We’ve all heard the story. Of the 150 original glaciers, only 35 remain, and those are projected to disappear by 2030. Being a forward-looking guy, I figure that we should start the process of selecting a new name for the park now.
We could call it Moraine National Park.
Al Gore has suggested The Park Formerly Known as Glacier.
Or we could just call it George W. Bush National Park. (Actually reality is way ahead of me on this suggestion. One of the glacier is named, errr, I mean was named “Chaney Glacier”.)
Eh? History has no previous instances of such massive glacial melting, so its seems to me that history is not a guide. In any case, you have to admit there’d be something odd about a Glacier National Park where the glaciers were on hiatus of unknown duration.
have you ever been to Glacier Point in Yosemite Nat’l Park?
Lots and lots of tourists drive the long windy road to the top, and then ask the ranger, “where can I see the Glacier?”. One ranger there likes to respond by asking “excuse me, ma’am, but how old are you? Because the glacier is no longer here. But if you are about a half million years old, then you may have seen it when you were a little girl.”
GW National Park ** – that way the righties can think it means George Bush ** and the lefties can think it means Global Warming, and the tourists can think it means Glaciers Where?
Doubly fitting because of Waterton Park directly across the border (the combination is known as Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park). Just get the Canadians to agree to the transposition, and you’re there!
Isn’t global warming supposed to melt enough ice-cap to desalinate the North Atlantic and kill the Gulf Stream thereby plunging us into a new ‘Little Ice Age’ like what caused the Dark Ages and result in the growth of glaciers in the Northern Hemisphere?
My dad and I went looking for a glacier near Georgetown, Colorado last year but couldn’t find it. A guy at a nearby store thought it might have melted. If anyone knows anything about this glacier and where it went I’d like to hear about it.
As for Glacier National Park, Cold, Damp, and Windy park is an accurate enough name for me.
I think that in 20 years of going there regularly (parents live about an hour from East Glacier) I may have had one cold, damp, windy day. That was probably in the fall. It’s one of the most beautiful places in the world, in the summer.
Geological history does. As this article describes, Earth’s history includes many glacial cycles. There have also been times when the Earth had very little ice, even in high latitudes.
Google “st mary’s glacier, colorado” for more. 20 years ago, it appeared to be a dirty snowbank. Not very exciting to look at, but I’ll be sad when it’s gone.