Anyone here remember the 59 Hebgen Lake quake? I was there.
Awesome. I was there as a five year old, just afterward.
I remember hearing about it in the news.
I remember it in a 1959 National Geographic article - an entire mountainside avalanched down into a ravine, which created a lake, and Old Faithful’s timing was altered. Pictures of kitchens with cupboard contents scattered about. We had just returned from Japan & remembered earthquakes that made everything in the house move about.
Did you survive?
Is that the night the mountain fell?
I have a park service book from the early 60’s about that quake that I bought when visiting there. Lots of devastation.
I was in High School in Helena. Pretty good rockin’ and rollin’ in the dorms.
Was that a dance?
I vividly remember the 1959 Hebgen Lake earthquake! The night of the earthquake, I was with my family sleeping in a 16-ft. travel trailer parked next to my aunt and uncle's cabin in the national forest less than 150 yards from the south shore of the lake.
Besides the terrifying, violent shaking that literally threw me out of a bunk bed during the quake, I'll never forget the eerie sight we saw at daybreak when we went down to the lake. The entire lake bed had tilted to the north in the night and the new shoreline was almost 200 feet out from my uncle's boat dock!
“Anyone here remember the 59 Hebgen Lake quake? I was there.”
We were through the area a few weeks before the quake, visiting grandparents and relatives in Cody and Powell, WY.
I think my Aunt, Uncle, and my two cousins were there then too! My Mom was saying they came from Nevada and took their two kids to Yellowstone for a vacation. They had to evacuate the park when it happened! I had thought it was a fire, but if it was in 1959, it must’ve been that earthquake!
If you were there, you’re lucky to be here.
You were there? As a young child I would guess. You could have been one of the boy-scouts camping or other children who’s families who got trapped behind the landslide that blocked off the river that created the new lake.
I have been to Hebgen lake many times. It’s kind of eerie in a way?
My grandparents were children of homesteaders in Montana, and they spent many days hiking around Yellowstone park. They discovered a few new geysers and mud pots even. Long before the boardwalks and regulations made the park too restrictive, they would fish, hunt, camp there for weeks on end.
After the 59 quake, my grandmother told me there were many changes in the park. As regular as Old Faithful is, she said it has never been as accurate as it was before the quake.
My grandparents used to camp next to the geysers and even washed their cloths and dishes in the hot water that overflowed from the Grand Prismatic Spring as it flowed in to the Yelowstone river that runs between the geysers and the road.
My grandfather was one of the many carpenters who worked on expanding Old Faithful Inn back during the 1920’s
We just visited there in Oct. after Obama evicted us from Yellowstone and we decided to detour our route home. It was quite interesting.
We were going to hike to see the fault scarp but there were recent grizzly sightings/warnings. We weren’t sure our pocket glocks were sufficient griz deterrents so we’ll return better equipped.
Lew, Ks.
Wow. How old were you? If you don’t mind me asking. What did you experience?