The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-06-25
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
THE TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
INFORMATION BUREAU
BY Frederic j. Haskin. Director
Washington. d. G.


service with a director in Wasnlng-
ton, in much the same way that the
national forests are controlled by the
forest service.
service is the elimination of cam
paign to make the American people
realize the value of these parks. aes-
thetic, sentimental and financial
which has been one of the cher pur-
poses of Secretary Lanes administra-
ton of the interior department IL
is a work scarcely second in import
ance to the creation of the natlonal
forests, and like that great measure
of conservation, it will be much more
appreciated in the future than II Is at
present.
the National parks means to save
from destruction and exploitation LOT
all time certain of the most beautlful
and wonderful parts of the west
to save them just as they were When
the first daring Americans pushed
into the Rockies, when Fremont found
the way across the divide and Kit
Carson trapped from Taos to cali
fornia, and from Canada to Mexico. 1t
also means making these wonder
regions accessible to all Americans on
equal terms. To drag in once more
our new watchword, it means making
the great outdoors safe for Democ-
racy.
But Ln6S6 COHSlucIdllOiiS w nv
reach your imagination, you may re-
fleet that it also means bringing of
millions of dollars to the United States
and keeping here hundreds of mil
lions of dollars that would otherwise
go away.
For scenery and fresh air, in an
ver-more-crowded world, are be-
coming some of the most expensive
and readily salable commodities on
the market. True, there is a good
deal of both left in America; but it is
only a hundred years since we had
little else, and now there are Ameri-
can citizens who never saw noun
tain, whose lungs are smoke consum-
ers. who wouldn't know how to get a
drink out of spring without a tin
cup.
All the city jewellers of the world
who have money are willing to spend
it for fresh air and scenery. Canada
realized long ago that there was easy
money in this eternal hankering of
man to get back to the hills. She be-
gan advertising her Rocky mountains,
which are almost as well known as
the Swiss Alps, and the tourist bust
ness is said to rank fourth among the
Canadian industries. But that is not
the worst of it. About 20 per cent of
the hundred and fifty million dollars
which Canada is estimated to make
annually by selling glinpses of her
mountains is spent there by Ameri-
cans. Think upon thatI The people
that own the Yellowstone, and Gla-
cler and Mount Rainier and the Yo-
semitic, not to mention a number of
others that you never heard of, carry
their hard iron dollars every summer
up INTO Canada and leave them there
LOT the privilege of scrambling around
IN the Canadian Rockies.
In some ways we are not so original
after all. Before the Canadian Rock
les Were discovered by the tourist, we
all went to Switzerland, because we
knew from tradition and advertise
ment that that is where they have
scenery There were plenty of guides
to tell US when and what to admire.
mere were good hotels, too, and ex-
cellent transportation. which certain
~ our own scenery then lacked But
II we had displayed any interest in
cur own country ways of seeing would
doubtless have been found The
whole trouble was that none of us,
not even our writers, could see seem
cry without someone to point 1t out.
Mark Twain spent long years in the
west and in some of his letters home
he did mention the scenery. But his
book ''Roughing 1t" is mainly about
the discomforts and crimes of that
region Even Mark Twain, most
/
thrill out of mountain until he saw
| the Jungfrau in Switzerland from the
/ balcony of a hotel
Which shows that Clemens was a
good American first and a connois-
seur of scenery afterwards. 1t was
John Muir, Scotchman, who really
discovered that the west is beautiful.
1t was he who first saw it's great "de-
velopments" as stains on a beautiful
fabric woven by God-stains which
would ultimately splotch and ruin the
| whole unless some parts were set
aside to be preserved as they were.
To him belongs a good deal of the
credit for setting aside these regions.
| The process Of creating national
parks began about 1872, and did not
attract any attention for a long time
Congress would now and again pass
a bill setting aside such and such
areas as National parks. It was easy
to get the bills thru because they did
not call for the expenditure of any
money. The parks were merely hand
ed over to the secretary of the interior
to look after. Later on, when all the
| world began going to the Yellowstone
to look upon that bit of virgin Ameri-
can wildneSS, teeming with wild life
a detachment of troops was sent there
to keep order and make some effor
to suppress the poachers who were
killing the last of the buffalo fol
their robes, and the elk that fra
ternal order might be provided witt
watch fobs. To other National park:
engineers were sent, rangers, fire
guards, whatever seemed urgently
needed. There was no system abou
It. There was not even a clerk il
Washington whose sole duty it was t
attend to National park business
Hotel concessions were let to almos
anyone who had a little pull, anC
many of these hotels bravely pre-
served the good old holdup tradition
of the west.
Secretary Lane lived in California
and could not fail to see what grea
possibilities were being neglected il
the national parks. He made it ont
of the prime purposes OF his admins
tration to develop some of these posi-
bilities. stephen T. Mather was choseI