1 00:00:06,349 --> 00:00:08,340 [Bell clanging] 2 00:00:23,867 --> 00:00:28,065 PETER COYOTE: ln July of 1929, a 90-year-old woman returned 3 00:00:28,104 --> 00:00:31,437 to the Yosemite Valley in California. 4 00:00:31,474 --> 00:00:36,275 She was called Maria Lebrado, but 78 years earlier as 5 00:00:36,312 --> 00:00:41,579 a young girl, she had been known by her real name To-tu-ya, 6 00:00:41,618 --> 00:00:44,951 the granddaughter of Chief Tenaya, leader 7 00:00:44,988 --> 00:00:48,185 of the Ahwahneechees, an lndian tribe who 8 00:00:48,224 --> 00:00:52,126 for centuries had called the valley their home until 9 00:00:52,162 --> 00:00:56,929 in 1851 a battalion of white men had driven them out 10 00:00:56,966 --> 00:00:59,867 at bayonet point. 11 00:00:59,903 --> 00:01:02,394 To-tu-ya was the sole remaining survivor 12 00:01:02,439 --> 00:01:04,566 of that sad moment. 13 00:01:04,607 --> 00:01:07,906 This was her first time back. 14 00:01:07,944 --> 00:01:11,345 Half a generation after the Ahwahneechees' expulsion, 15 00:01:11,381 --> 00:01:14,407 the federal government had preserved the beautiful valley 16 00:01:14,451 --> 00:01:17,579 permanently as a national park. 17 00:01:17,620 --> 00:01:21,989 Still, everywhere she looked, To-tu-ya was reminded of how 18 00:01:22,025 --> 00:01:25,222 much things had changed. 19 00:01:25,261 --> 00:01:28,958 ln a broken mixture of English, Spanish, and her own 20 00:01:28,998 --> 00:01:33,560 ancient language, she told her escorts the valley floor was 21 00:01:33,603 --> 00:01:37,130 now more wooded and brushy than in her day. 22 00:01:37,173 --> 00:01:40,472 Her people had regularly set grass fires to keep 23 00:01:40,510 --> 00:01:46,813 the meadows open and the trees and shrubs at bay. 24 00:01:46,850 --> 00:01:50,786 Then she looked up at the rock walls of the valley. 25 00:01:50,820 --> 00:01:53,789 The great monoliths and majestic waterfalls 26 00:01:53,823 --> 00:01:57,384 stood unchanged. 27 00:01:57,427 --> 00:02:00,954 Turning toward Half Dome, the cleft rock she knew as 28 00:02:00,997 --> 00:02:05,798 Tis-sa-ack, she stretched out her arms and raised her voice 29 00:02:05,835 --> 00:02:08,998 in a strong, clear, high-pitched call that echoed 30 00:02:09,038 --> 00:02:11,472 off the granite walls. 31 00:02:11,508 --> 00:02:14,068 lt was, she explained, the call her 32 00:02:14,110 --> 00:02:17,546 grandfather Tenaya had once used to summon his 33 00:02:17,580 --> 00:02:19,912 people together. 34 00:02:19,949 --> 00:02:25,410 Until that moment, she had been the last one to hear it. 35 00:02:25,455 --> 00:02:27,548 [Woman calling] 36 00:03:03,526 --> 00:03:05,858 WOMAN: They're islands of hope. 37 00:03:05,895 --> 00:03:09,353 The parks are always where l can go home again. 38 00:03:09,399 --> 00:03:11,993 l go back to my hometown, there is a Safeway where l 39 00:03:12,035 --> 00:03:15,027 used to play with Sylvia Gonzalez, they have taken 40 00:03:15,071 --> 00:03:17,835 and turned my old school into a junk shop, 41 00:03:17,874 --> 00:03:20,604 but the parks don't do that. 42 00:03:20,643 --> 00:03:23,976 So these are places we can always go home 43 00:03:24,013 --> 00:03:27,779 and paradoxically that we can always see into the future 44 00:03:27,817 --> 00:03:31,014 and hope for the better things. 45 00:03:31,054 --> 00:03:34,581 MAN: When we look at parks and we look at the United States 46 00:03:34,624 --> 00:03:39,391 and we examine the whole idea of democracy, l think that 47 00:03:39,429 --> 00:03:41,488 the park experience is an exploration 48 00:03:41,531 --> 00:03:44,694 of the idea of freedom. 49 00:03:44,734 --> 00:03:48,397 Where do l come from, where am l going, 50 00:03:48,438 --> 00:03:52,238 how did l get here, how did we as a people get here? 51 00:03:52,275 --> 00:03:55,642 l think that when people go to a national park, they 52 00:03:55,678 --> 00:04:01,480 get a sense, a compass to history. 53 00:04:01,517 --> 00:04:05,044 COYOTE:: As the 1920s ended, the United States was about to 54 00:04:05,088 --> 00:04:09,024 enter two of the darkest and most frightening decades 55 00:04:09,058 --> 00:04:12,994 of the 20th Century, ones that included an economic 56 00:04:13,029 --> 00:04:16,157 catastrophe that threatened the foundation of American 57 00:04:16,199 --> 00:04:21,102 sociery, followed by a war that threatened the existence 58 00:04:21,137 --> 00:04:24,504 of freedom throughout the world. 59 00:04:24,540 --> 00:04:28,237 For a time during those dark years, the national parks 60 00:04:28,277 --> 00:04:33,112 would thrive as never before. 61 00:04:33,149 --> 00:04:36,550 ln the 1930s and 1940s, hundreds of thousands 62 00:04:36,586 --> 00:04:40,113 of American boys would go to the parks in pursuit 63 00:04:40,156 --> 00:04:45,924 of a paycheck and discover a new sense of digniry. 64 00:04:45,962 --> 00:04:49,022 Then hundreds of thousands more under different 65 00:04:49,065 --> 00:04:56,062 circumstances would enjoy in the parks a moment of peace. 66 00:04:56,105 --> 00:04:59,074 And what happens in the United States is that the American 67 00:04:59,108 --> 00:05:01,975 land comes to embody the American nation, 68 00:05:02,011 --> 00:05:06,846 and the national parks become the icons of our nationalism, 69 00:05:06,883 --> 00:05:08,817 the place where we come to celebrate what it means 70 00:05:08,851 --> 00:05:11,149 to be an American. 71 00:05:11,187 --> 00:05:14,953 COYOTE:: The national park idea was changing, too. 72 00:05:14,991 --> 00:05:17,892 Though the park service had lost its charismatic first 73 00:05:17,927 --> 00:05:21,920 director Stephen Mather, a new president and his 74 00:05:21,964 --> 00:05:25,525 progressive administration would vastly expand the number 75 00:05:25,568 --> 00:05:30,437 of parks and then even more dramatically expand the very 76 00:05:30,473 --> 00:05:34,910 notion of what a national park could be. 77 00:05:34,944 --> 00:05:39,074 A young biologist would insist that the survival of wildlife 78 00:05:39,115 --> 00:05:42,312 is as important as the preservation of scenery 79 00:05:42,351 --> 00:05:45,718 and that places without mountains or waterfalls should 80 00:05:45,755 --> 00:05:50,692 be seen as natural wonders, as well, and in a time when 81 00:05:50,727 --> 00:05:54,322 the future of the country was most in doubt, the symbols 82 00:05:54,363 --> 00:05:59,027 of her complicated past would be set aside and cherished 83 00:05:59,068 --> 00:06:02,265 while Americans from every walk of life and every 84 00:06:02,305 --> 00:06:05,365 possible background would find in the parks a deeper 85 00:06:05,408 --> 00:06:12,007 connection to their land, their nation, and themselves. 86 00:06:12,048 --> 00:06:14,039 MAN: My sense is that our special connection with 87 00:06:14,083 --> 00:06:17,541 the national parks comes from the fact that we're a nation 88 00:06:17,587 --> 00:06:21,250 of immigrants, we're a nation of people for whom this is not 89 00:06:21,290 --> 00:06:26,227 home, and the national parks are what anchor and root us 90 00:06:26,262 --> 00:06:27,559 on this continent. 91 00:06:27,597 --> 00:06:30,464 They are the meaning of home for many of us. 92 00:06:30,500 --> 00:06:34,129 They're what it means to be an American and to inhabit 93 00:06:34,170 --> 00:06:35,762 this continent. 94 00:06:35,805 --> 00:06:39,935 lt's the end of the immigrant experience, and they're what 95 00:06:39,976 --> 00:06:42,706 takes you and says, ''Now l am in America.'' 96 00:06:55,424 --> 00:06:59,588 COYOTE:: ln April of 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 97 00:06:59,629 --> 00:07:03,326 newly sworn in as president, asked Horace Albright, 98 00:07:03,366 --> 00:07:06,665 the second director of the National Park Service to come 99 00:07:06,702 --> 00:07:09,967 along with him during a day trip from Washington to 100 00:07:10,006 --> 00:07:13,840 Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains. 101 00:07:13,876 --> 00:07:15,434 MAN AS HORACE ALBRlGHT: The president got in the front 102 00:07:15,478 --> 00:07:17,912 seat, where there was more room, and they took 103 00:07:17,947 --> 00:07:20,177 the braces off his legs. 104 00:07:20,216 --> 00:07:22,707 He put a cigarette in his long cigarette holder, 105 00:07:22,752 --> 00:07:25,277 sat back, and relaxed. 106 00:07:25,321 --> 00:07:28,415 l sat behind him on the jump seat just a few inches 107 00:07:28,457 --> 00:07:32,791 from his ear. 108 00:07:32,829 --> 00:07:36,060 l had a dream l wanted to make real. 109 00:07:36,098 --> 00:07:38,965 For years, l had wanted to get the many national military 110 00:07:39,001 --> 00:07:41,902 parks, battlefields, and monuments transferred out 111 00:07:41,938 --> 00:07:45,203 of the War Department and Department of Agriculture into 112 00:07:45,241 --> 00:07:48,404 the National Park Service. 113 00:07:48,444 --> 00:07:50,571 As we approached the Rappahannock River, l began 114 00:07:50,613 --> 00:07:54,071 thinking, ''lf l'm going to talk to the president 115 00:07:54,116 --> 00:07:56,516 ''about getting the military parks, 116 00:07:56,552 --> 00:07:59,248 ''l had better get to it.'' 117 00:07:59,288 --> 00:08:02,815 Now was the time. 118 00:08:02,859 --> 00:08:05,453 COYOTE:: Albright began pointing out sites important 119 00:08:05,494 --> 00:08:09,555 to the Second Battle of Bull Run in the Civil War, 120 00:08:09,599 --> 00:08:13,160 then broadened the discussion to myriad other battlefields 121 00:08:13,202 --> 00:08:16,638 and historic sites in the area. 122 00:08:16,672 --> 00:08:19,163 WOMAN: So my father had a golden opportuniry. 123 00:08:19,208 --> 00:08:22,371 He told him exactly what he wanted. 124 00:08:22,411 --> 00:08:24,936 He wanted the monuments, and he wanted 125 00:08:24,981 --> 00:08:27,711 the battlefields. ''All right.'' 126 00:08:27,750 --> 00:08:29,217 When they got back to the White House, 127 00:08:29,252 --> 00:08:30,378 ''Hey, Albright,'' he said. 128 00:08:30,419 --> 00:08:34,082 ''Tomorrow morning, l want a plan in my office. 129 00:08:34,123 --> 00:08:36,489 ''l want to know what you want to do.'' 130 00:08:36,525 --> 00:08:38,152 FRANKLlN ROOSEVELT: And to the formal duties of the 131 00:08:38,194 --> 00:08:43,131 Park Service by transferring from other departments many 132 00:08:43,165 --> 00:08:46,134 other parks, battlefields, memorials, 133 00:08:46,168 --> 00:08:47,635 and national monuments. 134 00:08:47,670 --> 00:08:50,901 COYOTE:: Within days, Roosevelt would sign two executive 135 00:08:50,940 --> 00:08:55,775 orders initiating a sweeping reorganization that overnight 136 00:08:55,811 --> 00:08:58,974 transformed the Park Service. 137 00:08:59,015 --> 00:09:01,540 From the War Department, the agency was given 138 00:09:01,584 --> 00:09:05,281 responsibiliry for more than 20 military parks and historic 139 00:09:05,321 --> 00:09:10,384 battlefields and monuments: from Castillo de san Marcos, 140 00:09:10,426 --> 00:09:14,385 an ancient Spanish fort in St. Augustine, Florida, 141 00:09:14,430 --> 00:09:17,627 to Yorktown, Virginia, where the decisive victory 142 00:09:17,667 --> 00:09:22,331 of the American Revolution had been won; From Antietam, 143 00:09:22,371 --> 00:09:25,636 where the bloodiest battle of the Civil War was fought, 144 00:09:25,675 --> 00:09:29,338 to Appomattox Courthouse, where it ended. 145 00:09:29,378 --> 00:09:32,905 Under the new plan, the Park Service was now expected to 146 00:09:32,949 --> 00:09:36,510 protect and interpret more than a dozen nonmilitary 147 00:09:36,552 --> 00:09:40,488 historic sites, as well: The Statue of Liberry in 148 00:09:40,523 --> 00:09:45,756 New York's Harbor; Mount Rushmore in South Dakota; 149 00:09:45,795 --> 00:09:47,922 and many of the District of Columbia's 150 00:09:47,964 --> 00:09:49,898 most hallowed places, 151 00:09:49,932 --> 00:09:52,799 including the Lincoln Memorial, the shrine to 152 00:09:52,835 --> 00:09:56,999 the president who in 1864 had given the national park 153 00:09:57,039 --> 00:10:02,238 idea its first tentative expression. 154 00:10:02,278 --> 00:10:07,648 National parks now embraced the idea of America itself. 155 00:10:16,425 --> 00:10:19,394 MAN: Our national heritage is richer than just 156 00:10:19,428 --> 00:10:22,261 scenic features. 157 00:10:22,298 --> 00:10:24,823 The realization is coming that perhaps our greatest national 158 00:10:24,867 --> 00:10:30,999 heritage is nature itself with all its complexiry and its 159 00:10:31,040 --> 00:10:33,941 abundance of life. 160 00:10:33,976 --> 00:10:38,037 George Melendez Wright. 161 00:10:38,080 --> 00:10:41,572 COYOTE:: During To-tu-ya's emotional return to Yosemite, 162 00:10:41,617 --> 00:10:44,848 one of her escorts, chosen because he was fluent 163 00:10:44,887 --> 00:10:48,948 in Spanish, was a young Park Service employee named 164 00:10:48,991 --> 00:10:51,551 George Melendez Wright. 165 00:10:51,594 --> 00:10:54,961 He had been born into a wealthy San Francisco family. 166 00:10:54,997 --> 00:10:57,363 His mother came from one of El Salvador's most 167 00:10:57,400 --> 00:10:59,459 prominent dynasties. 168 00:10:59,502 --> 00:11:02,198 His father was a ship captain. 169 00:11:02,238 --> 00:11:05,173 When they both died prematurely, he was raised by 170 00:11:05,207 --> 00:11:08,335 an aunt, who encouraged his fascination with the natural 171 00:11:08,377 --> 00:11:13,110 world, which led to a degree in zoology. 172 00:11:13,149 --> 00:11:16,585 Working in Yosemite as an assistant park naturalist, 173 00:11:16,619 --> 00:11:19,884 Wright became convinced that the parks were fulfilling only 174 00:11:19,922 --> 00:11:22,413 part of their purpose. 175 00:11:22,458 --> 00:11:25,757 By focusing so much on attracting visitors, 176 00:11:25,795 --> 00:11:29,356 park managers had overlooked another responsibiliry, 177 00:11:29,398 --> 00:11:32,799 which Wright called ''the very heart of the National Park 178 00:11:32,835 --> 00:11:39,331 ''System,'' preserving wildlife in its natural state. 179 00:11:39,375 --> 00:11:40,672 MAN AS GEORGE MELENDEZ WRlGHT: When a tourist enters the 180 00:11:40,709 --> 00:11:43,803 park, he is looking for the same concentration of animals 181 00:11:43,846 --> 00:11:47,782 he saw in the paddocks of the zoological garden. 182 00:11:47,817 --> 00:11:51,184 A galaxy of bears at our garbage platform approximates 183 00:11:51,220 --> 00:11:55,987 this concept, and he is satisfied. 184 00:11:56,025 --> 00:11:58,926 Then comes a day when his heart skips a beat. 185 00:11:58,961 --> 00:12:01,293 Walking along a deep forest trail, he comes upon a single 186 00:12:01,330 --> 00:12:05,096 bear eagerly peeling the bark from a log in search 187 00:12:05,134 --> 00:12:07,500 of fat white grubs. 188 00:12:07,536 --> 00:12:11,404 This is a fresh thrill, and it brings the realization that 189 00:12:11,440 --> 00:12:14,432 the unique charm of the animals in a national park 190 00:12:14,477 --> 00:12:18,538 lies in their wildness, not their tameness, in their 191 00:12:18,581 --> 00:12:22,039 primitive struggle to survive, rather than their fat 192 00:12:22,084 --> 00:12:26,418 certainry of an easy living. 193 00:12:26,455 --> 00:12:28,980 COYOTE:: Though only in his mid-20s and near the bottom 194 00:12:29,024 --> 00:12:32,687 of the Park Service career ladder, Wright proposed to his 195 00:12:32,728 --> 00:12:35,697 superiors that he undertake something that had never been 196 00:12:35,731 --> 00:12:40,293 done before, a scientific survey of wildlife conditions 197 00:12:40,336 --> 00:12:42,361 in the parks. 198 00:12:42,404 --> 00:12:46,170 lt took a year of persuasion, but he finally won approval 199 00:12:46,208 --> 00:12:49,609 for his plan, partly because of his persistence 200 00:12:49,645 --> 00:12:53,775 and friendly personaliry and also because the financially 201 00:12:53,816 --> 00:12:56,683 independent Wright offered to pay for the whole 202 00:12:56,719 --> 00:13:01,315 thing himself. 