Geology is the star attraction in many national parks, but Arches National Park reveals erosional wonders like no other place on Earth. There’s something thrilling and slightly unsettling about a massive rock with a hole in its middle or a ribbon of stone flung like a spider’s thread from one rock face to another. And there’s nothing quite like a view of blue sky or snow-capped mountains framed by stone.
So many stony holes of so many shapes and sizes abound here that people spend years hunting unrecorded arches, quarreling over measurements and categories, and dreaming up original names. Selections in "The Arches Reader" range from creative nonfiction to short fiction to poetry to amateur versions of scientific reports.
Jeffrey D. Nichols is professor of history at Westminster University. He is the author of "Prostitution, Polygamy, and Power" and co-editor of "Playing with Shadows: Voices of Dissent in the Mormon West."
