Devils Tower National Monument

27 mi. north-west of Sundance is the Devil's Tower, an extraordinary natural monument and a landmark visible from many miles away. This huge isolated crag (alt. 5118 ft) was declared a National Monument, the first in the United States, in 1906.The crag, known to the local Indians as Mateo Tipi, was the subject of an old legend. A giant bear, it was said, was pursuing two children when suddenly the land on which the children were standing was thrust up into the air, out of the bear's reach; and the grooves in the crag were made by the bear's claws as it scrabbled at the rock to get at them. Under the south-east side of the Devil's Tower, which is particularly impressive in the morning or evening sun, lives a large colony of prairie dogs.