The road is considered an “engineering feat” because it was constructed despite intense seasonal snowdrifts and the fact that builders had to blast through solid rock.
Although it opened in 1910, the land itself has been inhabited by humans for millennia and geological evidence shows that some parts of the park date back as far as 1.6 billion years.
The wildlife in the park has been unchanged since it was established over 110 years ago. There are 71 species of mammals, 24 species of fish, 276 documented species of birds, and almost 2,000 species of plants.
The park was named for its many active glaciers. There were once as many as 150, but today, there are only 26. Unfortunately, they’re melting at two times the global average.
Glacier is home to 762 lakes and 563 streams. To say it another way, there are 25,622 acres of lakes and 2,865 miles of streams in the park.
The park covers 1,583 square miles, which makes it about 500 square miles bigger than the state of Rhode Island, about 400 square miles smaller than Delaware, and the twelfth largest national park in the country.