The National Parks

I have just completed watching Ken Burns' six-part film The National Parks, which features breathtaking photography and the typical Burns touch--humanizing a large subject through the use of individual stories. It was a wonderful experience.

As the subtitle of the project suggests, the notion of setting aside land because of its beauty or other factors is peculiarly American. The first National Park, Yellowstone, was declared in 1872, although parts of what would become Yosemite were preserved by the state of California before that. One of the purest expressions of a democratic society, it's still a little spine-tingling to think of the concept--land preserved, in perpetuity, for the "benefit and enjoyment" of the people, free from development.

Not that there weren't many battles along the way. The film takes a chronological approach. Yellowstone was declared a national park before many Americans even knew what it was, or developers could get notions about it (many refused to believe the descriptions of mountain men who talked of geysers and so forth). By the time of Theodore Roosevelt, there were only a few parks, but he was in the right place at the right time: a conservation-minded president leading at the time of the clash between business and conservation. He used a law called the Antiquities Act to bypass congress and declare places "national monuments," such as Devil's Tower. But when he did it for the Grand Canyon, which was savored by the mining industry, there was hell to pay.

But Roosevelt didn't back down (more on him tomorrow) and he ended up preserving 234 million acres, or half the size of the Louisiana Purchase.

The film continues with a series of several different fights for preservation. The Tetons, the Great Smoky Mountains, the Everglades, Biscayne Bay, and much of Alaska, all declared National Parks over the objections of either business or the locals (in Alaska Jimmy Carter was burned in effigy for his use of the Antiquities Act).

Many of the parks were created through the actions of a determined few, or sometimes a single person. Several of these people are rendered vividly by Burns and his writer, Dayton Duncan. Foremost is John Muir, the spiritual father of the environmental movement, who founded the Sierra Club and fought vigorously for the preservation of Yosemite, among other places. It was there that the one great defeat happened--a valley, called Hetch Hetchy, was dammed and flooded to provide drinking water for San Francisco. In a way, this fiasco served its purpose, as when other sites were suggested for damming Hetch Hetchy was recalled and rued.

Other personalities on parade in the film are Stephen Mather, under whose leadership the National Park Service was created in 1916. Mather pushed for greater attendance at the parks, to the point of building roads and encouraging automobile traffic, which turned out to be something of a deal with the devil. Another key person was George M. Wright, who argued that the parks should also be a way of protecting wildlife, and Adolph Murie, who studied wolves. Wolves had been eradicated from all of the parks in the lower 48 states, but Murie argued that they were essential parts of the ecosystem. They were reintroduced in the 1970s.

Watching this film at this period of American history is interesting, because the National Park Service is one of the greatest expressions of the good that government does. Today we wouldn't think of mining the Grand Canyon, but it was a hot topic in the 1910s. It was action by the government, through Roosevelt and Congressman John Lacey, that stopped their ruination (as what happened with Niagara Falls, which is surrounded by tacky souvenir shops). But it's also clear that the government couldn't do it alone--many of the parks were established through the largess of the wealthy, especially the Tetons, which were bought up by John D. Rockefeller, Jr.

The best parts of the film are the touches that Burns specializes in. There are many experts interviewed, and they all share their personal remembrances of their visits, sometime in tears. There's also a segment where the diary of a woman who visited the parks over many years, starting in 1915, with her husband by car, along with the family dog, that resonate wonderfully. It is repeated throughout, like a mantra, that National Parks have served to connect generations, who remember visiting as children, and then take their own children.

But above all the film is spectacular to look at. The views are beyond breathtaking. I couldn't quite get over how majestic Denali looks, rising into the clouds like a children's drawing of a mountain. The Grand Canyon, as well as the other canyons of the southwest, are gorgeous, and the shots of nature, whether bears fishing or wolves bringing down an impala, are stunning.

The sad thing is how few of these parks I've been to. I've done very little traveling in the west, so the only parks I've been to are those in the east: Shenandoah, Mammoth Cave, the Everglades, the Dry Tortugas, and I'm not sure about Biscayne Bay. I felt a little wistful while watching, realizing there's little chance I'll get to too many of these. But I would like to try.