SS-3

This tree trunk was exhibited on the lawn in front of the Snow Museum and weighs 5,500 lbs. It is cut and polished on one end and came from the Arizona petrified forest which is said to contain, in 1000 acres, a million tons of petrified wood. There are some trees in this National Monument that measure up to 150 ft in length and 10 ft in diameter. This log is one of the largest known, perhaps even the largest. The circumference is 38 x 28" at the widest and narrowest points. According to geology the trees grew fifty million years ago and were in their present petrified condition many millions of years before the advent of man. Petrifaction is a process that takes ages of gradually changing organic matter into stone, usually where the trees have fallen into a primeval stream and the wood has been replaced by silica, etc, making silicified wood. Petrified wood is colorfully agatized due to iron and manganese in solutions. (This material was included in the label from the Snow Museum)