1) The Sierra Nevada. President Theodore Roosevelt & John Muir. Every tree heard the bodeful sound, and pillars of smoke gave the sign in the sky, Many of natures five hundred kinds of wild trees had to make way for orchards and cornfields. Muir constantly brings up the burning of the forests. About seventy million acres it still owns, enough for all the country, if wisely used. His lifelong passion for hiking began when he hiked 1,000 miles from Indianapolis to the Gulf of Mexico in. It took more than three thousand years to make some of the trees in these Western woods, trees that are still standing in perfect strength and beauty, waving and singing in the mighty forests of the Sierra. During heavy rainfalls and while the winter accumulations of snow were melting, the larger streams would swell into destructive torrents; cutting deep, rugged-edged gullies, carrying away the fertile humus and soil as well as sand and rocks, filling up and overflowing their lower channels, and covering the lowland fields with raw detritus. Listen to the trailer for Holy Week. > It is the only genuine Erebus route. But the state woodlands are not allowed to lie idle. Bright seas made its border with wave embroidery and icebergs; gray deserts were outspread in the middle of it, mossy tundras on the north, savannas on the south, and blooming prairies and plains; while lakes and rivers shone through all the vast forests and openings, and happy birds and beasts gave delightful animation. > But when the steel axe of the white man rang out in the startled air their doom was sealed. It is a compilation of his own accounts of his travels and journeys, and his explorations and examinations, of the mountain ranges of California, in particular the Sierra Nevada, during the late 1860s to the early 1870s, a time when the wild places in the State where . The abstract is typically a short summary of the contents of the document. Of all the magnificent coniferous forests around the Great Lakes, once the property of the United States, scarcely any belong to it now. He explains that "any fool can destroy trees" as "they cannot run away" (Muir, 2006, p. 364). Here and there in the Southern States there are still considerable areas of timbered government land, but these are comparatively unimportant. Thence still westward the invading horde of destroyers called settlers made its fiery way over the broad Rocky Mountains, felling and burning more fiercely than ever, until at last it has reached the wild side of the continent, and entered the last of the great aboriginal forests on the shores of the Pacific. Chapter 2: How is Sustainability a Political Issue? But in the Rocky Mountains and California and Arizona, where the forests are inflammable, and where the fertility of the lowlands depends upon irrigation, public opinion is growing stronger every year in favor of permanent protection by the federal government of all the forests that cover the sources of the streams. The blackness is perfect. And when he was tired wading in the sloughs and touched with rheumatiz, he just knocked off on ducks, and went to the Contra Costa hills for dove and quail. Mere destroyers, however, tree-killers, spreading death and confusion in the fairest groves and gardens ever planted, let the government hasten to cast them out and make an end of them. In particular, from our Earth-based vantage point, we are keen to know where the closest life to us is, and how similar it might be to life on our home planet. Uncle Sam is not often called a fool is business matters, yet he had sold millions of acres of timber land at two dollars and a half an acre on which a single tree was worth more than a hundred dollars. How strong a voice that metal has! Our National Parks, by John Muir (1901, c. 1909) - The Writings of John Muir - John Muir Exhibit (John Muir Education Project, Sierra Club California) Our National Parks by John Muir Contents List of Illustrations Preface The Wild Parks and Forest Reservations of the West The Yellowstone National Park The Yosemite National Park At university, Muir focused his studies on chemistry, geology and botany. Visit Muir Woods National Monument, located in Marin County, just north of San Francisco. "No prisoners were taken," recalled the witness to these events . There is no real sky and no scenery. Likewise many of natures five hundred kinds of wild trees had to make way for orchards and cornfields. On the other hand, about one half of the fifty million francs spent on forestry has been given to engineering works, to make the replanting of denuded areas possible. While in Alaska, I saw the loveliest forests and scenery I've ever seen. This paper looks at the roles that language had in the writings of John Muir, the father of American national parks and Gifford Pinchot, the father of American forest conservation. Only the forests of the West are significant in size and value, and these, although still great, are rapidly vanishing. All sorts of local laws and regulations have been tried and found wanting, and the costly lessons of our own experience, as well as that of every civilized nation, show conclusively that the fate of the remnant of our forests is in the hands of the federal government, and that if the remnant is to be saved at all, it must be saved quickly. Thence still westward swept the forests to right and left around grassy plains and deserts a thousand miles wide: irrepressible hosts of spruce and pine, aspen and willow, nut-pine and juniper, cactus and yucca, caring nothing for drought, extending undaunted from mountain to mountain, over mesa and desert, to join the darkening multitudes of pines that covered the high Rocky ranges and the glorious forests along the coast of the moist and balmy Pacific, where new species of pine, giant cedars and spruces, silver firs and sequoias, kings of their race, growing close together like grass in a meadow, poised their brave domes and spires in the sky three hundred feet above the ferns and the lilies that