203 00:13:01,357 --> 00:13:04,815 ln the summer of 1930 in a Buick Roadster he had 204 00:13:04,860 --> 00:13:09,160 purchased and customized to carry camping gear, cameras, 205 00:13:09,198 --> 00:13:12,326 and scientific instruments, Wright set off with two 206 00:13:12,368 --> 00:13:18,796 colleagues on an 11,000-mile tour of the western parks. 207 00:13:18,841 --> 00:13:24,780 They would keep at it for 4 consecutive years. 208 00:13:24,813 --> 00:13:28,010 At each park, Wright kept a daily log 209 00:13:28,050 --> 00:13:32,316 of the animals he saw. 210 00:13:32,354 --> 00:13:35,448 He also gathered information from his conversations 211 00:13:35,491 --> 00:13:38,358 with people in the field, park rangers 212 00:13:38,394 --> 00:13:42,854 and superintendents, local rangers and hunters, 213 00:13:42,898 --> 00:13:45,867 old-timers who remembered what it was like back 214 00:13:45,901 --> 00:13:49,632 in the 19th Century, anyone with information 215 00:13:49,672 --> 00:13:53,335 about the state of wildlife in the parks, to augment what he 216 00:13:53,375 --> 00:13:56,003 and his fellow researchers were observing 217 00:13:56,045 --> 00:13:57,535 with their own eyes. 218 00:14:03,552 --> 00:14:07,545 Everywhere he went, Wright discovered disturbing evidence 219 00:14:07,590 --> 00:14:11,617 that the equilibrium of nature was out of kilter. 220 00:14:11,660 --> 00:14:16,256 Coyotes, wolves, and mountain lions, even badgers and hawks 221 00:14:16,298 --> 00:14:21,497 and owls were routinely shot as unwelcome predators. 222 00:14:21,537 --> 00:14:25,906 Buffalo were kept in corrals like domestic cows. 223 00:14:25,941 --> 00:14:29,468 Elk, deer, and antelope were being fed hay 224 00:14:29,511 --> 00:14:31,809 in the wintertime. 225 00:14:31,847 --> 00:14:34,816 At Yellowstone, he learned that rangers had been ordered 226 00:14:34,850 --> 00:14:38,581 to go to the nesting grounds of white pelicans and stomp 227 00:14:38,621 --> 00:14:42,182 their eggs because it was feared that grown pelicans 228 00:14:42,224 --> 00:14:46,456 deprived anglers of too many fish. 229 00:14:46,495 --> 00:14:50,363 The bears meanwhile were treated like pets, fed scraps 230 00:14:50,399 --> 00:14:53,960 of food at staged events each evening near the parks' 231 00:14:54,003 --> 00:14:57,370 garbage dumps or along the roadsides, where they were 232 00:14:57,406 --> 00:15:02,309 encouraged to beg for handouts from tourists. 233 00:15:02,344 --> 00:15:03,709 MAN AS GEORGE MELENDEZ WRlGHT: The average citizen expects 234 00:15:03,746 --> 00:15:05,941 more intelligence from a bear than he has any 235 00:15:05,981 --> 00:15:07,676 right to expect. 236 00:15:07,716 --> 00:15:09,843 He goes on the assumption that if he feeds a bear two sticks 237 00:15:09,885 --> 00:15:13,343 of candy and does not want to give it a third he is 238 00:15:13,389 --> 00:15:16,790 the one to say, ''No, no,'' and he believes that 239 00:15:16,825 --> 00:15:19,157 the bear is to be accused of an unforgivable breach 240 00:15:19,194 --> 00:15:22,960 of etiquette if it takes all the candy out of his hand 241 00:15:22,998 --> 00:15:28,368 and perhaps takes the hand with it. 242 00:15:28,404 --> 00:15:31,032 COYOTE:: Wright eventually published two reports 243 00:15:31,073 --> 00:15:34,975 proposing a radically new policy. 244 00:15:35,010 --> 00:15:38,104 Unless threatened with extinction within in a park, 245 00:15:38,147 --> 00:15:42,607 each native species, including the hated predators, he wrote, 246 00:15:42,651 --> 00:15:45,119 ''should be left to carry on its struggle 247 00:15:45,154 --> 00:15:48,715 ''for existence unaided.'' 248 00:15:48,757 --> 00:15:52,659 MAN: When he said that ''the rare predators shall be 249 00:15:52,695 --> 00:15:55,687 ''protected in the national parks 250 00:15:55,731 --> 00:16:01,033 ''in proportion that they are persecuted everywhere else,'' 251 00:16:01,070 --> 00:16:04,369 that was--that was revolutionary. 252 00:16:04,406 --> 00:16:08,365 COYOTE:: Wright also called for the end of winter feedings, 253 00:16:08,410 --> 00:16:12,107 closing the bear dumps, no more stocking streams 254 00:16:12,147 --> 00:16:16,914 with nonnative fish, expansion of some park boundaries to 255 00:16:16,952 --> 00:16:20,854 accommodate grazing habits and changes in a multitude 256 00:16:20,889 --> 00:16:25,792 of practices that had become ingrained. 257 00:16:25,828 --> 00:16:28,729 Most park managers were unconvinced, 258 00:16:28,764 --> 00:16:33,224 but Horace Albright, intrigued by the surveys, established 259 00:16:33,268 --> 00:16:37,796 a new Wildlife Division in 1933 260 00:16:37,840 --> 00:16:40,434 and named George Melendez Wright, 261 00:16:40,476 --> 00:16:44,879 only 29 years old, as its chief. 262 00:16:44,913 --> 00:16:47,643 MAN AS GEORGE MELENDEZ WRlGHT: lf we destroy nature blindly, 263 00:16:47,683 --> 00:16:52,052 it is a boomerang which will be our undoing. 264 00:16:52,087 --> 00:16:54,487 Consecration to the task of adjusting ourselves to the 265 00:16:54,523 --> 00:16:57,890 natural environment so that we secure the best values from 266 00:16:57,926 --> 00:17:03,592 nature without destroying it is not useless idealism. 267 00:17:03,632 --> 00:17:08,399 lt is good hygiene for civilization. 268 00:17:08,437 --> 00:17:10,405 MAN: Part of the changing relationship with national 269 00:17:10,439 --> 00:17:14,000 parks as we evolved as a nation went 270 00:17:14,042 --> 00:17:17,239 from scenery to science. 271 00:17:17,279 --> 00:17:19,110 The scenery was obvious. 272 00:17:19,148 --> 00:17:21,309 lt was overwhelming, it was stunning. 273 00:17:21,350 --> 00:17:25,047 The science is not so obvious. 274 00:17:25,087 --> 00:17:28,352 Science embraces mystery, and it begins to look into 275 00:17:28,390 --> 00:17:32,793 the future in ways that most people can't preserve. 276 00:17:32,828 --> 00:17:36,025 lt asks questions that most people don't ask, and it says, 277 00:17:36,064 --> 00:17:38,862 ''We need to hold on to these places, and l can't give you 278 00:17:38,901 --> 00:17:43,201 ''precise reason why, but the reason will come along later, 279 00:17:43,238 --> 00:17:46,139 ''and if we don't have them, we'll never be able to explore 280 00:17:46,175 --> 00:17:49,542 ''the answers to the questions we'll be asking.'' 281 00:17:49,578 --> 00:17:53,514 So they hold the answers to questions we have not even 282 00:17:53,549 --> 00:17:55,574 yet learned to ask. 283 00:18:05,227 --> 00:18:07,252 [Frogs croaking] 284 00:18:25,981 --> 00:18:29,417 WOMAN: l think it's the people that pressure the government 285 00:18:29,451 --> 00:18:33,353 to do the things that benefit them. 286 00:18:33,388 --> 00:18:36,653 l don't think most politicians sit there and say, ''Now what's 287 00:18:36,692 --> 00:18:39,991 ''the best thing l can do for the people today?'' 288 00:18:40,028 --> 00:18:42,792 But they hear from their constituents, and that's what 289 00:18:42,831 --> 00:18:47,029 makes up their minds, 290 00:18:47,069 --> 00:18:51,563 and the people really love their parks. 291 00:18:51,607 --> 00:18:53,541 They mean a lot. 292 00:18:53,575 --> 00:18:57,511 There's an emotional bond there, and they'll 293 00:18:57,546 --> 00:18:59,104 fight for them. 294 00:19:04,987 --> 00:19:07,888 WOMAN: There are no other Everglades in the world. 295 00:19:07,923 --> 00:19:10,790 Nothing anywhere else is like them. 296 00:19:10,826 --> 00:19:13,693 Their vast, glittering openness wider than 297 00:19:13,729 --> 00:19:17,631 the enormous visible round of the horizon, the sweetness 298 00:19:17,666 --> 00:19:20,328 of their massive winds under the dazzling blue 299 00:19:20,369 --> 00:19:22,929 heights of space. 300 00:19:22,971 --> 00:19:26,532 The miracle of the light pours over the green and brown 301 00:19:26,575 --> 00:19:30,477 expanse of saw grass and water, shining and slow-moving 302 00:19:30,512 --> 00:19:34,744 below, the grass and water that is the meaning central 303 00:19:34,783 --> 00:19:37,843 face of the Everglades of Florida. 304 00:19:37,886 --> 00:19:40,446 lt is a river of grass. 305 00:19:40,489 --> 00:19:45,017 Marjory Stoneman Douglas. 306 00:19:45,060 --> 00:19:47,688 COYOTE:: For centuries, the fresh waters of Lake 307 00:19:47,729 --> 00:19:52,132 Okeechobee had flowed slowly and yet unimpeded across 308 00:19:52,167 --> 00:19:55,694 a vast swath of southern Florida toward the Gulf 309 00:19:55,737 --> 00:20:01,175 of Mexico, a seemingly endless saw grass marsh punctuated by 310 00:20:01,209 --> 00:20:04,736 cypress swamps and mangrove forests, creating 311 00:20:04,780 --> 00:20:09,945 an environment unlike anything else on earth. 312 00:20:09,985 --> 00:20:12,579 lts highest elevation is never more than a few feet above sea 313 00:20:12,621 --> 00:20:17,456 level, yet its rich landscape supports more than a thousand 314 00:20:17,492 --> 00:20:21,258 different species of plants from royal palms 315 00:20:21,296 --> 00:20:23,958 and smooth-barked gumbo limbo trees 316 00:20:23,999 --> 00:20:27,457 to delicate orchids and bromeliads. 317 00:20:27,502 --> 00:20:31,461 lt is the only place where alligators and crocodiles can 318 00:20:31,506 --> 00:20:35,772 be found living side by side, and it is a critical breeding 319 00:20:35,811 --> 00:20:40,839 ground for wading birds beyond counting: egrets and ibises 320 00:20:40,882 --> 00:20:45,148 and herons of all sizes, roseate spoonbills, 321 00:20:45,187 --> 00:20:52,423 and the wood stork, the only stork native to America. 322 00:20:52,461 --> 00:20:56,363 GREENE: lt's magnificent when you stand there and look out 323 00:20:56,398 --> 00:20:59,799 on the vastness of it all. 324 00:20:59,835 --> 00:21:03,236 Well, they call it a swamp, but it's really not a swamp 325 00:21:03,271 --> 00:21:10,006 because the water moves ever so slowly, but it moves. 326 00:21:13,415 --> 00:21:16,384 COYOTE:: Because of its trackless impenetrabiliry, 327 00:21:16,418 --> 00:21:19,216 the Everglades became something of a sanctuary 328 00:21:19,254 --> 00:21:21,984 for people, too. 329 00:21:22,024 --> 00:21:25,460 ln the 1800s when the Seminole lndians were driven out 330 00:21:25,494 --> 00:21:30,397 of Florida, small groups escaped and found refuge deep 331 00:21:30,432 --> 00:21:33,629 in the cypress trees and saw grass along 332 00:21:33,669 --> 00:21:39,437 with the Miccosukee Tribe and hundreds of runaway slaves. 333 00:21:39,474 --> 00:21:42,466 Later when the fashion in women's hats made the white 334 00:21:42,511 --> 00:21:46,504 feathers of egrets more valuable per ounce than gold, 335 00:21:46,548 --> 00:21:50,177 plume hunters and poachers hid out in the Everglades 336 00:21:50,218 --> 00:21:53,949 and slaughtered the birds there with impuniry. 337 00:21:53,989 --> 00:21:57,584 A few game wardens who dared try to stop them were killed, 338 00:21:57,626 --> 00:22:03,861 too, but a greater threat soon imperiled not just the birds 339 00:22:03,899 --> 00:22:06,265 but the Everglades itself. 340 00:22:08,870 --> 00:22:13,239 Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, elected governor on a slogan 341 00:22:13,275 --> 00:22:17,371 of ''Drain the Everglades'' was merely one in a long series 342 00:22:17,412 --> 00:22:20,745 of Florida politicians and promoters who built their 343 00:22:20,782 --> 00:22:25,446 careers on the idea of turning the vast wetland into 344 00:22:25,487 --> 00:22:28,615 a developer's promised land. 345 00:22:28,657 --> 00:22:32,957 They had divided up the Everglades into lots that they 346 00:22:32,994 --> 00:22:36,225 were selling to the suckers from up north. 347 00:22:36,264 --> 00:22:40,826 They were selling land by the gallon. 348 00:22:40,869 --> 00:22:44,600 COYOTE:: As mechanized dredges began digging drainage canals, 349 00:22:44,639 --> 00:22:47,699 real estate speculators began offering land 350 00:22:47,743 --> 00:22:53,181 at $1.00 an acre, then $20, then $50, 351 00:22:53,215 --> 00:22:57,015 even though some of it was still underwater. 352 00:22:57,052 --> 00:23:01,648 A succession of real estate booms swept south Florida. 353 00:23:01,690 --> 00:23:03,920 Much of the northern Everglades was turned into 354 00:23:03,959 --> 00:23:07,292 sugar cane plantations, vegetable fields, 355 00:23:07,329 --> 00:23:09,957 and cattle ranches. 356 00:23:09,998 --> 00:23:13,490 The towns sprouting up along the coastline began taking 357 00:23:13,535 --> 00:23:16,265 more and more land in the interior as their 358 00:23:16,304 --> 00:23:18,238 populations swelled. 359 00:23:23,612 --> 00:23:28,447 Then in the late 1920s in the Miami area, a small movement 360 00:23:28,483 --> 00:23:31,680 began, hoping to save as much of the remaining 361 00:23:31,720 --> 00:23:35,156 Everglades as possible. 362 00:23:35,190 --> 00:23:38,626 The Florida Federation of Women's Clubs had already 363 00:23:38,660 --> 00:23:43,620 preserved a 1 20-acre parcel called Royal Palms and given 364 00:23:43,665 --> 00:23:46,065 it to the state. 365 00:23:46,101 --> 00:23:49,434 That wasn't enough for Ernest Coe, a landscape 366 00:23:49,471 --> 00:23:52,998 architect who had recently moved from Connecticut to Miami 367 00:23:53,041 --> 00:23:57,341 and was shocked to learn that rare orchids, exotic birds, 368 00:23:57,379 --> 00:24:00,143 and so much else in the Everglades were being 369 00:24:00,182 --> 00:24:03,083 systematically destroyed. 370 00:24:03,118 --> 00:24:06,986 He decided to make it his life's work to create a much 371 00:24:07,022 --> 00:24:10,082 larger national park. 372 00:24:10,125 --> 00:24:13,686 Coe threw himself into the cause, convening meetings, 373 00:24:13,728 --> 00:24:17,129 firing off petitions, relentlessly pestering 374 00:24:17,165 --> 00:24:24,936 politicians, and persuading others to join his crusade. 375 00:24:24,973 --> 00:24:27,339 WOMAN AS DOUGLAS: l can't say l've spent many years and months 376 00:24:27,375 --> 00:24:30,435 communing with the Everglades. 377 00:24:30,478 --> 00:24:33,413 To be a friend of the Everglades is not necessarily 378 00:24:33,448 --> 00:24:37,441 to spend time wandering around out there. 379 00:24:37,485 --> 00:24:43,856 lt's too buggy, too wet, too generally inhospitable. 380 00:24:43,892 --> 00:24:46,554 l suppose you could say the Everglades and l have the kind 381 00:24:46,595 --> 00:24:49,029 of friendship what doesn't depend on constant 382 00:24:49,064 --> 00:24:52,556 physical contact. 383 00:24:52,601 --> 00:24:56,731 l know it's out there, and l know its importance. 384 00:24:56,771 --> 00:25:00,263 Marjory Stoneman Douglas. 385 00:25:00,308 --> 00:25:03,072 COYOTE:: Marjory Stoneman Douglas soon became 386 00:25:03,111 --> 00:25:06,774 the movement's most powerful public voice, even though, 387 00:25:06,815 --> 00:25:10,615 as she was the first to admit, she seemed an unlikely 388 00:25:10,652 --> 00:25:13,485 champion of the cause. 389 00:25:13,521 --> 00:25:16,581 She wouldn't voluntarily say, ''Well, let's go have a picnic 390 00:25:16,625 --> 00:25:23,053 in the Everglades,'' or, ''Let's go boating in the Everglades.'' 391 00:25:23,098 --> 00:25:26,829 She just wasn't that much of an outdoor person really, 392 00:25:26,868 --> 00:25:30,565 but she taught people about the Everglades. 393 00:25:30,605 --> 00:25:34,063 She would go anywhere anytime to make a speech 394 00:25:34,109 --> 00:25:36,634 about the Everglades. 395 00:25:36,678 --> 00:25:39,476 COYOTE:: A graduate of Wellesley College, Douglas had 396 00:25:39,514 --> 00:25:43,883 come to Florida in 1915 to get a divorce after a brief 397 00:25:43,919 --> 00:25:47,719 and unhappy marriage, then enlisted in the Navy 398 00:25:47,756 --> 00:25:52,557 in World War l and served with the Red Cross in Europe. 