"National parks are the best idea we ever had,” according to Pulitzer Prize winning writer Wallace Stegner. “Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst." Channeling Stegner’s words, Ken Burns celebrated our nation’s national park heritage with his documentary series “The National Parks: America's Best Idea.”
The first national park was created 150 years ago today. On March 1, 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed into law S.392, establishing Yellowstone as the first national park. The national park idea is quintessentially American, our gift to the world. Since Yellowstone’s establishment, 62 other lands of varied shapes, sizes and resources have followed it in becoming National Parks within the United States – and hundreds of others worldwide.
On this anniversary, it is worth celebrating the uniquely beautiful lands, waters and wildlife of Yellowstone and commemorating those whose foresight protected it for us and for the generations yet to come. For me personally, Yellowstone is a magical place filled with wonder and memory. I first visited as a child on a family camping trip that cemented my love of the outdoors. Some 16 years later, I returned as an adult, taking my first “on my own” camping trip and catching my first trout fly fishing on the Yellowstone River. Since then, I have returned ten more times in summer, autumn and winter, including chances to share this special place with my wife and children. I have published a separate photo diary with images of Yellowstone from around the year, and in this diary will share some of the story behind our real-world Wonderland becoming the first national park.
While celebrating this notable anniversary, I also want to acknowledge the indigenous people whose stewardship of these lands extends long before the National Park designation. Yellowstone includes portions of the ancestral lands of the Shoshone-Bannock, Apsaalooké (Crow), Eastern Shoshone, and Cheyenne nations.
The popular story of where the idea of preserving Yellowstone as a National Park began comes from Nathaniel Langford’s retelling of the 1870 Washburn expedition to explore and document the area. After having seen many wonders, the expedition was camped by the junction of the Firehole and Gibbon rivers, forming the Madison. Langford wrote:
The entire party had a rather unusual discussion. The proposition was made by some member that we utilize the result of our exploration by taking up quarter sections of land at the most prominent points of interest, and a general discussion followed. One member of our party suggested that if there could be secured by pre-emption a good title to two or three quarter sections of land opposite the lower fall of the Yellowstone and extending down the river along the canon, they would eventually become a source of great profit to the owners. Another member of the party thought that it would be more desirable to take up a quarter section of land at the Upper Geyser Basin, for the reason that that locality could be more easily reached by tourists and pleasure seekers. A third suggestion was that each member of the party pre-empt a claim, and in order that no one should have an advantage over the others, the whole should be thrown into a common pool for the benefit of the entire party.
Mr. Hedges then said that he did not approve of any of these plans – that there ought to be no private ownership of any portion of that region, but that the whole of it ought to be set apart as a great National Park, and that each one of us ought to make an effort to have this accomplished. His suggestion met with an instantaneous and favorable response…
Thus, Langford credited Judge Cornelius Hedges of the 1870 Washburn party for giving voice to the National Park idea, and the party as a whole with becoming its advocates. This story has been commemorated by the naming of the mountain overlooking the campsite at the junction of the Firehole and Gibbon as “National Park Mountain.” However, other members of the 1870 expedition did not reference this seemingly significant conversation in their journals.
So there is reason for skepticism of Langford’s account, which he organized from his notes and journals and published some 35 years later, as “The Discovery of Yellowstone Park – Journal of the Washburn Expedition to the Yellowstone and Firehole Rivers in the Year 1870.” The book was of course misnamed as well – the Washburn expedition explored and documented parts of Yellowstone, but certainly didn’t discover it. Native Americans were familiar with the area for untold generations prior to the arrival of white trappers and explorers. And among those early explorers, John Colter was likely the first white man to set eyes on Yellowstone country during his explorations there in the winter of 1807-08, a year after he received his discharge from the Corps of Discovery of the Lewis & Clark expedition. Other trappers ventured into the area over the following years, including Jim Bridger – but these mountain men were known for spinning tall tales and their accounts of Yellowstone were met with plenty of doubt.
Still, reports of the area’s wonders spread enough that curious adventurers tried to make their way into the Yellowstone. One of these, Jesuit priest Father Francis Xavier Kuppens, shared his wonder at the area with the acting Territorial Governor of Montana, Thomas Francis Meagher, who may have been the first to suggest the idea of a national park there by responding that if things were as described the government ought to reserve the territory for a national park.
With increasing accounts of the Yellowstone’s remarkable natural features making there way to Montana Territory, there was growing interest in a more “official” – and hopefully thus reputable – expedition to explore and document the area. This led to the 1870 expedition on which Langford took part, led by the respected Surveyor General of Montana Henry D. Washburn. A year later, with support from a Congressional appropriation, Dr. Ferdinand V. Hayden led another expedition through the Yellowstone, further documenting the area and its key features.
Following these expeditions and the publicity they brought to Yellowstone, there was growing interest in protecting it for public use and enjoyment, in particular from the Montana gateway communities from which journeys into the area began. Proponents of a park got a major assist when the money and political pull of the Northern Pacific Railroad was also brought to bear. Financier Jay Cooke of the Northern Pacific saw in the lure of Yellowstone an opportunity to advance his efforts and investments in a northern transcontinental rail line.
The concept for a National Park didn’t emerge from a vacuum and was certainly inspired by the earlier reservation of the Yosemite in 1864 – pushed notably by Galen Clark and Senator John Conness. Congress passed, and President Abraham Lincoln signed into law, the grant of the Yosemite valley and environs to the state of California provided it “shall accept this grant upon the express conditions that the premises shall be held for public use, resort, and recreation [and] shall be inalienable for all time”. Proponents of establishing Yellowstone as a national park were clearly familiar with and inspired by this early designation of Yosemite. The Yosemite grant, however, established it as a state park. It wasn’t until the later advocacy of John Muir and others that the Yosemite reservation was both enlarged and established as Yosemite National Park in 1890.
The reason for Yellowstone to be a national park rather than a preserve granted to a state (or territory in the case of Montana at that time) was clear: access into the Yellowstone and the push for its reservation came from Montana communities. Yet the bulk of the area fell within the Wyoming Territory. Politics would have made seizure by Montana of a large swath of Wyoming territory difficult at best and would have set a troubling precedent. Montanan H.D. Hampton observed that “The only way to preserve the area and withhold it from settlement was to place it directly under federal control.”
So instead of a Yosemite-style reservation, proponents proposed that Yellowstone be established as a National Park. Legislation to accomplish that end was introduced as S.392 by Kansas Senator Samuel Clark Pomeroy and H.R. 764 by Montana Delegate William H. Clagett. Both chambers passed S.392, sending it to the desk of President Grant, who signed it on March 1, 1872, establishing the first-ever national park.
While Langford’s story of the “birth” of the national park idea from Judge Hedges at camp along the Firehole has undeniable charm, the reality is more complex – but no less inspiring. Yes, Yellowstone National Park was the result of the Washburn expedition, but also of the earlier reservation of the Yosemite to the state of California, of the advocacy of many Montana leaders and the Northern Pacific Railroad, and of the work of the legislators who ultimately brought the measure to pass through Congress. The national park idea grew from the work of many, not just the inspiration of one. On this 150th anniversary, we should give our thanks to all of those whose efforts ensured that Yellowstone would be preserved for our and future generations to enjoy, for all time.
For those who would like to dive deeper into the history of Yellowstone National Park, I recommend both Nathaniel Pitt Langford’s “The Discovery of Yellowstone Park” as a semi-contemporaneous account, and the more thorough and rigorous history from which much of this diary is drawn, “The Yellowstone Story” by historian Aubrey L. Haines.