 What could be indicated by the mention in the passage of some newspapers leaving out the question mark regarding "Only Active Volcano in U.S.?
It was still a matter of academic interest when in the late '40s geologists speculated on the relationship between the Kiowa Fault and the Conchas Fault farther south, in New Mexico, and which followed the Pecos as far south as Texas. Nor was there much in the papers a few years later when it was suggested that the Niobrara Fault (just inside and roughly parallel to the eastern border of Wyoming) was a northerly extension of the Kiowa. By the mid sixties it was definitely established that the three Faults were in fact a single line of fissure in the essential rock, stretching almost from the Canadian border well south of the New Mexico-Texas line. Not even in the Rockies could anyone remember a series of rock slides as bad as this. Newspapers in the mountain states gave it a few inches on the front page; anything is news in late August. Specifically, a dust volcano? "Only Active Volcano in U. S.?" demanded the headlines, and some papers even left off the question mark. Only Joseph Schwartzberg, head geographer of the Department of the Interior, wondered if the disturbance might not be a settling of the Kiowa Fault. The idea was not nearly so exciting as a volcano, even a lava-less one, and you couldn't draw a very dramatic picture of it. To excuse the other geologists, it must be said that the Kiowa Fault had never acted up before. The dust volcano was on the face of it a more plausible theory. As the tremors grew bigger, along with the affected area, as several towns including Edison were shaken to pieces by incredible earthquakes, whole bus- and plane-loads of geologists set out for Colorado, without even waiting for their university and government department to approve budgets. They found themselves on the scene of what was fast becoming the most violent and widespread earthquake North America—probably the world—has ever seen in historic times. All mountain climbing was prohibited on the Eastern Slope because of the danger of rock slides from minor quakes. Virtually all east-west land communication was suspended and the President declared a national emergency. By 23 September the Fault was active well into Wyoming on the north, and rapidly approaching the border of New Mexico to the south. Tremendous fissures opened up perpendicular to the Fault, and a general subsidence of the land was noticeable well into Kansas and Nebraska. The western borders of these states, and soon of the Dakotas and Oklahoma as well, were slowly sinking. The Fault nicked off the south-east corner of Montana.
 The newspapers were aiming for dramatic effect by proclaiming it was indeed active
 The newspapers were aiming for dramatic effect by proclaiming it was indeed active  The newspapers misprinted  The newspapers were confirming that there was an ongoing eruption  The newspapers were trying to pass off the dust as smoke from the volcanoes