Dates: Tuesday, February 17th OR Thursday, February 19th

Location: See your e-mail for Zoom Link

Website: https://www.nps.gov/jotr/index.htm

This week, we are Zooming with rangers at Joshua Tree National Park, since it’s a biiit outside our driving range. It is one of our closest National Parks, so let’s learn more about it!

Joshua Tree’s nearly 800,000 acres were set aside to protect the unique assembly of natural resources brought together by the junction of three of California’s ecosystems:

• The Colorado Desert, a western extension of the vast Sonoran Desert, occupies the southern and eastern parts of the park. It is characterized by stands of spike-like ocotillo plants and “jumping” cholla cactus.

• The southern boundary of the Mojave Desert reaches across the northern part of the park. It is the habitat of the park’s namesake: the Joshua tree. (We'll learn more about these in a bit!) Extensive stands of this peculiar looking plant are found in the western half of the park.

• Joshua Tree’s third ecosystem is located in the westernmost part of the park above 4,000 feet. The Little San Bernardino Mountains provide habitat for a community of California juniper and pinyon pine.

The plant diversity of these three ecosystems is matched by the animal diversity, including healthy herds of desert bighorn and six species of rattlesnakes. Joshua Tree National Park lies within the Pacific flyway for migratory birds, and is a rest stop for many. It was for this unusual diversity of plants and animals that Joshua Tree National Monument was set aside on August 10, 1936.

The park also encompasses some of the most interesting geologic features found in California’s desert areas. Exposed granite monoliths and rugged canyons testify to the tectonic and erosional forces that shaped this land. Washes, playas, alluvial fans, bajadas, desert varnish, and igneous and metamorphic rocks interact to form a pattern of stark beauty and ever-changing complexity.

Before the vast expansion of European culture around the globe, there was little need for the preservation of large outdoor spaces. Prior to the 19th century, Europeans and their American cousins saw nature as a resource for food, clothing, and shelter. In Europe, most early attempts at nature preservation were centered around efforts of wealthy landowners to conserve forest land for timber and game hunting. 

During the 1800s, Americans adhered to the idea of ‘Manifest Destiny’, to expand westward ‘from sea to shining sea’. As they expanded, they encountered the stunning wilderness of the West, from Wyoming's Yellowstone River to California’s Yosemite Valley. Early travelers and writers, like naturalist John Muir, brought the wonders of the West’s wild places to those who had never seen them. Muir and others like him helped to inspire a sort of national pride in the wilderness of America.

California's very own Yosemite was very much at the center of the movement to establish a National Parks Service. It was given to the state of California as a protected space during the Civil War, eight years before the country's first National Park was established! This 1864 painting, by Albert Bierstadt is entitled Cho-looke, the Yosemite Fall and is part of the Putnam Collection. The collection is housed right here in San Diego at the Timken museum!

John Muir also known as "John of the Mountains" and "Father of the National Parks", was an influential Scottish-American naturalist, author, environmental philosopher, glaciologist, and early advocate for the preservation of wilderness in the United States of America.

You can read more about John Muir here: 

In 1864, President Abraham Lincoln responded to their pressure by creating the Yosemite Grant Act to protect land in the Yosemite Valley. The Yosemite Act set a precedent for the creation of the national parks. It was the first time the U.S. federal government had set aside land specifically for preservation and public use.

(As a bonus, Ken Burns is featured in the video above - a history nerd’s favorite documentarian!)

When we think of the National Park Service, we often think immediately of Theodore Roosevelt, but the first National Park was actually established under President Ulysses S. Grant. Grant, who had been one of Lincoln's generals during the Civil War, along with Congress, established the Yellowstone National Park Protection Act in 1872. The bill’s creators envisioned a “pleasuring ground” for the enjoyment of all Americans—except for Native Americans, who would be effectively excluded from park land.

President Ulysses S. Grant signed the landmark bill into law on March 1, making Yellowstone America’s—and the world’s—first national park.

The Act, which set aside 1,221,773 acres of public land in the future states of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, broke with the established policy of transferring public lands in the West to private ownership.

