Surface and subsurface studies of the tectogenic conglomerates along the southern margin of the Wind River Range show that they are of three general types with regard to size, geometry, and depositional environment and that each of these types can be related to a specific structural setting. The Fort Union Formation (Paleocene) and the main body of the Wasatch Formation (early Eocene) make up a large clastic apron and were generated by uplift of the range as a whole along the Wind River fault zone. The South Pass Formation (late Oligocene-early Miocene), conglomerate in the White River Formation (Oligocene), and the recently identified Leckie Beds (post-South Pass) are each intramontane alluvial deposits that indicate faulting in the core of the range. Fault scarp clastic wedges in the Cathedral Bluffs Tongue of the Wasatch Formation (early Eocene) and the newly recognized Circle Bar beds (Miocene) document up-to-the-north motion along the Continental fault during Eocene time and later postcompressional collapse (down-to-the-north) in Pliocene time.

Conclusions from this study suggest that a steep tear fault may have uncoupled the Wind River Range from basins to the south as it was thrust toward the southwest. Furthermore, there may have been significant uplift in the core of the range after the main motion on the Wind River fault, and therefore, Laramide deformation may have lasted long after early Eocene time.