Source Notes
Title:
History of the National Park Service (United States).
Summary:
A complete history of the National Park Service, beginning with the first conservation act that protected Yosemite Valley in 1864 , to the present issues, projects, and policy that effect the agency today.
A complete history of the National Park Service.
Institutional.
What is it?
Encyclopedia article.
Published by Wikipedia on February, 10, 2009
No author listed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_National_Park_Service_(United_States)
Accessed:
February 12,2009.
George Catlin, artist.
John Conness, Senator of California in 1864.
Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of the United States of America.
.
Theodor Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States of America.
Franklin Roosevelt, 32 President of the United States of America.
Only a small portion of this article is used for my analysis. This article provides me with a systematic history of the establishment and progression of the National Park System. The idea to create a national conservation system was first conceptualized by George Catlin, a late 18thcentury artist. While traveling the Great Plains of the United States, he became concerned with the destruction of the Indian civilization, wildlife, and wilderness as eastern settlements spread westward. He wrote “by some great protecting policy of government… in a magnificent park… a nation’s park, containing man and beast, in all the wild[ness] and freshness of their nature’s beauty.” In 1864, several California leaders, including Senator John Conness, sponsored an act to protect Mariposa Big Tree Grove in California. President Lincoln would go on to sign this act, making it the first protected land. Nine years later, Yosemite became the first protected national park. Theodor Roosevelt continued Lincoln’s environmental action by signing the Antiquities Act of 1906, and protecting a multitude of sites around the country. In June of 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt consolidated all National Parks and Monuments into a single National Park System. The plan, among other actions, made the National Park Service the sole Federal agency responsible for all Federally owned public parks, monuments, and memorials.
Audience & Agenda:
Wikipedia.org is the biggest free-content encyclopedia on the internet, with two million articles and growing. Reaching over 77 million U.S. monthly people, the site attracts a more educated, younger audience. The typical visitor visits physicsforums.com and read Scientific American.
Usefulness:
Despite the fact that the source is from Wikipedia(content can sometimes be misinforming or false), the article provides me witha historical context to my argument. It explains how the idea was first conceptualized and how the idea has progressed to become what it is known as today—the National Park System. The document highlights presidents (Lincoln, Roosevelt, F.D.R,) who were catalysts of progression in the system.
Works cited:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_National_Park_Service_(United_States)
March 13, 2009 at 9:10 am |
[...] As noted above, the father of the National Forest System was Theodor Roosevelt. The idea to create a national conservation system was first conceptualized by George Catlin, a late 18thcentury artist. In 1864, several California leaders, including Senator John Conness, sponsored an act to protect Mariposa Big Tree Grove in California. President Lincoln would go on to sign this act, making it the first protected land. Nine years later, Yosemite became the first protected national park. Theodor Roosevelt continued Lincoln’s environmental action by signing the Antiquities Act of 1906, and protecting a multitude of sites around the country. In June of 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt consolidated all National Parks and Monuments into a single National Park System. The plan, among other actions, made the National Park Service the sole Federal agency responsible for all federally owned public parks, monuments (“History of the National Park Service (United States).”). [...]