{"id":3567,"slug":"fort-yellowstone-mammoth-hot-springs-wyoming","story":[{"heading":null,"paragraphs":["Yellowstone was dying before it had a chance to live. Established in 1872 as the world's first national park, it spent fourteen years under civilian superintendents who had no money, no men, and no power — while poachers slaughtered the herds, tourists broke off pieces of the geysers for souvenirs, and developers ran bathhouses in the hot springs. In 1886, Congress refused to fund the park at all. The Secretary of the Interior did the only thing left: he called the Army.","Captain Moses Harris rode in with Company M of the 1st Cavalry in August 1886 and set up Camp Sheridan at the foot of the Mammoth Terraces. It was supposed to be temporary. The Army stayed thirty-two years — the longest military administration of any national park, and the one that invented the job.","Fort Yellowstone's soldiers did everything the Park Service would later claim as its own: they arrested poachers, built the roads, ran the concessions, taught the tourists — the 'Immortal Fifteen' infantrymen posted at Old Faithful became the first ranger-interpreters in history. Buffalo Soldiers patrolled the backcountry. By 1910 there were 324 soldiers at the post. When the National Park Service was founded in 1916, it simply inherited the Army's playbook and put on different hats."]},{"heading":"Why this file matters","paragraphs":["Fort Yellowstone is the archive's rescue file — the first national park saved by the cavalry, its management invented by soldiers because no one else would do it. The documented 32-year administration is the record; the red-roofed fort under the terraces is the lore of a park that owes its existence to the Army.","A park that needed soldiers to survive keeps their fort — the file's suggestion being that Yellowstone's first rangers wore cavalry boots."]}],"name":"Fort Yellowstone","aliases":[],"type":"SITE","type_label":"Site","cats":["LOCAL_FOLKLORE","HAUNTED_PLACE","FRONTIER","MILITARY"],"groups":["hauntings","legends"],"desc":"The 1891 fort—where the Army ran the park.","full_desc":"A site in Mammoth Hot Springs, Wyoming, Fort Yellowstone is filed here for what the record attaches to it. The 1891 fort—where the Army ran the park. The presences in its file go unnamed: the soldiers, the record says. The dossier holds 2 reported claims, 1 legend and 1 documented fact, with the verified spine filed separately from the lore. The site is open to visitors.","address":null,"city":"Mammoth Hot Springs","county":null,"state":"Wyoming","postal":null,"region":"West","lat":44.97321,"lon":-110.692943,"coord_kind":"CITY","status":"ACTIVE","access":"PUBLIC","access_notes":null,"ownership":null,"website":null,"phone":null,"year_built":null,"year_opened":null,"year_closed":null,"year_demolished":null,"designation":null,"current_use":"Historic site","research_notes":"MTWY batch; VERIFY task auto-queued.","stage":"SOURCE_RESEARCH","quality":{"level":"MEDIUM","score":59.4,"dims":{"location_confidence":0.75,"identity_confidence":0.65,"historical_confidence":0.8,"source_quality":0.3999999999999999,"paranormal_claim_provenance":0.8,"coordinate_confidence":0,"current_access_confidence":0.7,"freshness":0.65}},"claims":[{"id":3944,"type":"NAMED_GHOST_LEGEND","description":"The soldiers are reportedly seen. The site in Mammoth Hot Springs, Wyoming gives the account a documented setting: real place, real history, unresolved reports. 'Fort Yellowstone' preserves the telling; the record keeps it filed where it belongs, as lore. The name gives the haunting a face, and the sightings give the name a job.","evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","evidence_label":"Documented legend","entity":"The soldiers","where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]},{"id":3945,"type":"APPARITION","description":"Reported figures at the fort. Fort Yellowstone's file is thin on proof and long on persistence — the standard profile of American place-lore. Witness accounts, no evidence file: the claim is anecdotal and stays that way. The account appears in 'Fort Yellowstone'. The figure remains the site's most-repeated sighting.","evidence":"ANECDOTAL","evidence_label":"Anecdotal","entity":null,"where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]}],"history":[{"description":"The 1891 fort is documented. The site's documented history is the record the rest of the file stands on. The fact is historically verified — the part of the file that doesn't need hedging. Sources including 'Fort Yellowstone' carry the record. It is the kind of fact the rest of the dossier leans on.","evidence":"HISTORICALLY_VERIFIED","date_start":"1891","date_end":null,"confidence":null,"source":{"name":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"legends":[{"name":null,"summary":"The soldiers are reportedly seen. Fort Yellowstone's file is thin on proof and long on persistence — the standard profile of American place-lore. 'Fort Yellowstone' preserves the telling; the record keeps it filed where it belongs, as lore. The report is preserved in sources like 'Fort Yellowstone'. It's the version the place will be remembered by, whether or not it's the true one.","earliest":null,"evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","source":{"name":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"entities":[{"name":"The soldiers","claimed_identity":"The soldiers","verified":null,"summary":"The soldiers are reportedly seen. The site in Mammoth Hot Springs, Wyoming gives the account a documented setting: real place, real history, unresolved reports. The file keeps The soldiers on the roster; the sightings keep the name alive. The telling survives; the proof stays folklore. The reports keep the address on the map.","behavior":"The soldiers are reportedly seen.","area":null,"first_ref":null,"source":{"name":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"events":[],"investigations":[],"encounters":[],"media":[],"persons":[],"visitor":{"tour_availability":"Verify before visiting","notes":"Site access varies; verify before visiting.","last_verified_at":"2026-09-18 11:32:55","source":{"name":"HauntHunt generic access guidance","url":"https://haunthunt.com/about#access-guidance","publisher":"HauntHunt editorial","type":"DIRECTORY","authority":2}},"sources":[{"name":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}],"conflicts":[],"wiki":{"title":"Fort Yellowstone","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Yellowstone","desc":"United States historic place in Yellowstone National Park","extract":"Fort Yellowstone was a U.S. Army fort, established in 1891 at Mammoth Hot Springs in Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone was designated in 1872 but the Interior Department was unable to effectively manage the park. Administration was transferred to the War Department in August 1886 and General Philip Sheridan sent a company of cavalry to Mammoth Hot Springs to build a cavalry post. The army originally called the post Camp Sheridan in honor of General Sheridan but the name was changed to Fort Yellowstone in 1891 when construction of the permanent fort commenced. The army administered the park until 1918 when it was transferred to the newly created National Park Service. The facilities of F","img":"https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/43/Fort_Yellowstone_Circa_1910.jpg/960px-Fort_Yellowstone_Circa_1910.jpg?utm_source=en.wikipedia.org&utm_campaign=api&utm_content=thumbnail","score":82,"lat":44.975,"lon":-110.69805556},"counts":{"claims":2,"history":1,"legends":1,"entities":1,"sources":1}}