enameled the ground; towering serene through the long centuries, preaching Gods forestry fresh from heaven. He returned with the famous story. dwelling in the most beautiful woods, in the most salubrious climate, breathing delightful doors both day and night, drinking cool living water, roses and lilies at their feet in the spring, shedding fragrance and ringing bells as if cheering them on in their desolating work. The axe is not yet at the root of every tree, but the sheep is, or was before the national parks were established and guarded by the military, the only effective and reliable arm of the government free from the blight of politics. Every tree heard the bodeful sound, and pillars of smoke gave the sign in the sky. As is shown by Mr. E. A. Bowers, formerly Inspector of the Public Land Service, the foundation of our protective policy, which has never protected, is an act passed March 1, 1817, which authorized the Secretary of the Navy to reserve lands producing live-oak and cedar, for the sole purpose of supplying timber for the navy of the United States. To show the results of the timber-planting act, it need only be stated that of the 38,000,000 acres entered under it, less than 1,000,000 acres have been patented. These forests were composed of about five hundred species of trees, all of them in some way useful to man, ranging in size from twenty-five feet in height and less than one foot in diameter at the ground to four hundred feet in height and more than twenty feet in diameter, lordly monarchs proclaiming the gospel of beauty like apostles. John Muir, Wilderness Protector. In 1913, Congress passed a law that approved the construction of the dam in Hetch Hetchy Valley. Everybody on the dry side of the continent is beginning to find this out, and, in view of the waste going on, is growing more and more anxious for government protection. Relating how the ever-increasing horde of settlers had poured across the continent, Muir writes: " with no eye to the future, these pious destroyers waged interminable forest wars; chips flew thick and fast, trees in their beauty fell crashing by the millions and the smoke of their burning has been rising to heaven more than 200 years . Every other civilized nation in the world has been compelled to care for its forests, and so must we if waste and destruction are not to go on to the bitter end." In one case which came under the observation of Mr. Bowers, it was the practice of a lumber company to hire the entire crew of every vessel which might happen to touch at any port in the redwood belt, to enter one hundred and sixty acres each and immediately deed the land to the company, in consideration of the company's paying all expenses and giving the jolly sailors fifty dollars apiece for their trouble. Being rather partial to trees, I could not resist reading "A wind-storm in the forests" by Scottish-born American naturalist/enviromentalist John Muir (1838-1914) when it lobbed in by email today as this week's Library of America story of the week.Anyone who has been to the stunning Yosemite - or visited the peaceful Muir Woods north of San Francisco - will have heard of John Muir. Restless to explore more of the country, he left school for what he would call "the University of the Wilderness. > Conservation in the United States can be traced back to the 19th century with the formation of the first National Park. Muir emigrated from Scotland with his family to Wisconsin in 1849. Through all the wonderful, eventful centuries since Christs time and long before that God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand straining, leveling tempests and floods; but he cannot save them from fools, only Uncle Sam can do that. See All test questions. He educated Americans about the value of the countrys wilderness, inspiring generations of wilderness advocates. The Land Ethic Aldo Leopold Part II: Two Philosophical Issues in Forestry Ethics MULTIPLE VALUES IN FORESTS . The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop away from you like the leaves of Autumn." John Muir, The Mountains of California tags: energy , mountains , nature 1227 likes Like The outcries we hear against forest reservations come mostly from thieves who are wealthy and steal timber by wholesale. In the settlement and civilization of the country, bread more than timber or beauty was wanted; and in the blindness of hunger, the early settlers, claiming Heaven as their guide, regarded Gods trees as only a larger kind of pernicious weeds, extremely hard to get rid of. Our National Parks, by John Muir (1901, c. (1901)) - John Muir Writings . Every place is made better by them. Under the timber and stone act, of the same date, land in the Pacific States and Nevada, valuable mainly for timber, and unfit for cultivation if the timber is removed, can be purchased for two dollars and a half an acre, under certain restrictions. The redwood is one of the few conifers that sprout from the stump and roots, and it declares itself willing to begin immediately to repair the damage of the lumberman and also that of the forest-burner. Drifting adventurers in California, after harvest and threshing are over, oftentimes meet to discuss their plans for the winter, and their talk is interesting. There will be a period of indifference on the part of the rich, sleepy with wealth, and of the toiling millions, sleepy with poverty, most of whom never saw a forest; a period of screaming protest and objection from the plunderers, who are as unconscionable and enterprising as Satan. HASC - Digital Archives About. Here the forests reached their highest development. Muir walked through these groves of giant sequoias and thought them to be among the most fascinating of ecosystems certainly worth whatever protection humans could afford them. Type the abstract of the document here. He was 29. Railroad tracks were just . In Luke 12 Jesus says, "I've come to bring fire on earth." The plan was usually as follows: A mill company desirous of getting title to a large body of redwood or sugar-pine land first blurred the eyes and ears of the land agents, and then hired men to enter the land they wanted, and immediately deed it to the company after a nominal compliance with the law; false swearing in the wilderness against the government being held of no account. 