Devils Tower / Bear Lodge

Sacred Native landmark, first US National Monument, deep folklore

The great stone tower rising 1,200 feet out of the Wyoming prairie is sacred to more than twenty Native nations, who know it as Bear Lodge and tell of a giant bear that clawed the sides as it chased children onto the rock, which rose to save them, the grooves in the columns being the claw marks. It became the first National Monument in the United States in 1906, is a world-famous climb, and starred as the meeting place in Close Encounters. June is the month of Native ceremonies here, and climbers are asked, though not required, to stay off the rock for it. About 85 percent honour the ban and do not climb.