The National Park Service * * * * 125 



goes largely to W. B. Acker, chief clerk of the Department of the In 

 terior and an able official and astute attorney. 



In 1913, Secretary Lane called Dr. Adolph C. Miller of the Univer 

 sity of California to become his assistant, devoting his particular atten 

 tion to the national parks. However, he was soon drafted by the 

 President to work on banking problems and Secretary Lane was again 

 looking for a man to adopt the national parks. This time he called 

 upon his old college friend, Stephen T. Mather, a Californian, living at 

 the time in Illinois, a man familiar with the great out-of-doors and the 

 West, and a lover of the mountains. Mr. Mather became assistant sec 

 retary, and when by Act of Congress of August 25, 1916, the National 

 Park Service was established, he became the first director. Mr. Mather 

 held that position until January 12, 1929, under three administrations, 

 two of them Republican and one Democratic, serving under five differ 

 ent secretaries of the Department of the Interior. 



The act creating the National Park Service gave its officers author 

 ity to "promote and regulate the federal areas known as the national 

 parks, monuments, and reservations," and enunciated the fundamental 

 purpose of the parks : "To conserve the scenery and the natural and his 

 toric objects and the wild life therein, and to provide for the enjoyment 

 of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them un 

 impaired for the enjoyment of future generations." 



Those were broad and comprehensive powers. Exercising them, 

 however, was another matter. For years private interests had advanced 

 schemes for the commercialization of the parks, the using of park lands 

 for cattle and sheep grazing, the diversion of waters for irrigation and 

 power, the invasion of the mountains by ugly mining shafts. One of 

 these schemes was successful, the plan of the city of San Francisco 

 to dam the Hetch Hetchy Valley, a miniature Yosemite, flooding the 

 valley with a lake. Another persistent proposal was the draining of 

 water from Yellowstone Lake for power purposes and the elimination 

 of parts of the southwestern area of the park for reservoir sites. 



The first job of the new National Park Service was to save the 

 parks from the exploitation schemes already undertaken. In the case 

 of Hetch Hetchy, the building of the dam was already authorized by 

 Congress, and nothing could be done. Under Mr. Mather's administra 

 tion the National Park Service has taken the position that if the natural 

 features of a park are sufficiently important and valuable to be placed 

 within a national park by an act of Congress, they should forever re 

 main there, regardless of their value from a commercial point of view, 

 and if they are not of national park caliber, they should be eliminated 

 from the park by appropriate legislation. The National Park Service 

 has opposed the creation of parks in certain areas because they did not 