14 minutes. It is the citizens of this country who are robbing from and destroying the beautiful forest. Muir fell in love with the immense beauty of the mountain landscape. With such variety, harmony, and triumphant exuberance, even nature, it would seem, might have rested content with the forests of North America, and planted no more. The effect of the present confused, discriminating, and unjust system has been to place almost the whole population in opposition to the government; and as conclusive of its futility, as shown by Mr. Bowers, we need only state that during the seven years from 1881 to 1887 inclusive the value of the timber reported stolen from the government lands was $36,719,935, and the amount recovered was $478,073, while the cost of the services of special agents alone was $455,000, to which must be added the expense of the trials. To Muir, these forests are a true creation by God himself--everlasting, plentiful, and can feed every man and . All the pine needles and rootlets and blades of grass, and the fallen decaying trunks of trees, are dams, storing the bounty of the clouds and dispensing it in perennial life-giving streams, instead of allowing it to gather suddenly and rush headlong in short-lived devastating floods. The remnant protected will yield plenty of timber, a perennial harvest for every right use, without further diminution of its area, and will continue to cover the springs of the rivers that rise in the mountains and give irrigating waters to the dry valleys at their feet, prevent wasting floods and be a blessing to everybody forever. From poetry, novels, and memoirs to journalism, crime writing, and science fiction, the more than 300 volumes published by Library of America are widely . But light is surely coming, and the friends of destruction will preach and bewail in vain. Only by gift or purchase, so far as I know, can the government get back into its possession a single acre of this wonderful forest. On the contrary, all the brains, religion, and superstition of the neighborhood are brought into play to prevent a new growth. Any fool can destroy trees. 1971. Any fool can destroy trees. Enthralled by nature from a young age, Roosevelt cherished and promoted our nation's landscapes and wildlife. by man, must have been a great delight to. Nevertheless the Andes and the South American forests continued to fascinate his imagination, as his letters show, for many years after he came to California. America is one of the wealthiest Continue reading Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged John Muir, The American Forests | 1 Comment A champion of America's great writers and timeless works, Library of America guides readers in finding and exploring the exceptional writing that reflects the nation's history and culture. John Muir founded the Sierra Club in 1892, whose main goal was to "do something for nature and make the mountains glad.". He concluded that all life forms have inherent significance and the right to exist. 237, pp. The Civil War had just ended. Ours is the blackest. Six of this volume's ten chapters are devoted to Muir's beloved Yosemite, exploring the forests, fountains, streams, and animals of the Sierra Nevada. Most notably, this was John Muir's first published essay (1871). It is not a book of forestry, but the forest is the most . Muir ended his life living in the care of his Chinese employees. Theres big money in it, and your grub costs nothing. It extends along the western slope, in a nearly continuous belt about ten miles wide, from beyond the Oregon boundary to the south of Santa Cruz, a distance of nearly four hundred miles, and in massive, sustained grandeur and closeness of growth surpasses all the other timber woods of the world. The United States government has always been proud of the welcome it has extended to good men of every nation, seeking freedom and homes and bread. It has, therefore, as shown by Mr. Pinchot, refused to deliver its forests to more or less speedy destruction by permitting them to pass into private ownership. The sempervirens is certainly the taller of the two. Even Japan is ahead of us in the management of her forests. T he Mountains of California, published in 1894, is John Muir's first book. They went to the woods to escape aspects of. 234. The axe and saw are insanely busy, chips are flying thick as snowflakes, and every summer thousands of acres of priceless forests, with their underbrush, soil, springs, climate, scenery, and religion, are vanishing away in clouds of smoke, while, except in the national parks, not one forest guard is employed. John Muir's 1897 Case for Saving America's Forests - The Atlantic August 1897 Issue Explore Technology The American Forests "God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease,. The provisions of the code concerning private woodlands are substantially these: No private owner may clear his woodlands without giving notice to the government at least four months in advance, and the forest service may forbid the clearing on the following grounds: to maintain the soil on mountains, to defend the soil against erosion and flooding by rivers or torrents, to insure the existence of springs and watercourses, to protect the dunes and seashore, etc. In "The American Forests", John Muir's purpose is to reveal the disloyalty that Americans have towards their agriculture. Taking from the government is with them the same as taking from nature, and their consciences flinch no more in cutting timber from the wild forests than in drawing water from a lake or river. Shot em on the Joaquin, tied em in dozens by the neck, and shipped em to San Francisco. 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