399 00:25:52,594 --> 00:25:57,156 ''l wanted my own life in my own way,'' she said. 400 00:25:57,198 --> 00:26:01,191 She became the ''Miami Herald'' sociery reporter but found 401 00:26:01,236 --> 00:26:04,433 herself more interested in the struggles for women's rights 402 00:26:04,472 --> 00:26:08,738 and racial justice, earning a reputation for her feistiness 403 00:26:08,777 --> 00:26:11,302 and colorful writing. 404 00:26:11,346 --> 00:26:14,747 When Ernest Coe turned her attention to the Everglades, 405 00:26:14,783 --> 00:26:17,650 Douglas quickly agreed with him that its unique 406 00:26:17,686 --> 00:26:21,816 combination of water, wildlife, and plants needed 407 00:26:21,856 --> 00:26:27,021 federal protection, but at the national level, many park 408 00:26:27,062 --> 00:26:31,158 supporters were unsure whether the Everglades, lacking 409 00:26:31,199 --> 00:26:34,760 dramatic mountains, waterfalls, or geysers, 410 00:26:34,803 --> 00:26:38,739 was worthy of being a national park. 411 00:26:38,773 --> 00:26:41,264 ''A swamp is a swamp,'' one leading 412 00:26:41,309 --> 00:26:44,142 conservationist said. 413 00:26:44,179 --> 00:26:48,240 The National Park Service has spent the first 15, 20 years 414 00:26:48,283 --> 00:26:51,616 of its own existence promoting the West, and suddenly, 415 00:26:51,653 --> 00:26:55,817 the Everglades comes along, and the National Park Service 416 00:26:55,857 --> 00:26:58,951 says, ''But wait a minute. Where's the scenery? 417 00:26:58,994 --> 00:27:01,462 ''Where's the Canyons? Where's the mountains? 418 00:27:01,496 --> 00:27:04,932 Why are people going to come here?'' 419 00:27:04,966 --> 00:27:08,458 COYOTE:: Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., who like his father had 420 00:27:08,503 --> 00:27:12,200 helped define the national park idea, was dispatched to 421 00:27:12,240 --> 00:27:16,267 Florida to study the request. 422 00:27:16,311 --> 00:27:19,542 ''The qualiry of the scenery,'' he conceded, ''is to 423 00:27:19,581 --> 00:27:23,574 ''the casual observer somewhat confused and monotonous, 424 00:27:23,618 --> 00:27:27,110 ''perhaps rather subtle for the average person in search 425 00:27:27,155 --> 00:27:28,713 ''of the spectacular.'' 426 00:27:33,895 --> 00:27:38,662 Then at the end of a long day, Olmsted found himself near the 427 00:27:38,700 --> 00:27:43,933 nighttime roost of thousands of ibises and herons. 428 00:27:56,718 --> 00:27:58,709 MAN AS OLMSTED: After dusk, flock after 429 00:27:58,753 --> 00:28:02,245 flock came in from their feeding grounds and settled 430 00:28:02,290 --> 00:28:06,021 in the thickets close at hand. 431 00:28:06,061 --> 00:28:09,428 lt was an unforgettable sight that ranks high among the 432 00:28:09,464 --> 00:28:13,366 natural spectacles of America. 433 00:28:13,401 --> 00:28:15,028 MAN: Somebody can tell you about a place, and you can nod 434 00:28:15,070 --> 00:28:17,698 your head and say, ''Yeah, boy, that's interesting.'' 435 00:28:17,739 --> 00:28:20,469 Someone can show you a photograph or a painting of it 436 00:28:20,508 --> 00:28:23,944 and say, ''Man, that's something,'' but until you're 437 00:28:23,978 --> 00:28:28,813 actually there, until you're in the midst of the place, 438 00:28:28,850 --> 00:28:32,650 where all your senses are involved, that's 439 00:28:32,687 --> 00:28:36,088 the transformative moment, that's when you say, 440 00:28:36,124 --> 00:28:41,323 ''This is a place, and l am part of it.'' 441 00:28:41,362 --> 00:28:44,388 COYOTE:: Skeptical Park Service leaders, including 442 00:28:44,432 --> 00:28:48,493 Horace Albright, made a series of official trips to decide 443 00:28:48,536 --> 00:28:51,027 whether to support the idea. 444 00:28:51,072 --> 00:28:54,735 So did George Melendez Wright, director of the new 445 00:28:54,776 --> 00:28:57,472 Wildlife Division. 446 00:28:57,512 --> 00:29:00,504 Both found it easier to conduct at least part of their 447 00:29:00,548 --> 00:29:05,281 investigations from the air, floating above the Everglades 448 00:29:05,320 --> 00:29:07,914 in the Good Year Blimp. 449 00:29:07,956 --> 00:29:13,019 Both were astonished by what they saw. 450 00:29:13,061 --> 00:29:16,827 ''Unless this area is quickly established as a national park,'' 451 00:29:16,865 --> 00:29:19,834 Wright warned, ''the wildlife there will 452 00:29:19,868 --> 00:29:24,032 ''become extinct.'' 453 00:29:24,072 --> 00:29:27,371 RUNTE: And then Horace Albright got in a blimp, 454 00:29:27,408 --> 00:29:31,310 went over the Everglades, looked down, saw the wildlife, 455 00:29:31,346 --> 00:29:35,476 saw the alligators and all the ibises and all the wonderful 456 00:29:35,517 --> 00:29:40,045 bird life, and said, ''You know, this is a beautiful 457 00:29:40,088 --> 00:29:44,582 ''place, and l think this could be a park,'' and began to 458 00:29:44,626 --> 00:29:47,925 change his mind. 459 00:29:47,962 --> 00:29:50,487 And in the process of changing his mind, 460 00:29:50,532 --> 00:29:52,432 it changed the Park Service's mind. 461 00:29:56,137 --> 00:30:00,096 COYOTE:: Finally, Ernest Coe and Marjory Stoneman Douglas' 462 00:30:00,141 --> 00:30:02,166 efforts paid off. 463 00:30:02,210 --> 00:30:06,704 A bill to create Everglades National Park passed Congress 464 00:30:06,748 --> 00:30:09,581 by the narrowest of margins. 465 00:30:09,617 --> 00:30:13,747 For the first time in history, a park had been created solely 466 00:30:13,788 --> 00:30:17,554 for the preservation of animals and plants 467 00:30:17,592 --> 00:30:20,686 and the environment that sustains them. 468 00:30:26,134 --> 00:30:34,564 GREENE: lt was an enchanted spot, and to me, that was the 469 00:30:34,609 --> 00:30:39,171 closest thing to heaven on earth, and l spent almost 470 00:30:39,214 --> 00:30:43,275 every weekend down in the a little bitty boat cruising 471 00:30:43,318 --> 00:30:47,618 Florida Bay and looking at the birds. 472 00:30:52,560 --> 00:30:59,523 We didn't fish, we didn't speed around in a boat. 473 00:30:59,567 --> 00:31:03,936 We just floated around and felt like we were 474 00:31:03,972 --> 00:31:06,497 all part of it. 475 00:31:11,312 --> 00:31:13,246 Us and the birds. 476 00:31:20,021 --> 00:31:23,787 And the fish that we could see on the bottom the water 477 00:31:23,825 --> 00:31:26,919 was so clear. 478 00:31:26,961 --> 00:31:31,557 We were just being there part of it all. 479 00:31:37,739 --> 00:31:40,674 l think that's what a national park is all about. 480 00:31:40,708 --> 00:31:46,943 lt gives people breathing room, it gives people 481 00:31:46,981 --> 00:31:51,315 a tranquil atmosphere. 482 00:31:51,352 --> 00:31:57,780 lt gives them an opportuniry to be a part of nature. 483 00:31:57,825 --> 00:32:04,822 You're just part of it all, just part of the rest of it. 484 00:32:25,520 --> 00:32:27,579 [Frogs croaking] 485 00:32:45,573 --> 00:32:51,170 ROOSEVELT: Today for the first time, l have seen Glacier Park. 486 00:32:51,212 --> 00:32:54,579 Perhaps l can best express to you my thrill and delight by 487 00:32:54,615 --> 00:32:58,278 saying that l wish that every American, old and young, 488 00:32:58,319 --> 00:33:00,344 could have been with me. 489 00:33:00,388 --> 00:33:02,822 The great mountains, the glaciers, the lakes, 490 00:33:02,857 --> 00:33:06,122 and the trees make me long to stay here for all 491 00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:08,424 the rest of the summer. 492 00:33:08,463 --> 00:33:13,230 To say from standpoint of scenery alone that-- 493 00:33:13,267 --> 00:33:19,001 MEN, SlNGlNG: Where seldom is heard a discouraging word 494 00:33:19,040 --> 00:33:26,845 And the skies are not cloudy all day 495 00:33:26,881 --> 00:33:30,681 COYOTE:: ln Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the national parks 496 00:33:30,718 --> 00:33:33,380 had found their greatest friend in the White House 497 00:33:33,421 --> 00:33:37,118 since the presidency of his cousin Theodore Roosevelt 498 00:33:37,158 --> 00:33:39,558 a generation earlier. 499 00:33:39,594 --> 00:33:43,496 F.D.R. had developed his own deep love of the outdoors 500 00:33:43,531 --> 00:33:46,227 during his boyhood on his wealthy family's 501 00:33:46,267 --> 00:33:49,202 country estate. 502 00:33:49,237 --> 00:33:52,263 Adding historic sites and battlefields to the national 503 00:33:52,306 --> 00:33:56,072 parks had been simply a first step in the larger 504 00:33:56,110 --> 00:34:01,673 reorganization F.D.R. and his administration contemplated, 505 00:34:01,716 --> 00:34:05,015 but a much bigger issue demanded his attention. 506 00:34:16,864 --> 00:34:20,391 The Great Depression had thrown 1 out of every 4 507 00:34:20,435 --> 00:34:24,303 American wage earners out of work. 508 00:34:24,338 --> 00:34:30,208 Factories shut down, farms were foreclosed, unemployed 509 00:34:30,244 --> 00:34:33,805 young men, concerned that they had become a burden to their 510 00:34:33,848 --> 00:34:37,011 families, roamed the countryside 511 00:34:37,051 --> 00:34:40,714 by the hundreds of thousands. 512 00:34:40,755 --> 00:34:43,952 Many Americans wondered where their next meal 513 00:34:43,991 --> 00:34:45,925 would come from. 514 00:34:48,863 --> 00:34:53,197 ln some cities, animals in the zoo were shot and the meat 515 00:34:53,234 --> 00:34:56,465 distributed to the poor. 516 00:34:56,504 --> 00:35:02,136 Everyone in the United States was affected. 517 00:35:02,176 --> 00:35:07,341 MAN: The welfare at that time was called relief. 518 00:35:07,381 --> 00:35:11,215 lt was sad when l found out the source of that money. 519 00:35:11,252 --> 00:35:16,986 lt was from the paupers' fund, so that was hard to take, 520 00:35:17,024 --> 00:35:20,357 but, hey, it kept us going. 521 00:35:20,394 --> 00:35:24,262 COYOTE:: Juan Lujan had grown up in west Texas near the tiny 522 00:35:24,298 --> 00:35:27,529 town of Redford on the Rio Grande. 523 00:35:27,568 --> 00:35:30,560 LUJAN: By the time l graduated from high school, that was 524 00:35:30,605 --> 00:35:35,304 the depth of the Depression, so that prompted me and my 525 00:35:35,343 --> 00:35:40,872 mother to seek something, and one of the social workers 526 00:35:40,915 --> 00:35:45,249 advised her about the CCCs. 527 00:35:45,286 --> 00:35:51,714 COYOTE:: The TVA, the PWA, the WPA, the CWA. 528 00:35:51,759 --> 00:35:55,695 Among the alphabet soup of programs Roosevelt's New Deal 529 00:35:55,730 --> 00:35:58,790 created to stimulate the economy and combat 530 00:35:58,833 --> 00:36:01,893 unemployment was one especially dear to 531 00:36:01,936 --> 00:36:05,804 the president's heart because it incorporated his concern 532 00:36:05,840 --> 00:36:08,240 for conservation. 533 00:36:08,276 --> 00:36:10,836 He had pushed it through Congress in less than a week 534 00:36:10,878 --> 00:36:13,904 after being inaugurated. 535 00:36:13,948 --> 00:36:17,679 The Civilian Conservation Corps put young men to work 536 00:36:17,718 --> 00:36:21,552 in national forests, state parks, and national parks, 537 00:36:21,589 --> 00:36:25,889 clearing brush and replanting forests, fighting fires, 538 00:36:25,927 --> 00:36:29,795 building visitor shelters and ranger cabins, improving 539 00:36:29,830 --> 00:36:32,799 campsites and trails. 540 00:36:32,833 --> 00:36:35,825 Horace Albright was part of the early planning, 541 00:36:35,870 --> 00:36:38,737 and because the Park Service already had a long list 542 00:36:38,773 --> 00:36:41,867 of projects ready to go, it was given a lead 543 00:36:41,909 --> 00:36:44,070 role in the new program. 544 00:37:11,839 --> 00:37:17,243 Within 3 months, 1,000 CCC camps were up and running 545 00:37:17,278 --> 00:37:21,738 with nearly 300,000 young men at work in them, sending money 546 00:37:21,782 --> 00:37:25,582 back home, helping millions of Americans. 547 00:37:48,275 --> 00:37:51,540 LUJAN: Prior to the CCC, l didn't know anything 548 00:37:51,579 --> 00:37:54,377 about national parks except what l read in my history 549 00:37:54,415 --> 00:37:57,509 books, that they existed somewhere. 550 00:37:57,551 --> 00:38:00,611 l had never been to a national park before. 551 00:38:00,655 --> 00:38:03,089 COYOTE:: Juan Lujan was dispatched to help develop 552 00:38:03,124 --> 00:38:08,562 what would become Big Bend National Park in Texas. 553 00:38:08,596 --> 00:38:11,258 LUJAN: We were housed in barracks, 554 00:38:11,298 --> 00:38:14,699 we ate in a mess hall just like the military, 555 00:38:14,735 --> 00:38:17,226 and we had a certain discipline. 556 00:38:17,271 --> 00:38:22,038 We'd get up early in the morning, do calisthenics. 557 00:38:22,076 --> 00:38:24,476 That was before breakfast, and you'd better be 558 00:38:24,512 --> 00:38:26,503 at the calisthenics. 559 00:38:26,547 --> 00:38:31,575 Otherwise, KP, kitchen patrol. 560 00:38:31,619 --> 00:38:35,214 COYOTE:: For many, it was their first time away from home 561 00:38:35,256 --> 00:38:41,217 and their first real encounter with the natural world. 562 00:38:41,262 --> 00:38:45,130 Burton Appleton from Brooklyn was sent to Glacier National 563 00:38:45,166 --> 00:38:48,533 Park in northwest Montana. 564 00:38:48,569 --> 00:38:52,733 l once visited my brother in Hackettstown, New Jersey, 565 00:38:52,773 --> 00:38:55,970 which was maybe 50 miles west of the Hudson River. 566 00:38:56,010 --> 00:38:59,002 l had an aunt who lived out on Long lsland, 567 00:38:59,046 --> 00:39:00,445 Eastport, Long lsland. 568 00:39:00,481 --> 00:39:04,144 Maybe that was 50 miles. 569 00:39:04,185 --> 00:39:07,916 l can't remember visiting anyplace else. 570 00:39:07,955 --> 00:39:11,254 Those are the only two times that l think l had left 571 00:39:11,292 --> 00:39:14,125 Brooklyn, New York. 572 00:39:14,161 --> 00:39:17,858 We'd been on the train for about 4 days, and we were 573 00:39:17,898 --> 00:39:23,495 awakened at a stop, and l looked out the window of my 574 00:39:23,537 --> 00:39:28,907 upper berth, and there was this mountain with snow 575 00:39:28,943 --> 00:39:33,880 in April, and of course, in Brooklyn, we had a bluff 576 00:39:33,914 --> 00:39:38,783 maybe in Prospect Park we could walk up, but nothing 577 00:39:38,819 --> 00:39:42,152 like that in my past. 578 00:39:42,189 --> 00:39:44,987 Another thing l remember is that l was out there by myself 579 00:39:45,025 --> 00:39:50,554 one day with my Kodak box camera, and l--to this day, 580 00:39:50,598 --> 00:39:51,724 l don't believe it. 581 00:39:51,766 --> 00:39:56,465 A deer walked up to me within 10 feet maybe. 582 00:39:56,504 --> 00:39:59,098 l stood stock still. 583 00:39:59,140 --> 00:40:03,076 l couldn't believe that, and l took a picture, and as 584 00:40:03,110 --> 00:40:07,911 soon as l clicked the camera, the deer turned tail an ran, 585 00:40:07,948 --> 00:40:09,472 and l have that photo. 586 00:40:14,789 --> 00:40:19,453 COYOTE:: Claude Tyler, at age 16 the eldest of 6 boys and 587 00:40:19,493 --> 00:40:23,224 2 girls in a desperately poor farm family from Blossom, 588 00:40:23,264 --> 00:40:27,633 Texas, was dispatched to the barren wastes of Death Valley 589 00:40:27,668 --> 00:40:30,159 National Monument. 590 00:40:30,204 --> 00:40:33,196 TYLER: We loaded on a truck somewheres in that area 591 00:40:33,240 --> 00:40:36,698 and went to Death Valley, and it was pretty warm then, 592 00:40:36,744 --> 00:40:41,147 but in June, it really did get hot. 593 00:40:41,182 --> 00:40:45,243 Fifth day of June, it was 1 20 in the shade. 594 00:40:45,286 --> 00:40:48,915 270 foot below sea level. 595 00:40:48,956 --> 00:40:52,983 Well, it was hot, and us boys kind of got toughened 596 00:40:53,027 --> 00:40:54,619 to it, l think. 597 00:40:54,662 --> 00:40:59,531 We all got a good suntan. 