M. Mark Miller, Author

Category: Hotels

  • An Event: Ready To Sign Adventures in Yellowstone at Old Faithful Inn

    Grand Geyser was erupting the last time I rode up to Old Faithful Inn for a book signing. I took the towering white plume of water and steam silhouetted against the pale blue sky as an auspicious sign. This will be a good day to sell books, I thought.

    I’ll be in the lobby of the famous inn again on Friday and Saturday (Aug. 10 and 11) from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. to sign my book Adventures in Yellowstone. Look for me by the clock that tells the next time Old Faithful is expected to erupt. There’ll be an easel with a a description of my book, my biography and a photo of me.

    The last time I was there, I checked in at the gift shop where employees greeted me like an old friend and helped me set up. (It was the fourth time I’ve done book signings at the Inn.) Soon, I was seated behind a table smiling as passers-by and enticing them to buy my book.

    I adjusted to the rhythm of the place, which is governed by Old Faithful’s 90-minute cycle. The lobby is nearly empty when the geysers plays. Then it fills with a rush of people searching for the restrooms, awing over the magnificent lobby and milling around. When things thin out a bit is the best time to sell books.

    I noticed that during slack times—even while Old Faithful was playing—there were a few people who were eager to talk about the stories in my book. I began asking questions and discovered that many of them were tour bus drivers looking for stories to tell their clients during the rides between sights.

    I told them that my book has stories about many of the famous people and events in Yellowstone history. Emma Cowan’s story of being captured by Indians would be one to tell when driving by Nez Perce Creek. Truman Everts’ 37-day ordeal of being lost lost alone in the Yellowstone wilderness would a good one near Yellowstone Lake. And crossing Dunraven Pass, why, the Earl of Dunraven’s hilarious description of how to pack a mule or one of his exciting hunting stories.

    “if there aren’t enough stories in my book,” I said, “you should check out my blog. There are more than hundred tales there.”  When I gave examples, I mentioned William Henry Wright’s efforts to photograph grizzlies at night with flash powder.  ”That’s great,” the bus driver  said, “sometimes I have a whole busload of photographers.”

    When I asked about her current load, she sighed. “Children,” she said, “lots of children.”

    “They’d love Ernest Thompson Seton’s ‘Johnny Bear,’” I replied, and she headed back to her bus to read it.

    So if you’re at Old Faithful Inn on Aug. 10 or 11, I’d love to see you. I’d be glad to sigh a copy of Adventures in Yellowstone for you and talk about park history. And if you miss me then you’ll have another chance. I’ll be back for another book signing the weekend of Aug. 25-26.

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    — Read about another book signing at Old Faithful Inn here.

    — Image, Postcard of Old Faithful Inn, c, 1906. New York Public Library.

  • A Tale: Early Hotels Offered Crude Accommodations — 1883

    In August of 1883 Yellowstone Park was overrun with parties of dignitaries including President Chester A. Arthur. Still, that’s when a 58-year-old school teacher, Margaret Cruikshank took new Northern Pacific train to Yellowstone. Miss Cruikshank said her guidebooks were far too lavish in praising the natural wonders of the Park, and she was quick to condemn the accommodations. Here’s her description of Marshall’s Hotel at the Lower Geyser Basin.

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    Marshall’s Hotel

    We went on a rather monotonous day’s journey till the early afternoon brought us to the Forks of Firehole—Marshall’s.

    Marshall is a man who, having no park permit, has chosen to assume that he could keep such a house of entertainment, that the Yellowstone Park Company would be glad to let him stay.

    When only rough teamsters and hunters visited the Park I suppose he gave satisfaction. But now that crowds throng there and are of a more fastidious sort, Marshall won’t do. Marshall must go.

    The effective force here is only three—Marshall, his wife, and a Chinaman—and they are all overworked and all cross. Not being forethoughted and forehanded as to providing and not having very high standards. I cannot praise their results.

    We had a tolerably good supper, which I enjoyed. Part of the reason was that our party got in early and the over‑worked cook was not so rushed. We had fish nicely fried and quite tolerable coffee. I often found it difficult when things were at their worst at Marshall’s to force down enough food to sustain nature, such abominable messes were served up to us.

    Above the square part of the building was a great loft, and this was elegantly subdivided into cells by burlap partitions reaching rather more than half‑way up. Judging by their size I thought that there must have been more than a dozen of these little cubbyholes, dark and stifling! Into these most of us were stowed. Beyond beds, the less said about our accommodations the better. Many slept on the floor.

    Our room was in the southeast comer upstairs and had two beds in it, one at each end. Mrs. Gobeen was our roommate.

    It fell to my lot to sleep where the eaves came down over me like the crust over the blackbird in the pie. Mrs. Gobeen objected to having the window open. The bed was stuffed with sagebrush and had a horrid medicinal, quininey smell. And though the bedclothes may have been clean, I fancied that they had covered every teamster in the valley, beside being washed in that hot spring till the blankets were perfect felt. Moreover, with the sagacity usually exhibited by the lower classes in bed making, every double blanket had its fold up towards the head, so that if you were too warm you had to throw off both thicknesses—or neither.

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    — Margaret Cruikshank’s journal is at the Yellowstone Research Center in Gardiner, Montana.

    — Photo from a  stereopticon view, Yellowstone Digital Slide File.