Sierra Club

Frank Ross McCoy reports on activities in Yosemite National Park, hoping to remind President Roosevelt of the “fine work and sport of the summertime.” John Muir, Joseph N. LeConte, and other members of the Sierra Club have said that the change in the valley has been very positive since it became part of the national park this year. The superintendent, Harry Coupland Benson, knows the park well and is popular with the Sierra Club. McCoy describes the park rangers and some encounters with grizzly bears, noting he found the instinct to shoot very strong but felt “stern duty’s restraining hand.” McCoy says Interior Secretary James R. Garfield came and went in a flurry, mentioning that he finds Roosevelt’s cabinet officers showing up everywhere to be “inspiring,” now that he has experienced it in the Philippines, Cuba, and the United States. McCoy offers his thoughts on race relations between the Californians and Japanese, as well as the attitudes of people on the West Coast regarding the Great White Fleet. McCoy regrets he cannot conduct Roosevelt and his family personally through the park.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1907-08-07

Horace M. Albright, a prominent conservationist who worked to organize the National Park Service, died on March 28, 1987. The Theodore Roosevelt Association acknowledges his accomplishments and publishes his last article, “Memories of Theodore Roosevelt,” in this issue.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal

Creation Date

1987

Stephen R. Fox explores the divide in the American conservation movement between camps headed by followers of John Muir and those of Gifford Pinchot. He talks about the popularity of each and of the scholarship that has been produced about each of them. Fox argues that Pinchot “is best understood not as a conservationist but as a politician,” and he examines Pinchot’s autobiography in some detail to support this assertion. Fox argues that Pinchot had presidential aspirations and that he demonstrated little interest in practical forestry matters in his later years, but he also contends that Pinchot remains an important figure in the history of the American conservation movement.

A photograph of Roosevelt and Pinchot appears in the article as does a listing of the officers of the Theodore Roosevelt Association. A notice that this issue of the Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal is dedicated to Jessica Kraft appears on the last page of the article.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal

Four brief book reviews comprise the “Book Notes” column. John A. Gable reviews Michael Teague’s oral history of Alice Roosevelt Longworth and praises it for its use of 170 photographs, and he also examines Stephen Fox’s John Muir and His Legacy which not only looks at Muir’s life and work, but at many lesser known conservationists who comprise Muir’s legacy. Elizabeth E. Roosevelt reviews Thomas G. Dyer’s Theodore Roosevelt and the Idea of Race and finds its chapters on Native Americans and African Americans valuable while Janice Marino finds William L. DeAndrea’s novel The Lunatic Fringe worthless.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal

Creation Date

1981

In this chapter excerpt from his book John Muir and His Legacy: The American Conservation Movement, Stephen Fox examines efforts to expand Yosemite National Park, the battle between preservationists and conservationists over the use of forests, and provides portraits of John Muir, Gifford Pinchot, John Burroughs, and Theodore Roosevelt. He looks at the work undertaken by the conservation movement to preserve Niagara Falls, the redwood forests of California, and Mount Desert Island in Maine. Fox concludes the chapter with a look at the battle over the city of San Francisco’s desire to build a dam at the southern end of Hetch Hetchy valley in Yosemite National Park. In addition to looking at the life and work of Muir, the chapter provides information on many lesser known figures in the turn of the twentieth-century conservation movement.

A listing of the officers and the members of the executive, finance, and Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace committees of the Theodore Roosevelt Association is found on the second page of the excerpt.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt Association Journal

A group of conservationist organizations announce the plans for wilderness areas within Theodore Roosevelt National Park and the public hearings in connection with those plans. Included in the announcement are maps and descriptions of specific areas within the park, as conservationists hope to pay special attention to issues of park boundaries at the hearings.

Collection

Denver Public Library

Creation Date

1970-11-18

Draft proposal for the Department of the Interior to designate 28,335 acres of land in Theodore Roosevelt National Park as wilderness. The proposal includes maps of the area, background information on the proposal, the land, and the ecological situation there.

Collection

Denver Public Library

Creation Date

1972-09-18