Prepared in conjunction with the 2016 GSA Annual Meeting in Denver, Colorado, this volume contains sixteen guides to field trips in this rich geologic region. The four “Great Surveys” of the late 1800s ventured west to explore and document the region’s unknown natural resources and collect valuable geologic information. Many of the field guides in this volume, aptly titled Unfolding the Geology of the West, will cover the same hallowed ground as the early geologic expeditions. Organized into four sections, this volume spans some of the major subdisciplines of geology: (1) stratigraphy, sedimentology, and paleontology; (2) structure and metamorphism; (3) Quaternary landscape evolution; and (4) engineering and environmental geology.