Death Valley Suite pictures, pageant advertising can be seen on the following links: Ferde Grofe's Desert Water Hole composition for orchestra, his biography and background of the pageant can be viewed at this link (pdf form): The 1949 Pageant Guide and its conception can be seen at this link: Death Valley Suite The Death Valley Suite is a short symphonic suite written by Ferde Grofé in 1949, depicting the westward travels of pioneers through the 'harsh lands' of Death Valley in California. Grofe was commissioned by the Death Valley 49ers, a non profit organization devoted to preserving pioneering and mining history of the
Death Valley shallow lake, but the extreme heat and aridity immediately began evaporating the ephemeral lake. The pair of images (seen at right) from NASA's Landsat 5 satellite documents the short history of Death Valley's Lake Badwater: formed in February 2005 (top) and evaporated by February 2007 (bottom). In 2005, a big pool of greenish water stretched most of the way across the valley floor. By May 2005 the valley floor had resumed its more familiar role as Badwater Basin, a salt-coated salt flats. In time, this freshly dissolved and recrystallized salt will darken. The western margin of Death Valley is traced