Stories in the Deep Time in the West series examine what this region was like thousands, millions and even billions of years ago. Collectively, they show how that history is still visible and consequential today.
These stories invite you to take a break from the churn of day-to-day, season-to-season, election-to-election urgencies and to marvel instead at the forces and phenomena that have shaped the West over a much longer time frame.
How pronghorn outran the ice age
Can they outrun an uncertain climate future?
Meet the oldest rock in the West
Wyoming’s 3.5 billion-year-old geologic history reminds us that Earth is ever-changing.
What does ‘time immemorial’ really mean?
An overused phrase goes under the microscope.
How plate tectonics revolutionized our understanding of Earth
And how scientist Tanya Atwater was at the center of it all.
An age-old monument faces modern threats
Scientists say Grand Staircase-Escalante isn’t reaching its full research potential.
The Grand Canyon and Meteor Crater have a surprising link
Mysterious driftwood high in Grand Canyon caves hints at the legacy of Arizona’s huge impact crater.
Our aim with this project is to celebrate the West’s deep past — and to implicitly acknowledge its deep and wide-open future.
How to find deep time in Seattle
A geologist connects Earth’s history to the amazing stones that clad the city’s buildings.
How geology not only shapes the world, it shapes us
A geologist’s daughter reflects on deep time and her father’s influence.
Three books explore deep time and help us look forward
The future has already happened.
An introduction to deep time in the West
Step away from the churn of day-to-day, season-to-season, election-to-election urgencies.
