The Golden Gate of Yellowstone occupies an area in northwestern Yellowstone Park in Wyoming, where a steep, narrow road passes through the mountainside. The Grand Loop Road hugs the walls along Golden Gate Canyon above Glen Creek and forms a narrow passage from Mammoth to Yellowstone Plateau. The Golden Gate also provides a view of Bunsen Peak, a 50-million year old volcano named for Robert Bunsen, the scientist responsible for the Bunsen burner.

Dan Christie Kingman, part of the Army Corps of Engineers, rebuilt the road through this area of the park in 1883; the pass along the treacherous portion of Grand Loop Road subsequently became known as Kingman Pass. Workers building a stagecoach road in 1883 named the area due to the golden color of the canyon’s rock and the road’s purpose as a gateway into the higher levels of Yellowstone.

The view of the Golden Gate into Yellowstone, America’s first national park, follows a uniquely American perspective that the territory was new and available for uses that Americans deemed necessary, including the establishment of the Grand Loop Road designed to improve accessibility between Mammoth Hot Springs and Yellowstone Plateau.

Researched, written, and narrated by University of West Florida Public History Student Jonathan Harwood.