598 00:40:59,567 --> 00:41:03,264 COYOTE:: Tyler was then sent to Lassen Volcanic National Park 599 00:41:03,304 --> 00:41:06,137 in northern California, a peak more than 600 00:41:06,173 --> 00:41:10,576 10,000 feet above sea level. 601 00:41:10,611 --> 00:41:13,944 TYLER: l'd never been to the mountains before. 602 00:41:13,981 --> 00:41:16,745 lt was all new to me. 603 00:41:16,784 --> 00:41:19,275 Kind of short-winded the first time l went up there. 604 00:41:19,320 --> 00:41:20,947 Ha ha ha! 605 00:41:20,988 --> 00:41:25,982 Get up above the tree line, why, you get short of breath, 606 00:41:26,026 --> 00:41:29,154 and l would make pictures and send them home and tell them l 607 00:41:29,196 --> 00:41:31,221 was doing all right and this is where l'm at, and Mother 608 00:41:31,265 --> 00:41:33,597 would write and say, ''Well, you be careful 609 00:41:33,634 --> 00:41:36,034 on those mountains.'' 610 00:41:36,070 --> 00:41:42,873 We got paid $30 a month of which a whole $5.00 was ours. 611 00:41:42,910 --> 00:41:47,574 The rest of it went home, and $25 a month seems like 612 00:41:47,615 --> 00:41:51,745 nothing, but it made a big difference. 613 00:41:51,785 --> 00:41:54,913 Money and digniry was important because whenever you 614 00:41:54,955 --> 00:41:59,722 need a shirt and you buy it, if you bought it with your own 615 00:41:59,760 --> 00:42:02,695 money, that's a good feeling. 616 00:42:10,905 --> 00:42:12,497 ROOSEVELT: lt's very good to be here at these 617 00:42:12,539 --> 00:42:15,633 Virginia CCC camps. 618 00:42:15,676 --> 00:42:19,112 l wish l could see them all over the country. 619 00:42:19,146 --> 00:42:21,546 l hope that all over the country they're in as fine 620 00:42:21,582 --> 00:42:24,813 condition as the camps that l have seen today. 621 00:42:24,852 --> 00:42:27,320 l wish that l could take a couple of months off from the 622 00:42:27,354 --> 00:42:30,790 White House and come down here and live with them because l 623 00:42:30,824 --> 00:42:34,419 know l'd get full of health the way l have. 624 00:42:34,461 --> 00:42:36,486 LUJAN: We almost thought he was God. 625 00:42:36,530 --> 00:42:39,624 We really liked him. 626 00:42:39,667 --> 00:42:42,864 Because at the same time, there were many other programs 627 00:42:42,903 --> 00:42:46,771 having nothing to do with the CCC, but there was progress, 628 00:42:46,807 --> 00:42:48,468 there was work, there was money in 629 00:42:48,509 --> 00:42:50,841 the communiry circulating. 630 00:42:50,878 --> 00:42:53,540 COYOTE:: Besides the conservation work they did, 631 00:42:53,580 --> 00:42:58,745 the men also participated in organized sports, hobby clubs, 632 00:42:58,786 --> 00:43:02,381 discussion groups, and classes meant to prepare them 633 00:43:02,423 --> 00:43:06,883 for getting jobs once they left the camps. 634 00:43:06,927 --> 00:43:10,886 At Big Bend, Juan Lujan helped lay the foundations for new 635 00:43:10,931 --> 00:43:14,867 park buildings and then, because he spoke both Spanish 636 00:43:14,902 --> 00:43:19,236 and English fluently, became a museum guide. 637 00:43:19,273 --> 00:43:21,764 He was also put to work teaching his 638 00:43:21,809 --> 00:43:25,006 less-educated comrades. 639 00:43:25,045 --> 00:43:27,707 LUJAN: Most of the enrollees in that particular camp had 640 00:43:27,748 --> 00:43:30,273 not graduated from high school. 641 00:43:30,317 --> 00:43:34,617 Many of them had little or no education, and those of us 642 00:43:34,655 --> 00:43:39,115 that had some, we volunteered to teach classes, and some 643 00:43:39,159 --> 00:43:42,754 of them wanted to learn how to read and write Spanish. 644 00:43:42,796 --> 00:43:47,358 l taught some of those, too. 645 00:43:47,401 --> 00:43:50,837 COYOTE:: Juan Lujan would go on to college, something his 646 00:43:50,871 --> 00:43:55,274 mother always wanted him to do, eventually earn a master's 647 00:43:55,309 --> 00:43:58,972 and then a doctoral degree and continue teaching others 648 00:43:59,013 --> 00:44:01,345 for the rest of his life. 649 00:44:04,351 --> 00:44:08,014 After his time at Lassen, Claude Tyler returned 650 00:44:08,055 --> 00:44:10,717 to Blossom, Texas. 651 00:44:10,758 --> 00:44:14,353 TYLER: l went back to school for a year. 652 00:44:14,395 --> 00:44:17,489 l went over to the school house, and the teacher wanted 653 00:44:17,531 --> 00:44:22,230 me to go from a--l had only finished about the fifth 654 00:44:22,269 --> 00:44:27,138 grade, and he looked over some of the things that l took 655 00:44:27,174 --> 00:44:30,769 in CC camps and correspondence courses, and he put me 656 00:44:30,811 --> 00:44:35,111 in the first year in high school, and so l went one year 657 00:44:35,149 --> 00:44:37,083 in high school, and that's the last 658 00:44:37,117 --> 00:44:40,280 of the education that l had. 659 00:44:40,320 --> 00:44:42,982 lt's because my parents hadn't really got up 660 00:44:43,023 --> 00:44:45,321 on their feet real good. 661 00:44:45,359 --> 00:44:52,060 l went back to CC camps and stayed two terms in there. 662 00:44:52,099 --> 00:44:54,033 APPLETON: l was not a very good high-school student. 663 00:44:54,068 --> 00:44:57,868 My grades were not all that good, and l am convinced to 664 00:44:57,905 --> 00:45:00,931 this day that the only reason l was able to matriculate 665 00:45:00,974 --> 00:45:04,603 at the New York State College of Forestry was that l 666 00:45:04,645 --> 00:45:08,979 convinced the registrar or the dean of admissions of my 667 00:45:09,016 --> 00:45:10,881 experience in the CCC. 668 00:45:10,918 --> 00:45:13,250 That's what the CCC did for me. 669 00:45:18,192 --> 00:45:21,286 COYOTE:: Over the course of the Depression, more than 670 00:45:21,328 --> 00:45:24,957 3 million men would find work at one time or another with the 671 00:45:24,998 --> 00:45:28,365 Civilian Conservation Corps. 672 00:45:28,402 --> 00:45:32,304 They would build more than 97,000 miles of fire roads 673 00:45:32,339 --> 00:45:36,673 in national forests, combat soil erosion on 84 million 674 00:45:36,710 --> 00:45:42,239 acres of farmland, and plant 3 billion trees, more than one 675 00:45:42,282 --> 00:45:45,547 half the total reforestation accomplished 676 00:45:45,586 --> 00:45:49,215 in the nation's history. 677 00:45:49,256 --> 00:45:54,193 During that time, some $218 million would be pumped 678 00:45:54,228 --> 00:45:58,358 into projects solely within the national parks, 679 00:45:58,398 --> 00:46:05,395 including trails and buildings that remain to this day. 680 00:46:05,439 --> 00:46:06,929 RUNTE: The Depression is a golden age 681 00:46:06,974 --> 00:46:10,273 because the National Park Service is a federal agency, 682 00:46:10,310 --> 00:46:12,938 and it's going to get all of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's 683 00:46:12,980 --> 00:46:15,039 ''let's rebuild the nation'' dollars. 684 00:46:18,318 --> 00:46:21,151 And the budgets of the National Park Service soar, 685 00:46:21,188 --> 00:46:24,783 and as the National Park Service looks at projects that 686 00:46:24,825 --> 00:46:27,794 could put people to work, Congress agrees, 687 00:46:27,828 --> 00:46:29,796 and Franklin Delano Roosevelt agrees, 688 00:46:29,830 --> 00:46:31,263 and the National Park Service 689 00:46:31,298 --> 00:46:33,960 suddenly finds itself swimming in money relative to what it 690 00:46:34,001 --> 00:46:38,062 had in the 1920s. 691 00:46:38,105 --> 00:46:42,371 ROOSEVELT: We are definitely in an era of building today, 692 00:46:42,409 --> 00:46:45,139 the best kind of building, 693 00:46:45,179 --> 00:46:48,478 the building of great public projects 694 00:46:48,515 --> 00:46:51,780 for the benefit of the public and with the definite 695 00:46:51,818 --> 00:46:56,721 objective of building human happiness at the same time. 696 00:47:24,985 --> 00:47:29,251 TYLER: Looking back on it now, l believe that it helped a lot 697 00:47:29,289 --> 00:47:32,383 of families have a better life. 698 00:47:32,426 --> 00:47:35,486 l realize now that it was for the benefit of the economy, 699 00:47:35,529 --> 00:47:40,831 too, but l believe that a lot of families might not have 700 00:47:40,867 --> 00:47:43,802 been able to survive if it hadn't have been 701 00:47:43,837 --> 00:47:47,034 for that program. 702 00:47:47,074 --> 00:47:49,338 And l got to see a lot of the world that l wouldn't have 703 00:47:49,376 --> 00:47:53,870 seen before that if l hadn't have done to the CC camps. 704 00:47:53,914 --> 00:47:58,510 Mount Lassen was outstanding all right. 705 00:47:58,552 --> 00:48:01,612 Death Valley was just hot. 706 00:48:01,655 --> 00:48:04,317 l don't know whether l'd call that a favorite memory, 707 00:48:04,358 --> 00:48:06,349 but l can remember it. 708 00:48:09,963 --> 00:48:14,093 [Clattering] 709 00:48:14,134 --> 00:48:16,500 SCHULLERY: The national parks have always been managed 710 00:48:16,536 --> 00:48:20,267 pretty much by the values of their time. 711 00:48:20,307 --> 00:48:24,243 lt was still spectacle. 712 00:48:24,278 --> 00:48:28,476 Wild beaury was defined on superficial levels that had 713 00:48:28,515 --> 00:48:32,918 very little to do with wildness and how wildness 714 00:48:32,953 --> 00:48:35,513 actually works. 715 00:48:35,555 --> 00:48:40,151 Oddly enough, it's the scientists who had the most to 716 00:48:40,193 --> 00:48:45,529 do with redefining beaury. 717 00:48:45,565 --> 00:48:47,590 MAN AS GEORGE MELENDEZ WRlGHT: ln the end, the National Park 718 00:48:47,634 --> 00:48:50,626 Service either will be praised for intelligently conserving 719 00:48:50,671 --> 00:48:55,540 the last fragments of primitive America or condemned 720 00:48:55,575 --> 00:48:59,409 for failure to hold to the real purpose. 721 00:48:59,446 --> 00:49:02,279 George Melendez Wright. 722 00:49:02,349 --> 00:49:03,941 WOMAN: l think his passion really shows through 723 00:49:03,984 --> 00:49:06,111 in his writing. 724 00:49:06,153 --> 00:49:08,053 He was very persuasive. 725 00:49:08,088 --> 00:49:12,548 He could convince people who really were against his ideas, 726 00:49:12,592 --> 00:49:15,561 he could bring them along. 727 00:49:15,595 --> 00:49:18,496 He was a joyous person. 728 00:49:18,532 --> 00:49:24,368 He was very comfortable in his own skin, not egotistical 729 00:49:24,404 --> 00:49:26,964 but very confident in himself. 730 00:49:27,007 --> 00:49:30,841 He was a small person even by Hispanic standards 731 00:49:30,877 --> 00:49:35,246 but with a big heart, mind, and presence. 732 00:49:35,282 --> 00:49:39,150 COYOTE:: By 1936, George Melendez Wright was married 733 00:49:39,186 --> 00:49:41,950 with a growing family, but he was busier 734 00:49:41,988 --> 00:49:44,923 with is work than ever. 735 00:49:44,958 --> 00:49:48,121 The Wildlife Division he had started within in the Park 736 00:49:48,161 --> 00:49:53,428 Service now had 27 biologists promoting Wright's vision that 737 00:49:53,467 --> 00:49:57,028 park policies had to take the animals and plants into 738 00:49:57,070 --> 00:50:01,632 account, not just the tourists. 739 00:50:01,675 --> 00:50:05,577 His personal interest in Yellowstone's trumpeter swans, 740 00:50:05,612 --> 00:50:09,013 the largest and most rare of American water fowl, which had 741 00:50:09,049 --> 00:50:12,314 been reduced by hunting to a mere handful of breeding 742 00:50:12,352 --> 00:50:16,584 pairs, had turned into a personal crusade to save them 743 00:50:16,623 --> 00:50:19,023 from extinction. 744 00:50:19,059 --> 00:50:22,586 Wright solicited the help of local rod and gun clubs, 745 00:50:22,629 --> 00:50:25,928 lobbied state fish and game commissions and other federal 746 00:50:25,966 --> 00:50:30,801 agencies, even donated some of his own money again to create 747 00:50:30,837 --> 00:50:35,035 a special wildlife refuge that ultimately brought the swans 748 00:50:35,075 --> 00:50:38,306 back from the brink. 749 00:50:38,345 --> 00:50:40,404 MAN AS GEORGE MELENDEZ WRlGHT: Sometimes while l'm watching 750 00:50:40,447 --> 00:50:43,883 these birds, the illusion of the untouchabiliry of this 751 00:50:43,917 --> 00:50:48,081 wilderness becomes so strong that it is stronger than 752 00:50:48,121 --> 00:50:53,252 the realiry, and the polished roadway becomes the illusion, 753 00:50:53,293 --> 00:50:58,822 the mirage that has no substance. 754 00:50:58,865 --> 00:51:01,356 COYOTE:: ln February, the traveled to the newly 755 00:51:01,401 --> 00:51:05,997 authorized Big Bend National Park in southwest Texas, 756 00:51:06,039 --> 00:51:08,803 where the Chisos Mountains rise out of the Chihuhuan 757 00:51:08,842 --> 00:51:13,074 Desert and the Rio Grande cuts through a series of dramatic 758 00:51:13,113 --> 00:51:18,574 canyons separating the United States from Mexico. 759 00:51:18,618 --> 00:51:21,712 With Roger Toll, another rising star within the Park 760 00:51:21,755 --> 00:51:25,748 Service, Wright was part of a two-nation commission studying 761 00:51:25,792 --> 00:51:29,284 the possibiliry of an international park straddling 762 00:51:29,329 --> 00:51:31,729 both sides of the border. 763 00:51:31,765 --> 00:51:35,599 His fluency in Spanish and his outgoing disposition helped 764 00:51:35,635 --> 00:51:38,627 him make friends with his Mexican counterparts. 765 00:51:41,241 --> 00:51:45,143 After the meeting, he and Toll headed for home. 766 00:51:45,178 --> 00:51:49,706 Near Deming, New Mexico, an oncoming car blew a tire 767 00:51:49,749 --> 00:51:53,617 and crashed head-on into their vehicle. 768 00:51:53,653 --> 00:51:56,383 Both men were killed. 769 00:51:56,423 --> 00:51:59,517 George Melendez Wright was 31. 770 00:52:02,362 --> 00:52:04,887 Without him, the Park Service's interest 771 00:52:04,931 --> 00:52:07,729 in wildlife waned. 772 00:52:07,767 --> 00:52:11,396 By the end of the decade, of the 27 biologists who had 773 00:52:11,438 --> 00:52:17,104 once been under his supervision, only 9 were left. 774 00:52:22,015 --> 00:52:27,681 MAN: Scenery without wildlife is scenery. 775 00:52:27,721 --> 00:52:34,285 Wildlife is a component of the grander scene. 776 00:52:34,327 --> 00:52:37,728 Without that wildlife, you don't have 777 00:52:37,764 --> 00:52:41,666 a national park. 778 00:52:41,701 --> 00:52:47,230 George Melendez Wright was a savior of wildlife 779 00:52:47,274 --> 00:52:51,506 in America's national parks, but more importantly, 780 00:52:51,545 --> 00:52:53,911 George Melendez Wright is a savior 781 00:52:53,947 --> 00:52:57,508 of the national park ideal. 782 00:53:18,772 --> 00:53:24,005 ROOSEVELT: l'm very keen about travel, not only personally-- 783 00:53:24,044 --> 00:53:30,506 you know that--but also travel for as many Americans as can 784 00:53:30,550 --> 00:53:37,114 possibly afford it because those Americans will be fulfilling 785 00:53:37,157 --> 00:53:41,753 a very desirable objective of our citizenship, getting to 786 00:53:41,795 --> 00:53:49,395 know their own country better, and the more they see of it, 787 00:53:49,436 --> 00:53:54,339 the more they will realize the privileges which God 788 00:53:54,374 --> 00:53:57,639 and nature have given to the American people. 789 00:54:03,149 --> 00:54:04,639 COYOTE:: Throughout the Depression, 790 00:54:04,684 --> 00:54:08,415 President Roosevelt made a number of well-publicized visits 791 00:54:08,455 --> 00:54:13,085 to the national parks, glorying in the chance to be outdoors 792 00:54:13,126 --> 00:54:17,495 in the midst of such stunning landscapes, even if the polio 793 00:54:17,530 --> 00:54:21,261 that had destroyed his legs confined him to the backseat 794 00:54:21,301 --> 00:54:26,364 of his touring car, and he cheerfully encouraged his 795 00:54:26,406 --> 00:54:32,402 fellow citizens to follow his example. 