PARKS 



1.-.04 



PARKS 



thousands of people visit the great national 

 reservations in the mountains of the West, and 

 from intimate contact with scenes of beauty 

 and grandeur are inspired to a better purpose 

 and a greater accomplishment in their daily 

 tasks; thus are the nations repaid for their in- 

 vestment. 



To preserve the sections of groat natural 

 beauty is not, however, the sole purpose of 

 national parks. In some of them wild animals 

 and birds are protected in their natural stato. 

 In others historic treasures or the remains of 

 prehistoric times are treasured, or medicinal 

 springs are administered for the public benefit. 



Parks of the United States 



A distinction is made by the United States 

 government between a national park and a 

 national monument. The Grand Canyon of 

 the Colorado, in Arizona, is one of the latter; 

 it is kept from exploitation by selfish private 

 interests, but the government spends no money 

 in its development. For the national parks, on 

 the other hand, the Department of the Interior 

 does everything it can to make their wonders 

 accessible to all, and to render a stay in them 

 comfortable. Hotels are erected, roads and trails 

 constructed, steamboat and stage lines estab- 

 lished and saddle horses provided. For trav- 

 elers with luxurious tastes and generous purses 

 there are the best of hotels, and for those who 

 prefer to be closer to nature, or who have less 

 to spend, there are well-kept tent camps. A 

 legion of rangers, and, in the Yellowstone Park, 

 a detachment of cavalry, guard the forests from 

 fire, the animals from hunters and the wild flow- 

 ers and other beauties of nature from wanton 

 destruction by vandal tourists. 



The United States government now main- 

 tains the following national parks, which are 

 here listed in alphabetical order: 



Casa Grande Ruin, the remains of a huge 

 adobe house built in Arizona by unknown pre- 

 historic Indians, is situated in a reservation of 

 three-quarters of a square mile, officially termed 

 a national park. The government's protection 

 was extended to Casa Grande in 1892. Travel- 

 ers may visit this interesting prehistoric rem- 

 nant by a ten-mile journey from the main line 

 of the Southern Pacific or the Arizona Eastern 

 Railroad. 



Crater Lake National Park, with its wonder- 

 fully blue lake within the walls of a volcano 

 extinct before the human race was cradled, was 

 created in 1902. It is an area of 249 square 

 miles surrounding Mount Mazama, in the Cas- 

 cade range of southern Oregon. It may be 

 reached by a short trip from the terminus of 

 the Southern Pacific branch to the Klamath 

 Indian Reservation. 



General Grant National Park, a bit of Cali- 

 fornian primeval forest, is really an annex to 



the Sequoia Park. It contains but four square 

 miles, and was formed in 1890 to shield tin- 

 famous General Grant Tree, a sequoia thirty- 

 five feet in diameter and 264 f eet in height, 

 which started to grow before the first pyramid 

 was built ; except for the General Sherman Tree 

 in the near-by park, it is probably the world's 

 oldest living thing. 



Glacier National Park, an alpine land of rare 

 beauty, containing within its 1,534 square miles 

 more than sixty glaciers, is described and pic- 

 tured elsewhere in this work. It is in the 

 northwestern corner of Montana, at the bound- 

 ary of Alberta and British Columbia, and is 

 bordered by the main line of the Great North- 

 ern Railway. Adjoining it on the north is 

 Canada's Waterton Lakes Park. 



Hawaii National Park, authorized August 1, 

 1916, contains three volcanoes, two on the island 

 of Hawaii and one on the island of Maui. One 

 of the first, Kilauea, has been continuously ac- 

 tive for a century, and its neighbor, Mauna 

 Loa, is the largest volcano in the world; both 

 are described in the proper places in this work. 

 The third volcano, Haleakala, has been quiet 

 for nearly two centuries. The area of the park 

 is nearly 118 square miles. 



Hot Springs Reservation, in the Ozark Moun- 

 . tains of Arkansas, is the oldest of the national 

 parks; it was established in 1832. In its square 

 mile and a half are forty-six hot and several 

 cold springs, valued since Indian days for their 

 medicinal properties. It is but a short distance 

 from Little Rock. 



Lassen Volcanic National Park, in which is 

 Lassen Peak, the only active volcano in the 

 United States, was created August 9, 1916. It 

 is forty-five miles east of the Southern Pacific's 

 line from San Francisco to Portland, and not 

 much farther from the main line of the West- 

 ern Pacific Railroad. It contains 124 square 

 miles. 



Mesa Verde National Park, if the Spanish 

 portion of its name be translated, means the 

 park of the green table. On one of the isolated 

 tablelike plateaus of southwestern Colorado are 



