Myth and History in the Creation of Yellowstone National Park

Myth and History in the Creation of Yellowstone National Park PDF

Author: Paul Schullery

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 2003-01-01

Total Pages: 154

ISBN-13: 9780803243057

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Does a beloved institution need its own myths to survive? Can conservationists avoid turning their heroes into legends? Should they try? Yellowstone National Park, a global icon of conservation and natural beauty, was born at the most improbable of times: the American Gilded Age, when altruism seemed extinct and society’s vision seemed focused on only greed and growth. Perhaps that is why the park’s “creation myth” portrayed a few saintlike pioneer conservationists laboring to set aside this unique wilderness against all odds. In fact, the establishment of Yellowstone was the result of complex social, scientific, economic, and aesthetic forces. Its creators were not saints but mortal humans with the full range of ideals and impulses known to the species. Authors Paul Schullery and Lee Whittlesey, both longtime students of Yellowstone’s complex history, present the first full account of how the fairy tale origins of the park found universal public acceptance and the long, painful process by which the myth was reconsidered and replaced with a more realistic and ultimately more satisfying story. In this evocative exploration of Yellowstone’s creation myth, the authors trace the evolution of the legend, its rise to incontrovertible truth, and its revelation as a mysterious and troubling episode that remains part folklore, part wish, and part history. This study demonstrates the passions stirred by any challenge to cherished national memories, just as it honors the ideals and dreams represented by our national myths.

America's National Park System

America's National Park System PDF

Author: Lary M. Dilsaver

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2016-02-18

Total Pages: 507

ISBN-13: 1442256842

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Now in a fully updated edition, this invaluable reference work is a fundamental resource for scholars, students, conservationists, and citizens interested in America's national park system. The extensive collection of documents illustrates the system's creation, development, and management. The documents include laws that established and shaped the system; policy statements on park management; Park Service self-evaluations; and outside studies by a range of scientists, conservation organizations, private groups, and businesses. A new appendix includes summaries of pivotal court cases that have further interpreted the Park Service mission.

Yellowstone

Yellowstone PDF

Author: David Rains Wallace

Publisher: National Park Service Division of Publications

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 132

ISBN-13:

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Yellowstone: A Natural and Human History, Yellowstone National Park, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming This colorful and profusely illustrated official Handbook from the National Park Service explores the exciting home of steaming geysers, hot springs, grizzly bears, wolves, elk, buffalo, big horn sheep, moose and other wildlife. This book also includes a travel guide and detailed reference material for touring the parks.

Civilizing Nature

Civilizing Nature PDF

Author: Bernhard Gissibl

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2012-11-01

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0857455273

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National parks are one of the most important and successful institutions in global environmentalism. Since their first designation in the United States in the 1860s and 1870s they have become a global phenomenon. The development of these ecological and political systems cannot be understood as a simple reaction to mounting environmental problems, nor can it be explained by the spread of environmental sensibilities. Shifting the focus from the usual emphasis on national parks in the United States, this volume adopts an historical and transnational perspective on the global geography of protected areas and its changes over time. It focuses especially on the actors, networks, mechanisms, arenas, and institutions responsible for the global spread of the national park and the associated utilization and mobilization of asymmetrical relationships of power and knowledge, contributing to scholarly discussions of globalization and the emergence of global environmental institutions and governance.

American Indians and National Parks

American Indians and National Parks PDF

Author: Robert H. Keller

Publisher: University of Arizona Press

Published: 1999-05-01

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 9780816520145

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Many national parks and monuments tell unique stories of the struggle between the rights of native peoples and the wants of the dominant society. These stories involve our greatest parks—Yosemite, Yellowstone, Mesa Verde, Glacier, the Grand Canyon, Olympic, Everglades—as well as less celebrated parks elsewhere. In American Indians and National Parks, authors Robert Keller and Michael Turek relate these untold tales of conflict and collaboration. American Indians and National Parks details specific relationships between native peoples and national parks, including land claims, hunting rights, craft sales, cultural interpretation, sacred sites, disposition of cultural artifacts, entrance fees, dams, tourism promotion, water rights, and assistance to tribal parks. Beginning with a historical account of Yosemite and Yellowstone, American Indians and National Parks reveals how the creation of the two oldest parks affected native peoples and set a pattern for the century to follow. Keller and Turek examine the evolution of federal policies toward land preservation and explore provocative issues surrounding park/Indian relations. When has the National Park Service changed its policies and attitudes toward Indian tribes, and why? How have environmental organizations reacted when native demands, such as those of the Havasupai over land claims in the Grand Canyon, seem to threaten a national park? How has the Park Service dealt with native claims to hunting and fishing rights in Glacier, Olympic, and the Everglades? While investigating such questions, the authors traveled extensively in national parks and conducted over 200 interviews with Native Americans, environmentalists, park rangers, and politicians. They meticulously researched materials in archives and libraries, assembling a rich collection of case studies ranging from the 19th century to the present. In American Indians and National Parks, Keller and Turek tackle a significant and complicated subject for the first time, presenting a balanced and detailed account of the Native-American/national-park drama. This book will prove to be an invaluable resource for policymakers, conservationists, historians, park visitors, and others who are concerned about preserving both cultural and natural resources.

Death in Yellowstone

Death in Yellowstone PDF

Author: Lee H. Whittlesey

Publisher: Roberts Rinehart

Published: 2014-01-07

Total Pages: 441

ISBN-13: 1570984514

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The chilling tome that launched an entire genre of books about the often gruesome but always tragic ways people have died in our national parks, this updated edition of the classic includes calamities in Yellowstone from the past sixteen years, including the infamous grizzly bear attacks in the summer of 2011 as well as a fatal hot springs accident in 2000. In these accounts, written with sensitivity as cautionary tales about what to do and what not to do in one of our wildest national parks, Whittlesey recounts deaths ranging from tragedy to folly—from being caught in a freak avalanche to the goring of a photographer who just got a little too close to a bison. Armchair travelers and park visitors alike will be fascinated by this important book detailing the dangers awaiting in our first national park.

The Battle for Yellowstone

The Battle for Yellowstone PDF

Author: Justin Farrell

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2017-02-28

Total Pages: 315

ISBN-13: 0691176302

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Yellowstone holds a special place in America's heart. As the world's first national park, it is globally recognized as the crown jewel of modern environmental preservation. But the park and its surrounding regions have recently become a lightning rod for environmental conflict, plagued by intense and intractable political struggles among the federal government, National Park Service, environmentalists, industry, local residents, and elected officials. The Battle for Yellowstone asks why it is that, with the flood of expert scientific, economic, and legal efforts to resolve disagreements over Yellowstone, there is no improvement? Why do even seemingly minor issues erupt into impassioned disputes? What can Yellowstone teach us about the worsening environmental conflicts worldwide? Justin Farrell argues that the battle for Yellowstone has deep moral, cultural, and spiritual roots that until now have been obscured by the supposedly rational and technical nature of the conflict. Tracing in unprecedented detail the moral causes and consequences of large-scale social change in the American West, he describes how a "new-west" social order has emerged that has devalued traditional American beliefs about manifest destiny and rugged individualism, and how morality and spirituality have influenced the most polarizing and techno-centric conflicts in Yellowstone's history. This groundbreaking book shows how the unprecedented conflict over Yellowstone is not all about science, law, or economic interests, but more surprisingly, is about cultural upheaval and the construction of new moral and spiritual boundaries in the American West.