796 00:54:32,445 --> 00:54:36,279 ROOSEVELT: l decided today that every year ought 797 00:54:36,316 --> 00:54:39,217 to be National Parks Year. 798 00:54:39,252 --> 00:54:44,155 There is nothing so American as our national parks. 799 00:54:44,190 --> 00:54:47,557 The scenery and wildlife are native, and the fundamental 800 00:54:47,594 --> 00:54:51,530 idea behind the parks is native. 801 00:54:51,564 --> 00:54:58,697 lt is in brief that the country belongs to the people. 802 00:54:58,738 --> 00:55:03,869 They are not for the rich alone. 803 00:55:03,910 --> 00:55:07,311 COYOTE:: Despite hard times, the number of park visitors 804 00:55:07,347 --> 00:55:11,613 continued to rise during the 1930s from roughly 3 million 805 00:55:11,651 --> 00:55:16,452 a year at the start of the decade to 15.5 million 806 00:55:16,489 --> 00:55:23,622 in 1939, and Roosevelt was intent on setting aside more 807 00:55:23,663 --> 00:55:26,029 places for them to visit. 808 00:55:26,066 --> 00:55:28,967 He turned his attention to the northwestern corner of 809 00:55:29,002 --> 00:55:33,200 Lake Superior off the coast of Minnesota and Michigan 810 00:55:33,239 --> 00:55:36,697 and the largest freshwater island in the world, creating 811 00:55:36,743 --> 00:55:40,270 lsle Royale National Park. 812 00:55:40,313 --> 00:55:43,111 The president also used his authoriry under 813 00:55:43,149 --> 00:55:47,745 the Antiquities Act to bypass Congress altogether and create 814 00:55:47,787 --> 00:55:50,813 a string of national monuments. 815 00:55:50,857 --> 00:55:54,588 Some of them would eventually be elevated to park status, 816 00:55:54,627 --> 00:55:58,290 including Joshua Tree in southern California, named 817 00:55:58,331 --> 00:56:02,267 for the distinctive plants Mormon pioneers believed 818 00:56:02,368 --> 00:56:05,929 looked in silhouette liked the Prophet Joshua raising his 819 00:56:05,972 --> 00:56:09,430 arms to beckon them forward. 820 00:56:09,476 --> 00:56:14,175 The Dry Tortugas, a remote cluster of 7 tiny islands 821 00:56:14,214 --> 00:56:17,843 70 miles off the southernmost tip of Florida. 822 00:56:17,884 --> 00:56:21,320 On one island sits the largest brick fortification 823 00:56:21,354 --> 00:56:23,914 in the world, Fort Jefferson, 824 00:56:23,957 --> 00:56:28,485 used during the Civil War as a prison. 825 00:56:28,528 --> 00:56:32,294 Capitol Reef in Utah, where a hundred-mile fold 826 00:56:32,332 --> 00:56:37,099 in the earth's crust exposes a panoply of differently colored 827 00:56:37,137 --> 00:56:40,163 rock formations the Navajo lndians called 828 00:56:40,206 --> 00:56:43,437 The Land of the Sleeping Rainbow. 829 00:56:43,476 --> 00:56:45,740 And off the coast of Santa Barbara, 830 00:56:45,779 --> 00:56:47,212 the Channel lslands, 831 00:56:47,247 --> 00:56:51,115 a crucial breeding ground for hundreds of animal species, 832 00:56:51,151 --> 00:56:55,417 including the California brown pelican, whose nesting place 833 00:56:55,455 --> 00:56:58,447 had virtually disappeared everywhere else in the western 834 00:56:58,491 --> 00:57:03,087 United States, an oasis of undeveloped land just a few 835 00:57:03,129 --> 00:57:09,364 miles from the explosive urban growth of greater Los Angeles. 836 00:57:09,402 --> 00:57:11,063 All clear! 837 00:57:19,979 --> 00:57:23,176 ROOSEVELT: We should remember that the development of our 838 00:57:23,216 --> 00:57:29,155 national park system over a period of many years has not 839 00:57:29,189 --> 00:57:34,217 been a simple bed of roses. 840 00:57:34,260 --> 00:57:39,163 lt has been a long and fierce fight against many private 841 00:57:39,199 --> 00:57:43,533 interests, which were entrenched in political 842 00:57:43,570 --> 00:57:45,936 and economic power. 843 00:57:45,972 --> 00:57:48,600 MAN: This is an allocation out of the total sum... 844 00:57:48,641 --> 00:57:51,166 COYOTE:: No one was more willing to take on entrenched 845 00:57:51,211 --> 00:57:53,145 interests than the president's 846 00:57:53,179 --> 00:57:57,275 irascible Secretary of the lnterior Harold lckes, 847 00:57:57,317 --> 00:58:01,253 a self-described old curmudgeon. 848 00:58:01,287 --> 00:58:04,984 A Chicago lawyer and former Republican stalwart known 849 00:58:05,024 --> 00:58:09,120 equally for his explosive temper and his fierce devotion 850 00:58:09,162 --> 00:58:12,859 to New Deal policies, he had become one of Roosevelt's 851 00:58:12,899 --> 00:58:16,630 closest and most controversial advisors. 852 00:58:16,669 --> 00:58:19,638 ''The meanest man who ever sat in a cabinet office 853 00:58:19,672 --> 00:58:22,641 ''in Washington,'' Horace Albright said, 854 00:58:22,675 --> 00:58:28,477 ''and the best Secretary of the lnterior we ever had.'' 855 00:58:28,514 --> 00:58:31,847 lckes fought battles on every front. 856 00:58:31,885 --> 00:58:35,252 One of his first acts was to abolish the department's 857 00:58:35,288 --> 00:58:37,518 segregated lunchrooms. 858 00:58:37,557 --> 00:58:40,890 Then he told the national parks in the South to simply 859 00:58:40,927 --> 00:58:43,725 ignore local Jim Crow laws 860 00:58:43,763 --> 00:58:47,494 requiring separate facilities for blacks. 861 00:58:47,533 --> 00:58:51,060 At Virginia's Shenandoah National Park, signs 862 00:58:51,104 --> 00:58:54,198 segregating campgrounds or picnic areas were 863 00:58:54,240 --> 00:58:57,209 quietly taken down. 864 00:58:57,243 --> 00:59:00,576 lckes make more enemies by repeatedly proposing the 865 00:59:00,613 --> 00:59:04,344 creation of a Department of Conservation that would put 866 00:59:04,384 --> 00:59:08,252 national parks, national forests, and all other natural 867 00:59:08,288 --> 00:59:14,284 resources under the same administrative control--his. 868 00:59:14,327 --> 00:59:19,060 Congress repeatedly refused, but he continued to have 869 00:59:19,098 --> 00:59:23,694 Roosevelt's ear and trust and was tirelessly effective 870 00:59:23,736 --> 00:59:29,697 in advocating new parks regardless of the opposition. 871 00:59:29,742 --> 00:59:33,303 ln 1937, Roosevelt and lckes entered 872 00:59:33,346 --> 00:59:38,978 into a park controversy that had been raging for 30 years. 873 00:59:39,018 --> 00:59:43,079 On the Olympic Peninsula west of Seattle, majestic mountains 874 00:59:43,122 --> 00:59:46,683 trapped the moist Pacific winds, which dropped 875 00:59:46,726 --> 00:59:51,959 160 inches of rain a year, nurturing verdant rain forests 876 00:59:51,998 --> 00:59:55,024 that contained the largest specimens in the world 877 00:59:55,068 --> 00:59:59,061 of Douglas fir, red cedar, western hemlock, 878 00:59:59,105 --> 01:00:01,596 and Sitka spruce. 879 01:00:01,641 --> 01:00:05,441 For centuries, it was the homeland of native tribes like 880 01:00:05,478 --> 01:00:11,110 the Makah and Quinault, the Hoh and Skokomish. 881 01:00:11,150 --> 01:00:14,176 Over the years, more than 10 different bills had been 882 01:00:14,220 --> 01:00:17,451 introduced in Congress to make Mount Olympus National 883 01:00:17,490 --> 01:00:21,290 Monument into a National Park. 884 01:00:21,327 --> 01:00:25,957 Each one was defeated, caught in a seemingly endless battle 885 01:00:25,999 --> 01:00:31,164 between the Forest Service and the Park Service. 886 01:00:31,204 --> 01:00:34,935 Meanwhile, loggers were approaching the last virgin 887 01:00:34,974 --> 01:00:37,568 stands of rain forest. 888 01:00:37,610 --> 01:00:40,477 ''Left to the care of the Forest Service,'' Harold lckes 889 01:00:40,513 --> 01:00:44,108 contended, ''such places suffered the same fate as 890 01:00:44,150 --> 01:00:46,744 ''a pig in the stockyards. 891 01:00:46,786 --> 01:00:51,416 All that is left,'' he said, ''is the squeal.'' 892 01:00:51,457 --> 01:00:56,121 POPE: Harold lckes was one of the few lnterior Secretaries 893 01:00:56,162 --> 01:01:02,101 of the 20th Century who was as big as the parks because lckes 894 01:01:02,135 --> 01:01:05,434 was the first Secretary of the lnterior who really engaged 895 01:01:05,471 --> 01:01:08,804 the fact that you could save a place once somebody had 896 01:01:08,841 --> 01:01:10,934 aspirations on it. 897 01:01:10,977 --> 01:01:13,502 The early parks were created before anybody big 898 01:01:13,546 --> 01:01:17,243 and powerful had aspirations, and when San Francisco, 899 01:01:17,283 --> 01:01:21,219 which was big and powerful, drew its bead on Hetch Hetchy, 900 01:01:21,254 --> 01:01:24,485 San Francisco won, Hetch Hetchy lost. 901 01:01:24,524 --> 01:01:25,991 lckes said, ''Wait a minute. 902 01:01:26,025 --> 01:01:28,050 ''Big, powerful people may have their aspirations 903 01:01:28,094 --> 01:01:34,658 ''on the Olympics, but they don't have to win.'' 904 01:01:34,700 --> 01:01:38,693 COYOTE:: The president decided to have a look for himself, 905 01:01:38,738 --> 01:01:42,230 but his visit was arranged by the Forest Service and its 906 01:01:42,275 --> 01:01:46,336 allies in the lumber and pulp mill industries, all of them 907 01:01:46,379 --> 01:01:49,815 intent on convincing Roosevelt that a national park would 908 01:01:49,849 --> 01:01:54,513 ruin an already suffering local economy. 909 01:01:54,554 --> 01:01:57,387 No detail was overlooked. 910 01:01:57,423 --> 01:02:00,221 They excluded all Park Service officials from 911 01:02:00,259 --> 01:02:04,355 the invitation list, scheduled a massive logging train to 912 01:02:04,397 --> 01:02:08,231 rumble past the president's lodge during his breakfast, 913 01:02:08,267 --> 01:02:12,260 a not-so-subtle reminder of the jobs at stake, and they 914 01:02:12,305 --> 01:02:16,503 moved the sign marking the National Forest boundary to 915 01:02:16,542 --> 01:02:19,943 give the impression that a heavily logged area, 916 01:02:19,979 --> 01:02:24,211 now several square miles of burned stumps, was not 917 01:02:24,250 --> 01:02:26,684 on federal land. 918 01:02:26,719 --> 01:02:29,483 ''l hope the son of a bitch who's responsible for this is 919 01:02:29,522 --> 01:02:33,959 ''roasting in hell,'' Roosevelt said, not realizing that he 920 01:02:33,993 --> 01:02:38,623 was actually looking at a national forest and his guide 921 01:02:38,664 --> 01:02:41,827 was the forest supervisor. 922 01:02:41,868 --> 01:02:44,928 When Roosevelt learned about the deception, it only 923 01:02:44,971 --> 01:02:50,637 increased his commitment to protect the forest. 924 01:02:50,676 --> 01:02:55,045 On June 29, 1938, with the president's passionate 925 01:02:55,081 --> 01:02:59,381 support, Congress converted the National Monument to 926 01:02:59,418 --> 01:03:04,355 Olympic National Park and gave Roosevelt the authoriry to 927 01:03:04,390 --> 01:03:09,225 expand its boundaries, which he soon did, saving two 928 01:03:09,262 --> 01:03:12,959 of the most threatened valleys by stripping an additional 929 01:03:12,999 --> 01:03:17,868 187,000 acres away from the Forest Service. 930 01:03:24,410 --> 01:03:28,938 MAN: When the weekend comes around, l get restless. 931 01:03:28,981 --> 01:03:33,179 At night, l bring maps of Mount Rainier into bed with me 932 01:03:33,219 --> 01:03:36,450 and fall asleep looking at them. 933 01:03:36,489 --> 01:03:39,652 When it's time to depart for a trip, l cannot stay in bed 934 01:03:39,692 --> 01:03:44,686 any longer and get up before anyone else. 935 01:03:44,730 --> 01:03:47,597 l can't wait to go hiking again. 936 01:03:47,633 --> 01:03:54,937 lwao Matsushita. 937 01:03:54,974 --> 01:03:56,601 COYOTE:: Among the millions of people who 938 01:03:56,642 --> 01:04:00,544 took President Roosevelt's advice to visit national parks 939 01:04:00,580 --> 01:04:05,813 were lwao Matsushita and his wife Hanaye, Japanese citizens 940 01:04:05,851 --> 01:04:10,788 who had moved to Seattle in 1919. 941 01:04:10,823 --> 01:04:14,259 Each Sunday, the Seattle Camera Club, which he had 942 01:04:14,293 --> 01:04:17,387 helped start, organized outings to nearby 943 01:04:17,430 --> 01:04:21,389 Mount Rainier National Park, where Matsushita not only took 944 01:04:21,434 --> 01:04:25,962 still photographs but also created home movies and kept 945 01:04:26,005 --> 01:04:29,600 a small journal to record their adventures. 946 01:04:29,642 --> 01:04:31,633 [Projector running] 947 01:04:44,357 --> 01:04:46,917 MAN AS lWAO MATSUSHlTA: Beyond these high valleys, you can 948 01:04:46,959 --> 01:04:49,553 see the craggily white mountains, whose peaks are 949 01:04:49,595 --> 01:04:51,756 showing through a thick fog. 950 01:04:51,797 --> 01:04:55,790 lt is a view worthy of a sumi-e painting. 951 01:04:55,835 --> 01:04:59,236 Looking to the north, you can see Mount Rainier appearing 952 01:04:59,272 --> 01:05:04,938 majestically like our king of mountains Mount Fuji. 953 01:05:04,977 --> 01:05:07,343 l sit on a patch of heather. 954 01:05:07,380 --> 01:05:09,905 l marvel at the speed with which clouds are 955 01:05:09,949 --> 01:05:12,213 changing their shape. 956 01:05:12,251 --> 01:05:16,654 l crouch by a stream fed by the remaining snow to enjoy 957 01:05:16,689 --> 01:05:21,251 a cold drink of water and open up my sushi. 958 01:05:25,031 --> 01:05:29,297 COYOTE:: By the mid-1930s, lwao and Hanaye had visited 959 01:05:29,335 --> 01:05:34,932 the park more than 100 times, drawn to the place they called 960 01:05:34,974 --> 01:05:37,636 Holy Mountain. 961 01:05:37,677 --> 01:05:38,974 MAN AS lWAO MATSUSHlTA: Everyone here is having a good 962 01:05:39,011 --> 01:05:43,004 old time, and no one had a reason to frown. 963 01:05:43,049 --> 01:05:48,487 Like a paradise of our own world and time. 964 01:05:48,521 --> 01:05:52,514 Looking up, l feel as though the great snowy mountain were 965 01:05:52,558 --> 01:05:55,789 an affectionate mother to all the people playing 966 01:05:55,828 --> 01:05:57,489 on her slopes. 967 01:06:02,435 --> 01:06:06,064 COYOTE:: Farther to the south, another Japanese immigrant was 968 01:06:06,105 --> 01:06:09,438 finding similar joy and inspiration 969 01:06:09,475 --> 01:06:12,706 in another national park. 970 01:06:12,745 --> 01:06:18,206 MAN: Success or failure is not my aim in life. 971 01:06:18,250 --> 01:06:23,779 Whether l be a flake of snow or only a drop of dew, 972 01:06:23,823 --> 01:06:26,087 l do not care. 973 01:06:26,125 --> 01:06:30,084 l wish only to paint with gratitude to nature in my 974 01:06:30,129 --> 01:06:34,828 heart and with sinceriry in my brush. 975 01:06:34,867 --> 01:06:39,964 This is my future, this is my biography. 976 01:06:40,005 --> 01:06:43,998 Chiura Obata. 977 01:06:44,043 --> 01:06:47,740 COYOTE:: Chiura Obata had arrived in the United States 978 01:06:47,780 --> 01:06:53,218 in 1903 at age 17, a promising young painter whose original 979 01:06:53,252 --> 01:06:57,052 intention was to stay only briefly in America before 980 01:06:57,089 --> 01:07:02,026 going on to Paris to continue his career, but he soon set 981 01:07:02,061 --> 01:07:06,225 down roots in San Francisco, creating some of the only 982 01:07:06,265 --> 01:07:09,564 on-site sketches of the destruction wrought by the 983 01:07:09,602 --> 01:07:14,665 Great 1906 Earthquake, making a name for himself in the bay 984 01:07:14,707 --> 01:07:19,041 area's international art communiry, even co-founding 985 01:07:19,078 --> 01:07:25,677 the first Japanese-American baseball team on the mainland. 986 01:07:25,718 --> 01:07:30,246 Then in 1927, he visited the high Sierra 987 01:07:30,289 --> 01:07:33,656 and John Muir's Yosemite. 988 01:07:33,692 --> 01:07:36,786 MAN AS CHlURA OBATA: ln the evening, it gets very cold. 989 01:07:36,829 --> 01:07:39,923 The coyotes howl in the distance. 990 01:07:39,965 --> 01:07:43,128 ln the mid-sky, the moon is arcing. 991 01:07:43,169 --> 01:07:46,195 All the trees are standing here and there... 992 01:07:46,238 --> 01:07:49,674 [Coyote howls] 993 01:07:49,708 --> 01:07:51,972 and it is very quiet. 