The Yellowstone National Park Protection Act says “the headwaters of the Yellowstone River … is hereby reserved and withdrawn from settlement, occupancy, or sale … and dedicated and set apart as a public park or pleasuring-ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people.” In an era of expansion, the federal government had the foresight to set aside land deemed too valuable in natural wonders to develop.

To read the entire Act, you can click here: https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/management/yellowstoneprotectionact1872.htm

After Yellowstone, more national parks followed, including Mackinack National Park (now a Michigan state park), Sequoia National Park, Kings Canyon, and Yosemite National Park (up until then, Yosemite was still a state park managed by the state of California).

You can see president Theodore Roosevelt pictured below with John Muir. The two camped together in Yosemite in the early 1900s. You can read an article about their trip here: http://www.yosemite.ca.us/library/yosemite/56-3.pdf

President Theodore Roosevelt was one of the park system’s greatest patrons. During his administration (1901-09) five new parks were created, as well as 18 national monuments, four national game refuges, 51 bird sanctuaries, and over 100 million acres of national forest. In 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt signed the Antiquities Act, which gave presidents the authority to create national monuments to preserve areas of natural or historic interest on public lands. The purpose of the Act was largely to protect prehistoric Native American ruins and artifacts.

Roosevelt used the Act to declare Devil’s Tower in Wyoming the first national monument, though he wasn’t the first president to set aside public land for cultural preservation. In 1892, President Benjamin Harrison had preserved one square mile in the Arizona Territory surrounding the Casa Grande Ruins—an archaeological site once inhabited by the ancient Sonoran Desert people. But Roosevelt helped push along the idea that unique sites should be saved from development for future enjoyment.

We have 63 National Parks in the United States, preserving 85 million acres of important land, habitats, and historical treasures. 

How many parks have you visited (both in person and virtually)? Click here to check off your visits and we’ll see how many we’ve visited as a class! (It's a pretty long list!)

What was your tally? Are you surprised? Read on for a few more quick facts!

15 Oldest National Parks

1. Yellowstone National Park: March 1, 1872

2. Sequoia National Park: September 25, 1890

3. Yosemite National Park: October 1, 1890

4. Mount Rainier National Park: March 2, 1899

5. Crater Lake National Park: May 22, 1902

6. Wind Cave National Park: January 9, 1903

7. Mesa Verde National Park: June 29, 1906

8. Glacier National Park: May 11, 1910

9. Rocky Mountain National Park: January 26, 1915

10. Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park: August 1, 1916

11. Lassen Volcanic National Park: August 9, 1916

12. Denali National Park: February 26, 1917

13. Acadia National Park: February 26, 1919

14. Grand Canyon National Park: February 26, 1919

15. Zion National Park: November 19, 1919

10 Newest National Parks

1. New River Gorge National Park: December 27, 2020

2. White Sands National Park: December 20, 2019

3. Indiana Dunes National Park: February 15, 2019

4. Gateway Arch National Park: February 22, 2018

5. Pinnacles National Park: January 10, 2013

6. Great Sand Dunes National Park: September 24, 2004

7. Congaree National Park: November 10, 2003

8. Cuyahoga Valley National Park: October 11, 2000

9. Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park: October 21, 1999

10. Joshua Tree National Park: October 31, 1994

Fun Fast Facts

• The largest national park is Wrangell – St. Elias. At 13 million acres, it is twice the size of Maryland and 6 times the size of Yellowstone.

• The smallest national park is Gateway Arch…it’s only 91 acres (the next smallest park is Hot Springs at 5,600 acres…big difference!).

• Great Smoky Mountains tends to be the most visited park every year.

• The remote national parks in Alaska (Gates of the Arctic and Kobuk Valley) tend to be the least visited national parks.

• In 2024, Gates of the Arctic in Alaska had just 12,000 visitors…Great Smoky Mountains gets three times that in just one day!!

• California holds the record for the number of national parks in one state (there are 9 of them…Alaska comes in second place with 8).

• Not every state has a national park.

Tune in this week to learn even more about one of our amazing National Parks!

https://www.earthtrekkers.com/us-national-parks-list/

https://lnt.org/why/7-principles/leave-what-you-find/

https://www.nps.gov/jotr/learn/historyculture/parkhistory.htm

https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/hisnps/NPSHistory/timeline_annotated.htm