[Geysers] Geyserland 1908---more about Joseph Peng from Lee Whittlesey

[Lee_Whittlesey at nps.gov]

For John and others who have mentioned Joseph Peng, an early geyser
gazer...

I've written about him in my book Storytelling in Yellowstone: Horse and
Buggy Tour Guides (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2007) in
the chapter entitled "A Pronounced Weakness for Geysers: Early  Geyser
'Gazers' in Yellowstone," pages 102-104 and 234.   Joseph Peng was probably
the person who is honored in Reau Campbell's book Campbell's New Revised
Complete Guide and Descriptive Book to Yellowstone Park (1909 and other
editions, page 112) in the section marked "The Walk with Joe."  Earlier (in
the 1890s), he may have been the Joe who worked for Larry Mathews at
Norris, giving walking-tours of that basin. As Mr. Robinett mentioned,
Joseph Peng wrote the geyser table for the Oregon Short Line. It appeared
in several editions of Where Gush the Geysers (such as 1909, p. 22), and I
suspect that this table is the same one that John mentioned as being in
Geyserland (1908), also by Oregon Short Line.

As I said in the book, I only wish that we had Peng's notebooks on geysers,
which must have been voluminous.

Lee Whittlesey
Park Historian, NPS
YNP



                                                                           
             John Robinett                                                 
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“Geyserland” is the title of a brochure published by the Oregon Short Line
Railroad (OSL) to promote the 1908 season at Yellowstone. The OSL was one
of only two railroads who built tracks close to the Park entrances, and, of
course, at that time the primary way to reach the Park for most tourists
was via train. Since my collection of Yellowstone memorabilia focuses on
the railroads that served YNP I’m always on the lookout for the relatively
scarce OSL publications. I recently found this brochure and thought it was
interesting enough to be worth the effort to scan it and put it online.
Many of you Geyser Gazers may want to take a look. There is one page
entitled Geyser Time Table. That page says “Prepared upon the authority of
Official Guide, Joseph Peng, Old Faithful Inn, whose observations in the
Park have covered 17 years.” Interestingly enough, in the several years I
have been watching the Geyser List, I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a
mention of Mr. Peng.

If you do choose to take a look, be sure to click on a photo to get to the
larger views which, hopefully, are large enough to read the text if you
wish to do so.

http://john-s-island.blogspot.com/2012/06/geyserland.html

John Robinett
Seattle, Washington
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