994 01:07:52,011 --> 01:07:54,707 [Water running] 995 01:07:54,747 --> 01:07:56,840 You can learn from the teachings within 996 01:07:56,882 --> 01:07:59,783 this quietness. 997 01:07:59,819 --> 01:08:05,815 Some people teach by speeches, some by talking, but l think 998 01:08:05,858 --> 01:08:12,161 it is important that you are taught by silence. 999 01:08:12,198 --> 01:08:16,601 WOMAN: l think for my grandfather it was not only 1000 01:08:16,635 --> 01:08:20,867 that he was able to paint this landscape, but for him, 1001 01:08:20,906 --> 01:08:26,003 it became a spiritual inspiration, as well, and he 1002 01:08:26,045 --> 01:08:28,912 would describe it that this was ''the greatest harvest 1003 01:08:28,948 --> 01:08:33,248 ''for my whole life and future in painting,'' and not only did 1004 01:08:33,285 --> 01:08:37,654 he paint for art that he would bring home but also even just 1005 01:08:37,690 --> 01:08:39,590 little postcards. 1006 01:08:39,625 --> 01:08:43,561 He sent several postcards back to his children back home. 1007 01:08:43,596 --> 01:08:48,659 One of them reads, ''Gyo-chan, the lovely moon is gone. 1008 01:08:48,701 --> 01:08:51,568 ''lt went to bed early to sleep. 1009 01:08:51,604 --> 01:08:54,402 ''Grow big and shine more.'' 1010 01:08:58,477 --> 01:09:02,004 COYOTE:: For two months, he and two other artist friends 1011 01:09:02,047 --> 01:09:05,710 tramped the high country, taking in all the park had to 1012 01:09:05,751 --> 01:09:11,917 offer, exposing Obata to what he called ''not just shizen,'' 1013 01:09:11,957 --> 01:09:16,360 or nature, ''but dai-shizen, great nature.'' 1014 01:09:32,244 --> 01:09:36,237 Obata's Yosemite images drew huge crowds when they were put 1015 01:09:36,282 --> 01:09:40,810 on exhibit and rave reviews from the critics. 1016 01:09:40,853 --> 01:09:43,686 ''To see our native beaury spots through the eyes 1017 01:09:43,722 --> 01:09:47,658 ''of a foreign artist of high rank,'' one of them wrote, 1018 01:09:47,693 --> 01:09:52,494 ''is to find new charm in our own land.'' 1019 01:09:52,531 --> 01:09:56,865 By the 1930s, Obata had been asked to join the art faculry 1020 01:09:56,902 --> 01:10:00,497 at the Universiry of California, and every summer, 1021 01:10:00,539 --> 01:10:04,441 he and his family would return to Yosemite, where he gave 1022 01:10:04,476 --> 01:10:07,741 lectures, taught outdoor sketching classes to the 1023 01:10:07,780 --> 01:10:12,808 tourists, and made his annual pilgrimage to a special mountain 1024 01:10:12,851 --> 01:10:17,151 spring, whose clear water he collected for use in making 1025 01:10:17,189 --> 01:10:21,922 his paints throughout the rest of the year. 1026 01:10:21,961 --> 01:10:25,124 MAN AS CHlURA OBATA: l dedicate my paintings first to 1027 01:10:25,164 --> 01:10:29,464 the great nature of California, which has always 1028 01:10:29,501 --> 01:10:36,964 given me great lessons, comfort, and nourishment, 1029 01:10:37,009 --> 01:10:41,969 second to the people who share the same thoughts as though 1030 01:10:42,014 --> 01:10:46,917 drawing water from one river under one tree. 1031 01:10:50,289 --> 01:10:55,989 My paintings, created by the humble brush of a mediocre man, 1032 01:10:56,028 --> 01:10:58,019 are nothing but expressions of my 1033 01:10:58,063 --> 01:11:01,521 whole-hearted praise and gratitude. 1034 01:11:06,305 --> 01:11:09,570 COYOTE:: By 1940, thanks in great part to the national 1035 01:11:09,608 --> 01:11:13,408 parks they had come to cherish as their own, 1036 01:11:13,445 --> 01:11:16,846 both Chiura Obata and lwao Matsushita 1037 01:11:16,882 --> 01:11:20,818 had decided the United States was home, 1038 01:11:20,853 --> 01:11:24,448 even if its laws at the time prohibited them from 1039 01:11:24,490 --> 01:11:30,759 becoming citizens because they had been born in Japan. 1040 01:11:30,796 --> 01:11:34,664 When the company he worked for ordered him back to Tokyo, 1041 01:11:34,700 --> 01:11:38,227 Matsushita resigned. 1042 01:11:38,270 --> 01:11:42,263 The Depression would make finding a new job difficult, 1043 01:11:42,307 --> 01:11:46,300 but he and Hanaye wanted to stay close to their 1044 01:11:46,345 --> 01:11:48,074 Holy Mountain. 1045 01:11:50,883 --> 01:11:54,785 MAN AS lWAO MATSUSHlTA: l enjoy my life in Seattle. 1046 01:11:54,820 --> 01:11:58,722 l have so many happy memories with nice people, both 1047 01:11:58,757 --> 01:12:02,887 Japanese and Americans. 1048 01:12:02,928 --> 01:12:10,858 l have visited Mount Rainier, my lover, more than 190 times. 1049 01:12:10,903 --> 01:12:15,203 l cannot leave Seattle when l think of the beautiful views 1050 01:12:15,240 --> 01:12:17,970 of Mount Rainier. 1051 01:12:18,010 --> 01:12:19,500 lwao Matsushita. 1052 01:12:33,258 --> 01:12:36,785 MAN: Fortunate he is who may see Mount McKinley against 1053 01:12:36,829 --> 01:12:44,702 the summer midnight sky, the lush fern forests of Kilauea, 1054 01:12:44,737 --> 01:12:49,436 the white jubilance of Yosemite's waters, 1055 01:12:49,475 --> 01:12:55,004 and the somber rock and surf of Acadia National Park. 1056 01:12:55,047 --> 01:12:58,778 To record and interpret these qualities for others, 1057 01:12:58,817 --> 01:13:02,878 to brighten the drab moods of cities, and build high 1058 01:13:02,921 --> 01:13:08,655 horizons of the spirit on the edge of plain and desert, 1059 01:13:08,694 --> 01:13:15,122 these are some of the many obligations of art. 1060 01:13:15,167 --> 01:13:20,070 Ansel Adams. 1061 01:13:20,105 --> 01:13:23,506 COYOTE:: ln 1938, a book arrived at Harold lckes' 1062 01:13:23,542 --> 01:13:29,037 office, entitled ''Sierra Nevada: the John Muir Trail.'' 1063 01:13:29,081 --> 01:13:32,073 lt was filled with stunning images of the mountainous 1064 01:13:32,117 --> 01:13:36,383 Kings River Canyon region of the southern Sierra, captured 1065 01:13:36,421 --> 01:13:41,120 by an aspiring photographer named Ansel Adams. 1066 01:13:41,160 --> 01:13:44,721 This was his first book of landscapes, and since he knew 1067 01:13:44,763 --> 01:13:47,664 that lckes was interested in making the area a national 1068 01:13:47,699 --> 01:13:54,036 park, Adams had sent it along with his personal compliments. 1069 01:13:54,072 --> 01:13:56,700 lckes took it to the White House to show 1070 01:13:56,742 --> 01:14:00,337 President Roosevelt, who liked it so much he quickly 1071 01:14:00,379 --> 01:14:04,145 appropriated it for his own. 1072 01:14:04,183 --> 01:14:07,983 Ansel Adams was on his way to becoming the most influential 1073 01:14:08,020 --> 01:14:11,387 photographer for the cause of national parks since 1074 01:14:11,423 --> 01:14:15,416 William Henry Jackson's images of Yellowstone had helped 1075 01:14:15,460 --> 01:14:17,758 persuade Congress to create the world's 1076 01:14:17,796 --> 01:14:21,789 first park in 1872. 1077 01:14:21,834 --> 01:14:26,237 There is this unending argument about whether art can 1078 01:14:26,271 --> 01:14:31,038 affect human affairs, and l think Ansel is one great 1079 01:14:31,076 --> 01:14:33,476 example of how it did. 1080 01:14:33,512 --> 01:14:35,139 Muir is another example. 1081 01:14:35,180 --> 01:14:38,445 Muir's writings absolutely had effect, and it wasn't just 1082 01:14:38,483 --> 01:14:39,609 propaganda writings. 1083 01:14:39,651 --> 01:14:41,881 lt was his evocative descriptive writings 1084 01:14:41,920 --> 01:14:43,615 of the Sierras. 1085 01:14:43,655 --> 01:14:45,247 Same with Ansel. 1086 01:14:45,290 --> 01:14:49,420 Ansel used his photographs in this movement and used them 1087 01:14:49,461 --> 01:14:53,761 very effectively. 1088 01:14:53,799 --> 01:14:56,768 COYOTE:: The sensitive only child of a patrician 1089 01:14:56,802 --> 01:15:00,761 San Francisco family, Adams had first encountered nature 1090 01:15:00,806 --> 01:15:04,469 during a family trip to Yosemite. 1091 01:15:04,509 --> 01:15:08,639 There, seeing the waterfalls and the rock faces, 1092 01:15:08,680 --> 01:15:12,912 El Capitan, The Three Brothers, Half Dome, 1093 01:15:12,951 --> 01:15:16,114 he was transfixed. 1094 01:15:16,154 --> 01:15:19,590 ''We should not casually pass them,'' Adams wrote later, 1095 01:15:19,625 --> 01:15:25,257 ''for they are the very heart of the earth speaking to us.'' 1096 01:15:25,297 --> 01:15:27,231 ''l knew my destiny,'' he added, 1097 01:15:27,266 --> 01:15:32,533 ''when l first experienced Yosemite.'' 1098 01:15:32,571 --> 01:15:36,598 ln the 1920s when he made two pack trips into the 1099 01:15:36,642 --> 01:15:40,738 Kings Canyon Country, it ignited in him the conviction that 1100 01:15:40,779 --> 01:15:44,442 the place was just as inspirationally spectacular as 1101 01:15:44,483 --> 01:15:51,150 Yosemite and equally deserving of federal protection. 1102 01:15:51,189 --> 01:15:53,783 lt was an old dream. 1103 01:15:53,825 --> 01:15:58,762 John Muir had fought for it and failed in the 1890s. 1104 01:15:58,797 --> 01:16:01,425 Then Stephen Mather had taken up the cause 1105 01:16:01,466 --> 01:16:03,559 with the same result. 1106 01:16:03,602 --> 01:16:07,629 Now Adams and the Sierra Club believed they had an ally who 1107 01:16:07,673 --> 01:16:12,804 shared the dream and had the power to make it come true-- 1108 01:16:12,844 --> 01:16:16,837 Secretary of the lnterior Harold lckes. 1109 01:16:16,882 --> 01:16:20,477 ''lf l had my way about national parks,'' lckes said, 1110 01:16:20,519 --> 01:16:24,979 ''l would create one without a road in it, a place where man 1111 01:16:25,023 --> 01:16:30,655 ''would not try to improve upon God.'' 1112 01:16:30,696 --> 01:16:34,154 lckes saw in Kings Canyon his chance to create a new 1113 01:16:34,199 --> 01:16:37,760 kind of park, a wilderness park in which 1114 01:16:37,803 --> 01:16:43,036 roads, hotels, and other large developments would be banned. 1115 01:16:43,075 --> 01:16:46,442 He thought it should be called the John Muir Kings Canyon 1116 01:16:46,478 --> 01:16:50,209 Wilderness Park, and he threw himself into the fight against 1117 01:16:50,248 --> 01:16:54,651 the forces that instead wanted dams, irrigation projects, 1118 01:16:54,686 --> 01:17:00,249 grazing, timber harvesting, and elaborate tourist resorts. 1119 01:17:00,292 --> 01:17:03,455 Through a series of shrewd maneuvers, he turned one 1120 01:17:03,495 --> 01:17:07,659 private interest group against the other, waged ceaseless 1121 01:17:07,699 --> 01:17:10,827 battle against the Forest Service's efforts to retain 1122 01:17:10,869 --> 01:17:14,327 control over the land, and persuaded most 1123 01:17:14,373 --> 01:17:17,638 of the major conservation groups not to abandon their 1124 01:17:17,676 --> 01:17:20,736 support because of the compromises he felt 1125 01:17:20,779 --> 01:17:22,940 he had to make. 1126 01:17:22,981 --> 01:17:25,973 ''lckes was,'' one opponent of the park said, 1127 01:17:26,018 --> 01:17:31,422 ''overambitious, egocentric, ruthless, unethical, 1128 01:17:31,456 --> 01:17:36,450 ''and highly effective.'' 1129 01:17:36,495 --> 01:17:39,931 ln the final moments before the vote in Congress, the name 1130 01:17:39,965 --> 01:17:42,559 was simplified, dropping any reference 1131 01:17:42,601 --> 01:17:45,832 to John Muir and wilderness. 1132 01:17:45,871 --> 01:17:50,240 On March 4, 1940, President Roosevelt signed the law 1133 01:17:50,275 --> 01:17:54,735 creating Kings Canyon National park. 1134 01:17:54,780 --> 01:17:59,217 Because it was a roadless park and because of his disabiliry, 1135 01:17:59,251 --> 01:18:04,689 Roosevelt would never be able to see Kings Canyon in person. 1136 01:18:04,723 --> 01:18:08,819 lnstead, he contented himself with following John Muir's 1137 01:18:08,860 --> 01:18:16,596 trail through the photographs and words of Ansel Adams. 1138 01:18:16,635 --> 01:18:19,297 MAN AS ANSEL ADAMS: The dawn wind in the high Sierra is not 1139 01:18:19,337 --> 01:18:24,434 just a passage of cool air through forest conifers, 1140 01:18:24,476 --> 01:18:28,469 but within the labyrinth of human consciousness becomes 1141 01:18:28,513 --> 01:18:35,885 a stirring of some world magic of most delicate persuasion. 1142 01:18:35,921 --> 01:18:40,221 Here are forces familiar with the eons of creation, 1143 01:18:40,258 --> 01:18:43,694 contemplating the flow of life and of change through living 1144 01:18:43,728 --> 01:18:49,189 things, each of them tied to cloud, stone, and sunlight. 1145 01:18:49,234 --> 01:18:53,295 We may make new discoveries about ourselves. 1146 01:18:57,809 --> 01:19:01,939 COYOTE:: ln the fall of 1941, lckes decided Adams could be 1147 01:19:01,980 --> 01:19:05,006 of even greater assistance. 1148 01:19:05,050 --> 01:19:09,919 He put him on the lnterior Department's payroll at $22.22 1149 01:19:09,955 --> 01:19:13,982 a day and told him to bring back photographs of all the 1150 01:19:14,025 --> 01:19:18,485 parks for prominent display in the capital ciry. 1151 01:19:18,530 --> 01:19:21,693 Adams said it was one of the best ideas ever to come out 1152 01:19:21,733 --> 01:19:25,726 of Washington and happily packed up his station wagon to 1153 01:19:25,770 --> 01:19:28,796 set out on his assignment. 1154 01:19:28,840 --> 01:19:32,173 Off and on for the next 8 years, he would compile 1155 01:19:32,210 --> 01:19:36,271 thousands of images of the national parks and visit every 1156 01:19:36,314 --> 01:19:41,342 one of them except, to his great regret, the Everglades. 1157 01:20:00,472 --> 01:20:02,531 [Radio static] 1158 01:20:02,574 --> 01:20:04,804 ANNOUNCER: This bulletin from the NBC Newsroom 1159 01:20:04,843 --> 01:20:05,969 here in New York. 1160 01:20:06,011 --> 01:20:08,002 SECOND ANNOUNCER: We've just had a flash... 1161 01:20:08,046 --> 01:20:09,604 ANNOUNCER: Action against Pearl Harbor defenses. 1162 01:20:09,648 --> 01:20:10,979 SECOND ANNOUNCER: saying that a state of war exists 1163 01:20:11,016 --> 01:20:12,176 with the United States. 1164 01:20:12,217 --> 01:20:13,343 THlRD ANNOUNCER: That the Japanese have attacked 1165 01:20:13,385 --> 01:20:15,410 the United States Naval Base. 1166 01:20:15,453 --> 01:20:17,045 SECOND ANNOUNCER: Now we begin to see through things, 1167 01:20:17,088 --> 01:20:21,184 it's obvious that the--the, uh, lmperial General's staff 1168 01:20:21,226 --> 01:20:25,060 has precipitated an attack and now announces 1169 01:20:25,096 --> 01:20:27,428 that that attack is war. 1170 01:20:27,465 --> 01:20:30,923 COYOTE:: But just a few months after Adams began his travels, 1171 01:20:30,969 --> 01:20:34,905 the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the United States 1172 01:20:34,940 --> 01:20:38,740 was thrust into another World War. 1173 01:20:38,777 --> 01:20:43,237 Now Adams pursued his project with even greater passion. 1174 01:20:43,281 --> 01:20:45,806 To those who questioned whether his artistry could be 1175 01:20:45,850 --> 01:20:48,614 put to a better purpose in wartime, he had 1176 01:20:48,653 --> 01:20:50,644 a simple reply. 1177 01:20:50,689 --> 01:20:54,489 ''l believe my work,'' he wrote, ''relates most efficiently to 1178 01:20:54,526 --> 01:20:59,623 ''what we are fighting for.'' 1179 01:20:59,664 --> 01:21:02,599 Like everything else in American life, the national 1180 01:21:02,634 --> 01:21:06,365 parks now found themselves subordinated to the all-out 1181 01:21:06,404 --> 01:21:12,934 effort to defeat Japan and its ally Germany. 1182 01:21:12,978 --> 01:21:16,778 The CCC camps closed down as the men who had been working 1183 01:21:16,815 --> 01:21:20,751 on trails and park buildings became soldiers and shipped 1184 01:21:20,785 --> 01:21:23,720 out overseas. 1185 01:21:23,755 --> 01:21:26,451 Park budgets were cut to a quarter of their 1186 01:21:26,491 --> 01:21:28,356 pre-war levels. 1187 01:21:28,393 --> 01:21:31,829 Just as in the First World War, pressures mounted to open 1188 01:21:31,863 --> 01:21:36,163 them up to timber cutting, mining, and grazing. 