History
Big Rock is one of several thousand erratics found in Alberta and Montana called the Foothills Erratics Train, which originated from a landslide in the Tonquin Valley of Jasper National Park, from Lower Cambrian-aged Gog Group. Big Rock was transported along the confluence of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet and the Laurentide Ice Sheet approximately 12 to 18 thousand years ago to its present location.
The people of the Blackfoot First Nation used Big Rock as a landmark for finding a crossing over the Sheep River (where Okotoks stands today) long before European settlement. The town's name, Okotoks, is derived from "o'kotok", meaning "rock" in the Blackfoot language, and may refer to the rock. The rock also contains native pictographs and was considered a medicine rock to the natives. In the 1970s the government declared it a Provincial Historic Site to protect its geological and cultural importance.
James Hector, a geologist with the Palliser Expedition, first documented the rock in 1863. He misidentified the feature as a klippe.
Read more about this topic: Big Rock (glacial Erratic)
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