II2 
the; story ot the: oak tree; 
All this was long ago, of course, nearly a thousand 
years before our time, but doesn’t it make you glad to 
know you live in a free land? Our government owns 
thousands of miles of glorious forests, wooded moun¬ 
tains, hills and streams. These lands are kept untouched 
for the pleasure, not of rich lords, but of common peo¬ 
ple. There is Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, 
Yosemite Park in California, the Grand Canyon of 
Arizona, and many others which I hope you may one 
day see. If you are an eastern boy or girl and have 
never seen the big trees of California, ask your teacher 
to show you a picture of that giant redwood which is 
so big around that an automobile can drive right through 
its trunk! 
These parks are vast playgrounds where grownups 
and their children can carry tents and camp out and have 
all kinds of good times. Nobody is allowed to cut down 
a tree or kill a wild animal in these beautiful places. 
But beside their beauty and the value of their lumber, 
forests are very useful things. All these leaves with 
their faces turned like so many umbrellas to the sun 
shade the soil so the heat cannot bum the richness out 
of it. The tree roots hold the soil in place, keeping it 
from shifting or sliding downhill, holding back flooded 
streams which would otherwise drown the farmed fields 
in the surrounding country. Rocky soil never brings 
