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KF5JRV > TODAY 01.10.18 12:25l 47 Lines 2428 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 22285_KF5JRV
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Subj: Today in History - Oct 01
Path: IW8PGT<CX2SA<ZL2BAU<N9PMO<NS2B<KF5JRV
Sent: 181001/1117Z 22285@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.16
On this day in 1890, an act of Congress creates Yosemite National Park,
home of such natural wonders as Half Dome and the giant sequoia trees.
Environmental trailblazer John Muir (1838-1914) and his colleagues
campaigned for the congressional action, which was signed into law by
President Benjamin Harrison and paved the way for generations of hikers,
campers and nature lovers, along with countless “Don’t Feed the Bearsö
signs.
Native Americans were the main residents of the Yosemite Valley, located
in California’s Sierra Nevada mountain range, until the 1849 gold rush
brought thousands of non-Indian miners and settlers to the region.
Tourists and damage to Yosemite Valley’s ecosystem followed. In 1864, to
ward off further commercial exploitation, conservationists convinced
President Abraham Lincoln to declare Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa
Grove of giant sequoias a public trust of California. This marked the
first time the U.S. government protected land for public enjoyment and
it laid the foundation for the establishment of the national and state
park systems. Yellowstone became America’s first national park in 1872.
In 1889, John Muir discovered that the vast meadows surrounding Yosemite
Valley, which lacked government protection, were being overrun and
destroyed by domestic sheep grazing. Muir and Robert Underwood Johnson,
a fellow environmentalist and influential magazine editor, lobbied for
national park status for the large wilderness area around Yosemite
Valley. On October 1 of the following year, Congress set aside over
1,500 square miles of land (about the size of Rhode Island) for what
would become Yosemite National Park, America’s third national park. In
1906, the state-controlled Yosemite Valley and Mariposa Grove came under
federal jurisdiction with the rest of the park.
Yosemite’s natural beauty is immortalized in the black-and-white
landscape photographs of Ansel Adams (1902-1984), who at one point lived
in the park and spent years photographing it. Today, over 3 million
people get back to nature annually at Yosemite and check out such
stunning landmarks as the 2,425-foot-high Yosemite Falls, one of the
world’s tallest waterfalls; rock formations Half Dome and El Capitan,
the largest granite monolith in the U.S.; and the three groves of giant
sequoias, the world’s biggest trees.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KF5JRV@ICLOUD.COM
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