a region where there is a permanent snow line, above which snow and ice may be found throughout the year. ”

“ The Coast range, reaching into the far northland, is cut and intersected by many inlets from the sea. These inlets are often narrow and enclosed by precipitous sides of rock, over which cascades fall hundreds of feet to tide-water below. The steeps are clad with forests of tropical luxuriance, through which it is only with great difficulty a passage can be forced, and giant trees of fir, cedar and balsam grow nearly to the summits of the mountains. ”

“ One of the objects of the recently organized Alpine Club of Canada is the study of prominent glaciers of the region, with a view to obtaining information concerning the formation and flow, advance or retreat of those upon which no observations have as yet been made, and of adding to existing information where some little work in this direction has been done. Speaking generally, it is desired to add the Club's mite to scientific knowledge of glacial action by instituting yearly observations of the more prominent and accessible ice-cascades of the Canadian Rockies. ”

“ The former contribute much to the seeker after the picturesque in Nature, and the latter are a source of joy to the true alpine enthusiast. Both effects are from the same cause, viz.: the large amount of precipitation deposited in the form of snow, accumulating from year's end to year's end until the entire cap of the range appears in perspective as an endless succession of snow-fields, with precipitous black faces of rock rising at intervals from their midst, where the sheer is too steep for snow to lie. ”

“ Gordon on the east and Yoho peak on the west, the latter separating it from the Habel glacier. On account of the short run be- tween rock-bound sides, the glacier carries a very small amount of debris and is of remarkable purity. For the same reason its moraines are poorly developed. A short distance above the tongue, the ice stream divides and flows around a knob of rock or "nunatak," which it covered at an earlier date and has now almost wholly encircled by a moraine. The eastern arm is small. ”

“ Crevasse—A fissure or crack formed in a snow-field or glacier; caused by non-elasticity of the ice when moving down the uneven surface of its rocky bed. Longitudinal crevasses are formed in the direction of the flow ”

“ Investigations of the Illecillewaet glacier at the summit of the Selkirk range, near Glacier station on the Canadian Pacific railway, were begun by George and William S. Vaux in 1887, when photographs were obtained of the ice-tongue. They were taken up systematically in 1894 and have been continued yearly since then. Other glaciers upon which they have made observations are: the Asulkan glacier in the Selkirks, and the Victoria and Yoho glaciers in the Main range. ”

“ There can be little doubt that the characteristics outlined above, furnish not only a worthy field for an alpine organization, but a field of immense magnitude, and one that will continually offer something new for many years to come. ”

“ The theory here advanced that the origin of "Block moraines" is due to seismic disturbance, is valuable in view of the fact that, at the present date, no snowfield or glacier in either range carries a load of rock fragments of sufficient size to form moraines similar to those studied by Dr. Sherzer under that name. The moraines referred to were found at no great distance from the ice-tongues of the Victoria, Wenkchema and Illecillewaet glaciers. ”

“ The books, etc., published by the authors named have attracted a great many people to the region, and, to meet the demand, the Canadian Pacific Railway Company have erected a number of hotels at beauty-spots along the line, which have been enlarged and modernized, until now the acme of luxury may be found in the heart of these wilds, where the many forces of Nature that contribute so largely to a civilized world are seen at work. ”

“ The author died before 1972, meaning that copyright on that author's works expired before the Canadian copyright term was extended non-retroactively from 50 to 70 years on 30 December 2022. The longest-living author of this work died in 1945, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 78 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works. ”

“ They are found even at the very summits of some of the peaks, at an altitude of 10,000 feet above the level of the sea—their former home. At the other places, beds containing fossilized species, closely allied to the trilobite, are to be found. One of these, on the slopes of Mt. Stephen, at an altitude of 7000 feet, has become famous.
In this range, the valleys are wide, owing to the susceptibility of the rock formations to the erosive power of ice and water. Their sides, clad with bronze-green pine and dark blue spruce, sweep upward to open parklands, dotted with golden larch ”

“ The glacier was at once visited, and, cutting steps in the ice forefoot, the party reached the comparatively level portion of the tongue where the plates had been set. The row of metal plates placed across the surface of the ice to mark the movement of the forefoot had been fixed in position on the 15th July, 1906, and their respective positions were now being checked, just one day later than the exact year. ”

“ It may incidentally be mentioned that it is only by the means of the science of photogrammetry that in a single day—not taking into consideration the other work done when locating plates and making measurements, etc.—sufficient data could be obtained by two persons to map the tongue so completely and accurately, without making actual measurements, a process that would entail a considerable expenditure of time and labor. ”

“ From it we may gather that the approximate thickness of the ice on the right side is 170 ft., and on the left side 130 ft.; that the height of the cliffs from the ice to the lower edge of the upper growth of timber in illustration No. 1 varies from 300 to 400 ft., a depth of ice that once filled the valley; and that the slope of the portion of the bed beneath the ice tongue is approximately 35 per cent. ”

“ The Dominion Government is steadily pushing its topographical surveys into the unknown terrtiory, but these surveys are slow and costly and some adequate return must be in sight before they can be undertaken. ”

“ Talus—The mass of rock fragments lying at the base of a mountain cliff, formed by the accumulation of pieces brought down from above by the action of gravity, frost, rain, etc.; equivalent to "scree" or "debris."
Till—A stiff clay containing boulders of all sizes up to several tons weight; often smoothed and striated by glacial action. ”

“ THE CANADIAN ROCKIES, A FIELD FOR AN ALPINE CLUB
By Arthur O. Wheeler
The first question is: What constitutes a field for an Alpine Club? The second question, and one of primary importance, is: Do the Rocky mountains of Canada fill the required conditions? ”

“ It is at the present time several hundred feet distant and many feet below. In his monograph, Dr. Sherzer refers to this feature and states that he measured the oldest living tree he could find growing in the path of the avalanche, and it had only 47 rings of growth. ”