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Half Dome photographed from Glacier Point in Yosemite National Park

Hark…Wednesday, April 21st was the 172nd birthday of John Muir, the quintessential American naturalist and father of our national parks. 

We might take a moment to reflect on his achievements, we staunch patriots who enjoy the company of forests and mountain rivers over the urban zoo, for we have him to thank.

An inspired champion of the wild splendor of the American west, he is best known for co-founding the Sierra Club, his political efforts to preserve what is now Yosemite National Park, and his writings which express a kind of piety to our vast unspoiled lands.

Our national park system, Muir’s legacy in part, “America’s best idea” to Ken Burns, is also perhaps our greatest gift to the world.

Ross Hanna, a grandson of Muir, spoke to TENTHMIL about the man and the legacy. 

Hanna said it wasn’t until well after Muir’s death, not until the post-WWII environmental enlightenment that the philosophy of preservation became a national call to arms.  It was then that John Muir became a lionized figure of the movement.

It might be said that Muir was ahead of his time.  And what the hell is that supposed to mean? 

What it means is he had great ideas met with great intolerance.  He wished to reserve pristine lands for their beauty and humanistic value, in a time when many more people saw the value in board feet of lumber or in short tons of minerals.

Born in Scotland, in 1838, Muir came the United States with his family eleven years later.  When he grew up, he became an engineer, writer, naturalist, and necessarily, something of a lobbyist.

He was a friend and colleague of Gifford Pinchot, the first chief of the Forest Service, who brought the ideas of traditional European forestry to American public lands.  Eventually, though, the two drifted apart.  Muir represented complete “preservation” of nature, while Pinchot was for “conservation” or wise use of resources.

Merced River at Yosemite National Park

The Hetch Hetchy Valley dam controversy, in the early 1900s, was one of Muir and the Sierra Club’s most illuminating moments to the public.  They opposed the construction of the O’Shaughnessy Dam on the Tuolumne River, which would create a reservoir to supply water to San Fransisco.  Muir wrote,

Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people’s cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man.

The John Muir legacy carries on to this day.  His descendants running a family vineyard in Napa Valley, the Sierra Club fighting for environmental justice, and thousands of park interpreters who foster the love of the land in countless American…all have a bit of Muir inside them.

Rejoice, then, ye freedom loving world citizens who fancy a respite from your concrete jungles, and have a think about a great American, as indeed he surely thought of you. 

He thought of all of us, to come centuries after his own self, of the inherent value of wild places to the human soul, and of the joy and nourishment each person shares to fill their senses so.

Stay tuned to TENTHMIL for our exclusive interview with Ross Hanna, grandson of John Muir.