10 



'Oh, Ranger!" 



"Hullo/' he said, extending his hand. "My name is Winess. What 

 park are you from ?" 



When it was explained that the new ranger was the Crown Prince 

 of Sweden, it took Winess the rest of the day to recover the speech he 

 had prepared to welcome the royal visitor to the Grand Canyon ! 



One day the Crown Prince went fishing with Chief Ranger Sam 

 Woodring at Peale Island in Yellowstone Lake. After a good day, in 

 which the Prince caught his limit, the party made ready to leave. Ob 

 serving the rangers cutting wood near the cabin used as a headquarters 

 for fishing parties, the Prince inquired the purpose of the wood. He 

 was told that it was the practice in the mountains never to leave a cabin 

 without wood, and that those in the cabin were supposed to replenish 

 the supply for the next occupants, who might possibly arrive in the 

 night or in distress. 



"All right," he said, "since I am a ranger I will insist upon cutting 

 my share of the wood." 

 Which he did. 



There are times, however, when visiting celebrities are a bit unwill 

 ing to obey the rules of the ranger service. The rangers have one rule 

 which says that no names shall be written on the cones of the geysers 

 in Yellowstone. It is hard for the ranger to understand why anyone 

 should want to disfigure a marvel of Nature by writing his name upon 

 it, yet that used to be a widely accepted custom of the traveling public, 

 just as carving initials in trees was the regular thing to do. It is pleas 

 ing to note that this custom is disappearing everywhere, and perhaps 

 the education that has been carried on in the national parks has had 

 considerable to do with ending the practice of disfiguring trees. 



One day a local celebrity from an eastern city was smitten with the 

 urge to write his name upon the cone of Old Faithful, a place where 

 the name would endure for several years before the geyser could elim 

 inate it by natural processes. This man was caught red-handed by a 



ranger, who arrested him. He was of 

 fered the choice of mixing up some soap 

 suds and scrubbing the name off the cone 

 or going before the United States Com 

 missioner for prosecution. He sputtered 

 considerably about his rights, but finally 

 decided to use the soapsuds, influenced 

 largely by the fact that if he appeared 

 before the judge and were fined, his 

 name would be in the papers and he 

 would become celebrated in a manner 

 that did not appeal to him. Nevertheless, 



