Marker Name: The Mammoth Site of Hot Springs, SD
Marker Type: Roadside
Marker Text:
Gigantic mammoths, ancestors of the majestic elephants of today, once roamed freely on the
High Plains of North America. A repository of their remains, along with other kinds of animals,
lay undisturbed until their discovery over 26,000 years later, in June 1974.
Limestone deposits beneath the earth’s surface dissolved in water from underground springs.
The land then collapsed and the resulting sinkhole filled with 95 degree water that lured
mammoths to drink or feed on vegetation. Once in the water, they could not get up the slippery,
steep incline. Death by starvation or drowning was the fate of most animals that came to the
sinkhole. Along with the mammoth, remains of the giant short-faced bear, extinct camel, gray
wolf, raptor, cottontail rabbit, white-tailed jackrabbit, white-tailed prairie dog, fish and other
associated fauna have also been found at the Site.
As centuries passed, the sinkhole gradually filled. Rain, snow and wind wore away the soil
leaving a hill of buried skeletons.
This hill remained undisturbed until 1974 when excavation for a housing project by Phil and
Elenora Anderson revealed bones and tusks of these huge animals.
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