1189 01:21:36,201 --> 01:21:41,571 Harold lckes did his best do minimize the damage. 1190 01:21:41,606 --> 01:21:43,301 MAN AS ANSEL ADAMS: When World War ll began, there were 1191 01:21:43,341 --> 01:21:46,071 strong pressures in many circles to close the national 1192 01:21:46,111 --> 01:21:49,569 parks for the duration with the thought that no one needs 1193 01:21:49,614 --> 01:21:52,174 a vacation in wartime. 1194 01:21:52,217 --> 01:21:54,981 lckes disagreed with this, stating that in times 1195 01:21:55,020 --> 01:21:59,480 of national stress and sorrow the people needed precisely 1196 01:21:59,524 --> 01:22:02,721 what the national parks could offer. 1197 01:22:02,761 --> 01:22:05,195 Ansel Adams. 1198 01:22:05,230 --> 01:22:08,256 COYOTE:: When lckes informed Roosevelt that a proposed 1199 01:22:08,300 --> 01:22:11,394 bombing range would endanger the breeding grounds 1200 01:22:11,436 --> 01:22:14,872 of the rare trumpeter swan that George Melendez Wright 1201 01:22:14,906 --> 01:22:18,706 had worked so hard to preserve, the president dashed 1202 01:22:18,743 --> 01:22:22,144 off a quick note to his Secretary of War 1203 01:22:22,180 --> 01:22:24,671 countermanding the decision. 1204 01:22:24,716 --> 01:22:27,617 ''The verdict is for the trumpeter swan and against 1205 01:22:27,652 --> 01:22:29,847 ''the Army,'' Roosevelt wrote. 1206 01:22:29,888 --> 01:22:35,849 ''The Army must find a different nesting place.'' 1207 01:22:35,894 --> 01:22:38,761 ln 1941, the year leading up to 1208 01:22:38,797 --> 01:22:43,359 America's entry into the war, a record 21 million people had 1209 01:22:43,401 --> 01:22:46,859 visited the national parks. 1210 01:22:46,905 --> 01:22:51,001 The next year, the figure dropped to 9 million, then to 1211 01:22:51,042 --> 01:22:55,877 6.8 million in 1943. 1212 01:22:55,914 --> 01:22:59,008 All across the system, many park rangers changed 1213 01:22:59,050 --> 01:23:02,383 uniforms and went off to war. 1214 01:23:02,420 --> 01:23:06,117 ''Poor, old National Park Service is in a bad way,'' 1215 01:23:06,157 --> 01:23:08,785 a now retired Horace Albright wrote to his 1216 01:23:08,827 --> 01:23:13,389 successor after being informed of all the cutbacks, 1217 01:23:13,431 --> 01:23:17,959 but the parks still had a role to play. 1218 01:23:18,002 --> 01:23:21,130 At Mount Rainier, units of what would become 1219 01:23:21,172 --> 01:23:24,699 the 10th Mountain Division were taught how to survive in high 1220 01:23:24,743 --> 01:23:27,837 altitudes and cold weather. 1221 01:23:27,879 --> 01:23:31,645 War planners also realized that national parks could 1222 01:23:31,683 --> 01:23:34,743 provide much needed rest and recuperation 1223 01:23:34,786 --> 01:23:37,414 for battle-weary soldiers. 1224 01:23:37,455 --> 01:23:41,118 The Navy took over the swank Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite 1225 01:23:41,159 --> 01:23:44,026 for a convalescence center. 1226 01:23:44,062 --> 01:23:48,328 Rest camps went up in Sequoia, Carlsbad Caverns, 1227 01:23:48,366 --> 01:23:50,994 the Grand Canyon, 1228 01:23:51,035 --> 01:23:54,163 and Mount McKinley National Park in Alaska was 1229 01:23:54,205 --> 01:23:58,039 transformed into an army recreation camp. 1230 01:23:58,076 --> 01:24:01,568 Soldiers stationed in the Aleutian lslands could fish, 1231 01:24:01,613 --> 01:24:07,643 hike, ski, skate, and relax. 1232 01:24:07,685 --> 01:24:12,054 ln 1943, 1.6 million soldiers found 1233 01:24:12,090 --> 01:24:16,754 momentary solace and enjoyment in a national park, 1234 01:24:16,795 --> 01:24:19,787 1/4 of the total visitation. 1235 01:24:26,905 --> 01:24:30,739 That same year, Ansel Adams interrupted his photographic 1236 01:24:30,775 --> 01:24:34,575 survey and went to the Owens Valley of California 1237 01:24:34,612 --> 01:24:37,877 in the eastern shadow of Mount Whitney to document 1238 01:24:37,916 --> 01:24:41,010 something entirely different. 1239 01:24:41,052 --> 01:24:44,249 After the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, President 1240 01:24:44,289 --> 01:24:48,726 Roosevelt signed an executive order requiring all people 1241 01:24:48,760 --> 01:24:52,992 of Japanese descent living on the West Coast, even those who 1242 01:24:53,031 --> 01:24:56,159 were United States citizens, to be uprooted from their 1243 01:24:56,201 --> 01:24:59,534 homes and sent to internment camps 1244 01:24:59,571 --> 01:25:02,233 for the duration of the war. 1245 01:25:02,273 --> 01:25:06,039 ''We must prosecute this war with all ruthless efficiency,'' 1246 01:25:06,077 --> 01:25:09,103 Adams wrote after he had photographed the Manzanar 1247 01:25:09,147 --> 01:25:13,982 lnternment Camp, ''but we must be certain that, as the rights 1248 01:25:14,018 --> 01:25:16,680 ''of the individual are the most sacred elements of our 1249 01:25:16,721 --> 01:25:21,954 ''sociery, we will not allow passion, vengeance, hatred, 1250 01:25:21,993 --> 01:25:26,054 ''and racial antagonism to cloud the principles of universal 1251 01:25:26,097 --> 01:25:28,531 ''justice and mercy.'' 1252 01:25:36,307 --> 01:25:42,439 WOMAN: Dear Husband, l'm a little too much tired, 1253 01:25:42,480 --> 01:25:44,914 but l'm sure l can live here all right. 1254 01:25:48,319 --> 01:25:50,287 Just imagine a mountain camp. 1255 01:25:54,826 --> 01:25:57,886 When the sky's clear, we will see our holy 1256 01:25:57,929 --> 01:25:59,897 Mount Rainier, l suppose. 1257 01:26:04,569 --> 01:26:08,596 l will write you again very soon. 1258 01:26:08,640 --> 01:26:14,772 Lovingly yours, Hanaye. 1259 01:26:14,812 --> 01:26:17,838 COYOTE:: Because he had worked for a Japanese company, 1260 01:26:17,882 --> 01:26:22,182 lwao Matsushita was arrested and taken away from his wife 1261 01:26:22,220 --> 01:26:25,747 in the first hours after Pearl Harbor. 1262 01:26:25,790 --> 01:26:30,887 Hanaye was put in a temporary detention center near Seattle, 1263 01:26:30,929 --> 01:26:33,454 where she tried her best to boost the spirits of her 1264 01:26:33,498 --> 01:26:37,332 husband far away in an internment camp 1265 01:26:37,368 --> 01:26:41,828 in western Montana. 1266 01:26:41,873 --> 01:26:46,071 WOMAN AS HANAYE MATSUSHlTA: Dear Husband, after severe 1267 01:26:46,110 --> 01:26:52,606 rain, the sky became clear, and we saw Mount Rainier over 1268 01:26:52,650 --> 01:26:59,783 the hill yesterday for the first time. 1269 01:26:59,824 --> 01:27:04,921 There will actually be a day when you'll be released 1270 01:27:04,963 --> 01:27:08,922 and we'll be able to rest peacefully. 1271 01:27:08,967 --> 01:27:12,835 Once in a while, l dream about running around the base 1272 01:27:12,870 --> 01:27:15,464 of Mount Rainier. 1273 01:27:15,506 --> 01:27:21,467 Remember the times we hiked through the mountain together? 1274 01:27:21,512 --> 01:27:24,037 lt all seems like a dream. 1275 01:27:32,457 --> 01:27:35,551 MAN AS CHlURA OBATA: The sudden burst of Pearl Harbor 1276 01:27:35,593 --> 01:27:39,689 was as if the Mother Earth on which we stood was swept by 1277 01:27:39,731 --> 01:27:43,633 the terrific force of a big wave of resentment 1278 01:27:43,668 --> 01:27:46,068 of the American people. 1279 01:27:46,104 --> 01:27:50,131 Our digniry and our hopes were crushed. 1280 01:27:55,213 --> 01:27:58,478 COYOTE:: Friends of Chiura Obata had pleaded with the 1281 01:27:58,516 --> 01:28:03,112 federal government that the artist posed no securiry 1282 01:28:03,154 --> 01:28:06,317 threat and even suggested that he be taken instead to his 1283 01:28:06,357 --> 01:28:09,019 beloved Yosemite. 1284 01:28:09,060 --> 01:28:11,858 The request was denied. 1285 01:28:11,896 --> 01:28:15,195 Obata and his family were forced to go to a camp 1286 01:28:15,233 --> 01:28:18,361 in Topaz, Utah. 1287 01:28:18,403 --> 01:28:21,600 To help keep his and his fellow prisoners' minds off 1288 01:28:21,639 --> 01:28:24,608 what he called ''the intolerable sin'' of their 1289 01:28:24,642 --> 01:28:29,102 incarceration, Obata opened an art school at the camp 1290 01:28:29,147 --> 01:28:32,514 and continued his own sketching and painting. 1291 01:29:07,819 --> 01:29:10,913 HlLL: So here he was basically with a communiry 1292 01:29:10,955 --> 01:29:13,822 of fellow Japanese. 1293 01:29:13,858 --> 01:29:16,725 ''Yes, we are in this desert, but don't just look 1294 01:29:16,761 --> 01:29:19,252 ''at the dust and the ground, don't just be depressed 1295 01:29:19,297 --> 01:29:20,559 ''about what's happening. 1296 01:29:20,598 --> 01:29:24,193 ''You can somehow lift your spirits by looking 1297 01:29:24,235 --> 01:29:27,568 ''at the mountains that are surrounding us.'' 1298 01:29:27,605 --> 01:29:30,335 They were not the same mountains that he had 1299 01:29:30,374 --> 01:29:34,674 experienced in the Sierras of course, and yet, 1300 01:29:34,712 --> 01:29:36,805 he felt comforted. 1301 01:29:36,848 --> 01:29:38,475 He would use that word. 1302 01:29:38,516 --> 01:29:44,455 ''l still feel comforted and nurtured by great nature.'' 1303 01:29:44,489 --> 01:29:47,686 And he wanted other people to understand this, as well. 1304 01:29:54,632 --> 01:29:58,363 COYOTE:: One of his paintings, ''Moonlight Over Topaz,'' 1305 01:29:58,402 --> 01:30:02,099 was given to the president's wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, 1306 01:30:02,140 --> 01:30:05,200 in thanks for her speaking out for fair treatment 1307 01:30:05,243 --> 01:30:08,735 of Japanese Americans. 1308 01:30:08,780 --> 01:30:13,240 Years later in remembrance of his personal ordeal, Obata 1309 01:30:13,284 --> 01:30:17,050 would paint ''Glorious Struggle,'' the image of a tree 1310 01:30:17,088 --> 01:30:21,422 in Yosemite's high Sierra, whose own struggle to survive 1311 01:30:21,459 --> 01:30:27,091 seemed to give him strength and hope in his darkest hour. 1312 01:30:27,131 --> 01:30:30,464 One subject he loved to paint again and again 1313 01:30:30,501 --> 01:30:33,766 was the sequoia. 1314 01:30:33,805 --> 01:30:36,205 For him, they were this great vertical 1315 01:30:36,240 --> 01:30:41,473 line that connected heaven and earth, and for him, he saw 1316 01:30:41,512 --> 01:30:47,473 the life of a person in these trees and that no matter the 1317 01:30:47,518 --> 01:30:53,013 storms and trials of life that these trees survive with great 1318 01:30:53,057 --> 01:30:58,051 digniry and great strength. 1319 01:30:58,095 --> 01:31:00,529 MAN AS CHlURA OBATA: ln such times, l heard the gentle 1320 01:31:00,565 --> 01:31:05,298 but strong whisper of the Sequoia gigantean. 1321 01:31:05,336 --> 01:31:08,134 ''Hear me, you poor man. 1322 01:31:08,172 --> 01:31:13,974 ''l've stood here more than 3,700 years in rain, snow, 1323 01:31:14,011 --> 01:31:20,746 ''storm, and even mountain fire, still keeping my thankful 1324 01:31:20,785 --> 01:31:25,518 ''attitude strongly with nature. 1325 01:31:25,556 --> 01:31:31,290 ''Do not cry, do not spend your time and energy worrying. 1326 01:31:31,329 --> 01:31:35,698 ''You have children following. 1327 01:31:35,733 --> 01:31:40,898 ''Keep up your uniry. Come with me.'' 1328 01:31:40,938 --> 01:31:42,530 Chiura Obata. 1329 01:31:54,118 --> 01:31:57,281 COYOTE:: ln the midst of the war, a letter arrived 1330 01:31:57,321 --> 01:32:01,223 at the White House for President Roosevelt. 1331 01:32:01,259 --> 01:32:04,558 MAN: My dear Mr. President, many years ago, 1332 01:32:04,595 --> 01:32:07,393 l purchased some 30,000 acres of land 1333 01:32:07,431 --> 01:32:13,165 in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, confidently expecting 1334 01:32:13,204 --> 01:32:15,968 that the federal government would gladly accept 1335 01:32:16,007 --> 01:32:22,435 the land as a gift to be added to its national park system. 1336 01:32:22,480 --> 01:32:25,108 15 years have passed. 1337 01:32:25,149 --> 01:32:29,017 The government has not accepted the properry. 1338 01:32:29,053 --> 01:32:32,352 l have now determined to dispose of the properry, 1339 01:32:32,390 --> 01:32:36,486 selling it if necessary in the market to any 1340 01:32:36,527 --> 01:32:39,553 satisfactory buyer. 1341 01:32:39,597 --> 01:32:45,229 Very sincerely, John D. Rockefeller Jr. 1342 01:32:45,269 --> 01:32:47,533 COYOTE:: The longest festering fight in the history 1343 01:32:47,571 --> 01:32:50,631 of the parks was about to erupt into 1344 01:32:50,675 --> 01:32:52,540 a full-scale battle. 1345 01:33:00,751 --> 01:33:04,118 Back in the 1920s, Horace Albright had shown 1346 01:33:04,155 --> 01:33:07,522 Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller Jr. 1347 01:33:07,558 --> 01:33:11,722 the flat, sage-brush- covered plain called Jackson Hole 1348 01:33:11,762 --> 01:33:15,198 and explained to them his dream that all of it, 1349 01:33:15,232 --> 01:33:16,995 the valley floor as well as 1350 01:33:17,034 --> 01:33:21,061 the mountains, would one day be preserved, but when 1351 01:33:21,105 --> 01:33:26,042 Congress had created Grand Teton National Park in 1929, 1352 01:33:26,077 --> 01:33:32,607 it left the valley alone and set aside only the mountains. 1353 01:33:32,650 --> 01:33:36,450 Meanwhile, Rockefeller continued anonymously buying 1354 01:33:36,487 --> 01:33:40,821 up ranches and homesteads in the valley with the intention 1355 01:33:40,858 --> 01:33:47,525 of donating it all for the park's expansion, but Wyoming 1356 01:33:47,565 --> 01:33:51,365 politicians, who had learned of Rockefeller's scheme, 1357 01:33:51,402 --> 01:33:55,771 did everything they could to thwart his plan, not wanting 1358 01:33:55,806 --> 01:33:59,674 Washington to tell them what they could and could not do 1359 01:33:59,710 --> 01:34:01,337 with their land. 1360 01:34:01,379 --> 01:34:04,837 The state's sole congressman even introduced a bill calling 1361 01:34:04,882 --> 01:34:09,546 for the complete abolition of Grand Teton National Park 1362 01:34:09,587 --> 01:34:12,522 despite the fact that the mountains were not part 1363 01:34:12,556 --> 01:34:16,117 of the dispute. 1364 01:34:16,160 --> 01:34:17,593 MAN AS HORACE ALBRlGHT: l must confess l get pretty 1365 01:34:17,628 --> 01:34:20,529 discouraged at times in trying to understand some 1366 01:34:20,564 --> 01:34:22,498 of the people out there. 1367 01:34:22,533 --> 01:34:26,526 lt almost makes one weep, not for one's self 1368 01:34:26,570 --> 01:34:28,834 because after all what difference does it make to 1369 01:34:28,873 --> 01:34:32,866 an individual what happens to Wyoming, but one weeps 1370 01:34:32,910 --> 01:34:35,811 for Wyoming itself. 1371 01:34:35,846 --> 01:34:38,007 Horace Albright. 1372 01:34:38,049 --> 01:34:41,507 COYOTE:: Albright was a private citizen but more determined 1373 01:34:41,552 --> 01:34:45,181 than ever to see his dream fulfilled. 1374 01:34:45,222 --> 01:34:50,524 ln 1943 with Congress still unwilling to enlarge the park, 1375 01:34:50,561 --> 01:34:54,429 he and Rockefeller and Harold lckes decided that their 1376 01:34:54,465 --> 01:34:57,798 only hope lay in the president's unique authoriry under 1377 01:34:57,835 --> 01:35:02,829 the Antiquities Act to create a national monument. 1378 01:35:02,873 --> 01:35:05,865 Rockefeller's letter to Roosevelt was meant to prod 1379 01:35:05,910 --> 01:35:08,674 the president into action. 1380 01:35:08,712 --> 01:35:10,839 lt worked. 1381 01:35:10,881 --> 01:35:16,842 On March 15, 1943, Roosevelt signed an executive order 1382 01:35:16,887 --> 01:35:20,755 establishing Jackson Hole National Monument, placing 1383 01:35:20,791 --> 01:35:28,357 221,610 acres of federal land on the eastern border of 1384 01:35:28,399 --> 01:35:33,166 Grand Teton National Park under Park Service control. 