eet UE EL ils sO. Name ola Llcels LEN 29 
and promoters fought off constructive conservation plans with bitter oppo- 
sition. Everything was “here to be used.” 
YELLOWSTONE’S WILD GRANDEUR was thought of as a “geological 
sideshow” from which vandals with crowbars carried off geological treas- 
ures. One park superintendent “sold rock formations to get needed cash.” 
Yellowstone’s gorgeous formations, falling to the crowbar and ax, “were 
shipped by the carload to Washington, D.C. and the East.” No one believed 
in the beauty of Yellowstone. Eye-witnesses were accused of exaggeration. 
Vicious opposition fought appropriations for the park’s upkeep. The 400-odd 
buffalo left in the entire country shrunk to 200, as ruffians invaded 
Yellowstone to kill buffalo for wealthy trophy collectors, the poachers 
getting $300, $500, and even $1,500 a head. The most notorious poacher, when 
finally captured, was ordered released by the Secretary of the Interior. 
Corruption flourished when Eastern lumberman and capitalists fraudulently 
secured claims in the Northwest for thousands upon thousands of acres... 
the very cream of timber in the U.S. In the East, in the Adirondacks, 
terribly abused by loggers and hunters, the forest cover was saved only 
when weathy families feared for their vacationland ... including the 
Theodore Roosevelt family. 
ft ft I A 
WHEN PRESIDENT McKINLEY was shot, the “damned cowboy,” 
Vice President Theodore Roosevelt, entered the White House at age 43, 
announcing in his message to the nation: “The forest and water problems 
are perhaps the most vital internal questions of the United States.” De- 
struction of America’s native fauna was at its peak. The buffalo was 
gone from the entire United States, except for 21 walled up in Yellowstone! 
Even the vandalism that had ‘plagued Yellowstone” had spread to looting 
many superb geological sites, including the Grand Canyon. 
WHILE CONGRESS DAWDLED about establishing them as national 
parks, Theodore Roosevelt fought to preserve them from exploitation. 
Though suffering many defeats in his last years in the White House, this 
did not diminish his victories in saving land and wildlife. T. R. had enlarged 
the national forests from 42,000,000 acres to 172,000,000; created 51 national 
wildlife refuges (six in Alaska); set aside 18 sites as National Monuments, 
including Grand Canyon and the Petrified Forest; and begun a world 
movement “for controlling land waste and saving the things upon which, 
alone, a great and peaceful and progressive country can be founded.” Though 
T. R. appointed a National Conservation Commission to take inventory of 
this country’s natural resources, Congress soon starved the Commission to 
death for funds. 
ft fl ee ft 
GREEN AND GAIN ARE STILL THE MOTIVES DOMINATING THE 
DESTRUCTION ...OF . OUR NATURAL. “RESOURCES AND SCENIC 
BEAUTY. IN MAN’S DOMINION OF THE GREEN EARTH, WHERE DO 
YOU STAND? What disaster are you fighting to prevent? What protection 
are you pressing for in Congress? What scene are you saving today? 
OVERLEAF / ‘COUNTERPOINT’—a painting by Arthur Getz. Originally 
in AUDUBON magazine, September 1971. Reprinted with 
permission of the National Audubon Society. 
