3215m (10548ft.)
Located north of the head of Totem Creek; easternmost tower on south portion of Mount Murchison. Banff Park, Alberta Major headwater Saskatchewan River.
Latitude 51; 54; 40 Longitude 116; 37; 40, Topo map 82N/15
Can be seen from Highway 11
Named by W.L. Putnam in 1973. Hall, Henry Snow (Henry Snow Hall jr. made the first ascent of this tower in 1940. He was an official and first honourary president of the American Alpine Club.) Unofficial name.
First ascended in 1940 by H.S. Hall, guided by Edward Feuz jr.. Journal reference AAJ 4-312.
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| Photo: (l-r) Hall Tower, Engelhard Tower, Bison Tower, and un-named tower looking up Murchison Creek on Highway #11 |
Other Information
Photo: Looking up Murchison Creek to Hall TowerMount Murchison was named by James Hector in 1858 after Sir Roderick Murchison who was at that time the director of the Geological Survey of Great Britain and had recommended that Hector be chosen as the geologist on the Palliser Expedition. In a letter written in 1859, Sir Murchison thanked Hector, "for attaching my name to this culminating point."
The base of Mount Murchison covers an area measuring five km by seven km. There are two high points on the main summit (northwest and southeast). They are 700 metres apart. Seven "towers" in excess of 3050 metres (Engelhard Tower, Gest Tower, Feuz Tower, Bison Tower, Cromwell Tower, Hall Tower, and South East Tower,) lie to the southeast and have been unofficially named. It is a rather unique mountain and Bow Pass is probably the best point to get a feeling for its areal extent and the fact that it has so many individual summits of approximately the same elevation.
It is said that the Indians believed that Mount Murchison was the highest peak in the Rockies.