1385 01:35:33,204 --> 01:35:39,404 ln Wyoming, the response was a declaration of political war. 1386 01:35:39,443 --> 01:35:42,708 The president, one senator said, had committed 1387 01:35:42,746 --> 01:35:46,011 ''a foul, sneaking, Pearl Harbor blow.'' 1388 01:35:46,050 --> 01:35:49,542 A journalist wrote that Roosevelt's action followed 1389 01:35:49,587 --> 01:35:51,384 the general lines of Adolf Hitler's 1390 01:35:51,422 --> 01:35:54,289 seizure of Austria. 1391 01:35:54,325 --> 01:35:58,125 MAN: When this happened, it was a big uproar, 1392 01:35:58,162 --> 01:36:02,792 lots of talk, lots of talk, and the ranchers 1393 01:36:02,833 --> 01:36:06,769 were totally opposed, and they thought their grazing 1394 01:36:06,804 --> 01:36:11,138 rights were being destroyed. 1395 01:36:11,175 --> 01:36:14,167 COYOTE:: Wyoming's governor threatened to use state police 1396 01:36:14,211 --> 01:36:18,045 against any National Park official attempting to assume 1397 01:36:18,082 --> 01:36:20,573 authoriry in the new monument. 1398 01:36:20,618 --> 01:36:24,918 Some Forest Service employees gutted their ranger stations 1399 01:36:24,955 --> 01:36:28,482 before turning them over to the Park Service, and hoping 1400 01:36:28,526 --> 01:36:33,554 to provoke a confrontation and draw attention to their cause, 1401 01:36:33,597 --> 01:36:37,033 a group of armed local ranchers, led by the aging 1402 01:36:37,067 --> 01:36:41,970 movie star Wallace Beery, defiantly herded 500 head 1403 01:36:42,006 --> 01:36:46,636 of cattle across the monument without a permit. 1404 01:36:46,677 --> 01:36:50,875 MAN: l was born here in Jackson Hole in 191 2. 1405 01:36:50,915 --> 01:36:55,147 There was pretty strong resentment about the manner 1406 01:36:55,186 --> 01:37:00,488 in which the monument had been created, and we had rifles, 1407 01:37:00,524 --> 01:37:04,324 and we drove cattle across the Gros Ventre River and across 1408 01:37:04,361 --> 01:37:07,159 the monument land, and Wallace Beery was right 1409 01:37:07,198 --> 01:37:10,292 at the--right at the head. 1410 01:37:10,334 --> 01:37:14,100 ostensibly to shoot anybody who might try to stop us. 1411 01:37:14,138 --> 01:37:16,538 No one tried to stop us, but we did get 1412 01:37:16,574 --> 01:37:19,236 a lot of attention. 1413 01:37:19,276 --> 01:37:22,143 COYOTE:: ln Washington, Wyoming's delegation pushed 1414 01:37:22,179 --> 01:37:26,081 through a bill abolishing the national monument and turning 1415 01:37:26,116 --> 01:37:29,552 the land back to the Forest Service. 1416 01:37:29,587 --> 01:37:32,351 Roosevelt vetoed it. 1417 01:37:32,389 --> 01:37:35,722 The state of Wyoming then went to court, claiming that 1418 01:37:35,759 --> 01:37:39,160 Jackson Hole lacked the objects of scientific or 1419 01:37:39,196 --> 01:37:44,862 historic interest necessary for national monument status. 1420 01:37:44,902 --> 01:37:49,100 Postcards showing a ramshackle outhouse were circulated 1421 01:37:49,139 --> 01:37:51,403 with a message saying, ''These are some 1422 01:37:51,442 --> 01:37:53,967 ''of the historic structures here. 1423 01:37:54,011 --> 01:37:58,175 ''This is one known to have been occupied several times 1424 01:37:58,215 --> 01:38:01,378 ''by Horace M. Albright.'' 1425 01:38:01,418 --> 01:38:05,445 A federal court dismissed the case, saying it was a dispute 1426 01:38:05,489 --> 01:38:09,118 between the executive and legislative branches which 1427 01:38:09,159 --> 01:38:15,064 the judiciary would do well to steer clear of. 1428 01:38:15,099 --> 01:38:21,299 ln 1945, Roosevelt died and World War ll ended, 1429 01:38:21,338 --> 01:38:26,503 but the battle of Jackson Hole roared on. 1430 01:38:26,543 --> 01:38:28,306 MAN AS HORACE ALBRlGHT: Dealing with Wyoming is like 1431 01:38:28,345 --> 01:38:30,506 dealing with the Russians. 1432 01:38:30,547 --> 01:38:34,347 You never get anywhere by trying to cooperate. 1433 01:38:34,385 --> 01:38:36,376 Horace Albright. 1434 01:38:36,420 --> 01:38:39,617 COYOTE:: ''This was a battle,'' the retired Albright said, 1435 01:38:39,657 --> 01:38:42,387 ''l had to get into.'' 1436 01:38:42,426 --> 01:38:45,520 He lobbied his Republican friends like former president 1437 01:38:45,562 --> 01:38:49,498 Herbert Hoover and marshaled a campaign by major conservation 1438 01:38:49,533 --> 01:38:52,991 groups to rally their members to tell Congress that 1439 01:38:53,037 --> 01:38:56,336 the American people also had a stake in what 1440 01:38:56,373 --> 01:38:58,864 happened in Wyoming. 1441 01:38:58,909 --> 01:39:02,709 A study was published showing that retail sales taxes 1442 01:39:02,746 --> 01:39:06,682 in Jackson Hole had doubled and the region's overall 1443 01:39:06,717 --> 01:39:11,450 economy had been strengthened by the boost in tourism, 1444 01:39:11,488 --> 01:39:15,151 but the local political climate remained decidedly, 1445 01:39:15,192 --> 01:39:20,027 stubbornly antipark. 1446 01:39:20,064 --> 01:39:24,194 Finally in 1950 after it became clear that the bitter 1447 01:39:24,234 --> 01:39:27,863 battle would never end in unconditional surrender by 1448 01:39:27,905 --> 01:39:33,207 either side, a compromise was worked out. 1449 01:39:33,243 --> 01:39:36,178 Teton Counry would be reimbursed for lost properry 1450 01:39:36,213 --> 01:39:41,150 taxes, existing grazing rights were grandfathered in, 1451 01:39:41,185 --> 01:39:44,484 and the migratory elk herd would be managed by both the 1452 01:39:44,521 --> 01:39:47,979 Park Service and the state, which would be permitted to 1453 01:39:48,025 --> 01:39:52,291 oversee supervised hunts. 1454 01:39:52,329 --> 01:39:57,164 ln return, the bulk of Jackson Hole National Monument became 1455 01:39:57,201 --> 01:40:01,604 part of an enlarged Grand Teton National Park, 1456 01:40:01,638 --> 01:40:05,734 now 3 times its original size. 1457 01:40:05,776 --> 01:40:10,008 lncluded in it was the 30,000 acres of private land 1458 01:40:10,047 --> 01:40:14,950 John D. Rockefeller Jr. had been trying so hard to give away. 1459 01:40:19,690 --> 01:40:22,716 MURlE: So it's not just the spectacular. 1460 01:40:22,760 --> 01:40:24,489 lt's the foreground. 1461 01:40:24,528 --> 01:40:28,259 You have to have foregrounds to wilderness, you have to 1462 01:40:28,298 --> 01:40:34,032 have the highlands and middle lands and the lowlands, 1463 01:40:34,071 --> 01:40:37,905 and a huge piece of northern Jackson Hole is saved from 1464 01:40:37,941 --> 01:40:42,844 strip malls, saved from what happened to--to--down 1465 01:40:42,880 --> 01:40:45,747 in the town of Jackson. 1466 01:40:45,783 --> 01:40:48,581 COYOTE:: Tucked away in the compromise that finally ended 1467 01:40:48,619 --> 01:40:52,419 the battle of Jackson Hole was another concession: 1468 01:40:52,456 --> 01:40:56,688 ''According to this provision, future United States presidents 1469 01:40:56,727 --> 01:41:00,686 ''are barred from ever again using executive action to 1470 01:41:00,731 --> 01:41:03,222 ''establish new national monuments 1471 01:41:03,267 --> 01:41:05,861 ''in the state of Wyoming except 1472 01:41:05,903 --> 01:41:10,602 ''by the express permission of Congress.'' 1473 01:41:10,641 --> 01:41:14,236 Wyoming, the state with the distinction of having the 1474 01:41:14,278 --> 01:41:18,237 world's first national park, Yellowstone, and the first 1475 01:41:18,282 --> 01:41:21,649 national monument, Devil's Tower, now had another 1476 01:41:21,685 --> 01:41:26,520 distinction--the only state where the Antiquities Act 1477 01:41:26,557 --> 01:41:29,526 is null and void. 1478 01:41:29,560 --> 01:41:33,553 HANSEN: l was one who was very critical of the Rockefellers 1479 01:41:33,597 --> 01:41:40,560 and did all l was able to do to try to thwart their plans, 1480 01:41:40,604 --> 01:41:44,563 and l'm grateful now that l wasn't successful because l 1481 01:41:44,608 --> 01:41:49,443 have to appreciate as everyone else does the uniqueness 1482 01:41:49,480 --> 01:41:51,414 and the beaury of this area. 1483 01:41:51,448 --> 01:41:52,972 Thank God for the Rockefellers. 1484 01:41:53,016 --> 01:41:56,247 l've told them on more than one occasion that l'm glad 1485 01:41:56,286 --> 01:41:59,255 l lost that fight. 1486 01:41:59,289 --> 01:42:01,780 WOMAN: For all the bureaucracy, for all the red 1487 01:42:01,825 --> 01:42:06,558 tape, for all the arguments about public policy, 1488 01:42:06,597 --> 01:42:12,900 our national parks are first and foremost places of love, 1489 01:42:12,936 --> 01:42:15,871 and l think each American can look into their own hearts 1490 01:42:15,906 --> 01:42:20,002 and tell you, ''This is my national park,'' and it might 1491 01:42:20,043 --> 01:42:22,603 be the Great Smokys, it might be Yosemite. 1492 01:42:22,646 --> 01:42:25,615 For our family, it's Grand Teton. 1493 01:42:25,649 --> 01:42:29,085 This is the range of our memory. 1494 01:42:29,119 --> 01:42:33,180 My great-grandfather brought my grandfather, who brought 1495 01:42:33,223 --> 01:42:37,592 my father, who brought us as children. 1496 01:42:37,628 --> 01:42:41,120 lt's the last place my mother came before she died. 1497 01:42:41,164 --> 01:42:47,694 lt's also the last place my brother took his family before 1498 01:42:47,738 --> 01:42:49,603 he succumbed to lymphoma. 1499 01:42:49,640 --> 01:42:52,632 l'll never forget. We were at the Murie Ranch, 1500 01:42:52,676 --> 01:42:56,442 and Steve and Ann and the girls were walking 1501 01:42:56,480 --> 01:42:58,914 toward the Snake River. 1502 01:42:58,949 --> 01:43:03,511 lt was pink light, alpenglow, and Steve stopped, 1503 01:43:03,554 --> 01:43:05,419 and you could see the reflections of the Tetons 1504 01:43:05,455 --> 01:43:11,257 in one of the pools, and he turned to Ann and the girls, 1505 01:43:11,295 --> 01:43:15,561 and he said, ''Mark this moment.'' 1506 01:43:15,599 --> 01:43:21,265 And then 5 elks went across the Snake River, and l watched 1507 01:43:21,305 --> 01:43:25,139 this family of 5 return. 1508 01:43:25,175 --> 01:43:29,305 These are the stories that allow us to go home and face 1509 01:43:29,346 --> 01:43:33,407 not only our lives but even our deaths. 1510 01:43:33,450 --> 01:43:37,443 That's the power of these remembered landscapes. 1511 01:43:55,672 --> 01:43:57,833 DUNCAN: The Declaration of lndependence began with this 1512 01:43:57,874 --> 01:44:02,902 incredible statement that all men, all human beings 1513 01:44:02,946 --> 01:44:06,609 are created equal. 1514 01:44:06,650 --> 01:44:11,053 We've been chasing that ideal, those words for the rest 1515 01:44:11,088 --> 01:44:15,548 of our history, often too slowly, never quite reaching 1516 01:44:15,592 --> 01:44:23,158 it even yet, but that's the statement that we're chasing. 1517 01:44:23,200 --> 01:44:26,863 The national park idea, which is the best idea we had 1518 01:44:26,903 --> 01:44:31,397 after we became a nation, didn't start that way 1519 01:44:31,441 --> 01:44:34,672 with a bold statement, grand ideals that we're 1520 01:44:34,711 --> 01:44:36,611 trying to chase. 1521 01:44:36,647 --> 01:44:39,707 lt began sort of experimentally, 1522 01:44:39,750 --> 01:44:44,050 improvisationally, and it's only as we've moved through 1523 01:44:44,087 --> 01:44:51,653 time that we have added this notion of what a park is 1524 01:44:51,695 --> 01:44:55,688 and what's allowed in it and what's not allowed in it, 1525 01:44:55,732 --> 01:45:00,795 what we should be drawing from it, but like the notion 1526 01:45:00,837 --> 01:45:05,604 of freedom, we've always been arguing over it, we've always 1527 01:45:05,642 --> 01:45:09,908 been trying to grapple with its meaning, and always trying 1528 01:45:09,946 --> 01:45:15,384 to on the one hand remain true to the ideal but leaving it up 1529 01:45:15,419 --> 01:45:19,515 to each succeeding generation to either push it a little bit 1530 01:45:19,556 --> 01:45:26,985 farther or broaden it a little bit more. 1531 01:45:27,030 --> 01:45:28,691 COYOTE: ln the midst of Franklin Roosevelt's 1532 01:45:28,732 --> 01:45:33,635 presidency, the world renowned contralto Marian Anderson had 1533 01:45:33,670 --> 01:45:36,969 been denied the opportuniry to perform in 1534 01:45:37,007 --> 01:45:40,773 Constitution Hall, the 4,000-seat auditorium 1535 01:45:40,811 --> 01:45:44,247 controlled by the Daughters of the American Revolution, 1536 01:45:44,281 --> 01:45:47,944 because of the color of her skin. 1537 01:45:47,984 --> 01:45:51,476 At the urging of Eleanor Roosevelt, Harold lckes, 1538 01:45:51,521 --> 01:45:55,981 who had once been the head of the NAACP in Chicago, quickly 1539 01:45:56,026 --> 01:46:00,622 issued Anderson permission to sing at a different venue, 1540 01:46:00,664 --> 01:46:04,156 the Lincoln Memorial, a recent addition 1541 01:46:04,201 --> 01:46:07,693 to the national park system. 1542 01:46:07,738 --> 01:46:13,335 The concert was free and drew a crowd of 75,000 1543 01:46:13,376 --> 01:46:15,776 of all races and creeds. 1544 01:46:20,283 --> 01:46:25,812 HAROLD lCKES: Genius, genius draws no color line, and so it 1545 01:46:25,856 --> 01:46:29,417 is fitting that Marian Anderson should raise her 1546 01:46:29,459 --> 01:46:32,826 voice in tribute to the noble Lincoln, 1547 01:46:32,863 --> 01:46:36,128 whom mankind will ever honor. 1548 01:46:36,166 --> 01:46:37,724 Miss Marian Anderson. 1549 01:46:37,768 --> 01:46:41,465 COYOTE:: After being introduced by lckes, Anderson stepped to 1550 01:46:41,505 --> 01:46:45,441 the microphone and began her program. 1551 01:46:52,449 --> 01:46:58,445 My country, 'tis of thee 1552 01:46:58,488 --> 01:47:04,518 Sweet land of liberry 1553 01:47:04,561 --> 01:47:10,363 Of thee we sing 1554 01:47:10,400 --> 01:47:16,100 Land where my fathers died 1555 01:47:16,139 --> 01:47:21,873 Land of our pilgrims' pride 1556 01:47:21,912 --> 01:47:28,249 From every mountainside 1557 01:47:28,285 --> 01:47:35,657 Let freedom ring 1558 01:47:35,692 --> 01:47:45,397 Ave Maria 1559 01:47:45,435 --> 01:47:49,496 lCKES: ln this great auditorium under the sky, 1560 01:47:49,539 --> 01:47:53,236 all of us are free. 1561 01:47:53,276 --> 01:47:57,372 When God gave us this wonderful outdoors and the sun 1562 01:47:57,414 --> 01:48:04,616 and the moon and the stars, he made no distinction of race 1563 01:48:04,654 --> 01:48:07,350 or creed or color. 1564 01:48:07,390 --> 01:48:10,450 [Anderson continues singing ''Ave Maria''] 1565 01:48:10,493 --> 01:48:12,188 POPE: You start out with places that were created 1566 01:48:12,229 --> 01:48:15,357 in the late 19th Century because nobody wanted them, 1567 01:48:15,398 --> 01:48:18,890 like Yellowstone. 1568 01:48:18,935 --> 01:48:21,460 You go through places like Hetch Hetchy, which were 1569 01:48:21,504 --> 01:48:25,998 sacrificed because somebody did want them. 1570 01:48:26,042 --> 01:48:29,534 You go to the Olympic Peninsula, and the guys who 1571 01:48:29,579 --> 01:48:32,912 wanted to cut the logs lose. 1572 01:48:32,949 --> 01:48:36,908 You go to Jackson Hole, and the state of Wyoming 1573 01:48:36,953 --> 01:48:39,513 desperately fights the creation of Grand Tetons 1574 01:48:39,556 --> 01:48:44,584 and then puts it on its license plates, and finally, 1575 01:48:44,628 --> 01:48:47,722 you end up with history. 1576 01:48:47,764 --> 01:48:51,495 So what--what, a European would ask, does all this have 1577 01:48:51,534 --> 01:48:56,301 in common, and l think what it all has in common is these are 1578 01:48:56,339 --> 01:49:00,139 the places where Americans encounter who they 1579 01:49:00,176 --> 01:49:01,803 are and are home. 1580 01:49:04,881 --> 01:49:11,150 These are the places that make this continent our home. 1581 01:49:11,187 --> 01:49:15,749 This is what enables Americans to inhabit this whole place, 1582 01:49:15,792 --> 01:49:20,058 where after all very few of us originally came from. 1583 01:49:20,096 --> 01:49:30,768 ANDERSON: Ave Maria 1584 01:49:35,478 --> 01:49:37,469 [Cheering and applause]