Science: Indian Signs

Many a curiously bent tree growing in the Mississippi Valley and the Great Lakes region is no mere freak of nature. It is the handwork of long-dead Indians. In the July Scientific Monthly Geologist Raymond E. Janssen of Evanston, Ill. tells how he settled the puzzle of the crooked trees for which he could find no scientific explanation anywhere. He ran across a few historical references which indicated that "trees were sometimes bent by the Indians to mark trails through the forests." Several summers of study convinced Janssen that the deformed trees are surviving guideposts.

Trees gnarled by accident most often bend...