Podcast Episodes

101 Years Apart

  • February 17, 2020February 17, 2020

This past Wednesday, Grand Canyon National Park’s Interpretive Rangers lowered the flag in honor of one of their own. A ranger who lived and worked at the park for the past 20 years, and became a favorite of visitors from far and wide.

After forty-eight jobs in five states, Ron Brown found his calling as an interpretive park ranger. It was his wife Pat’s life long dream, in fact. “She’s one of those little girls who from five years old, when daddy took her traveling to national parks, she fell in love with it and wanted to be a park ranger all her life,” Brown told KPBS. “I was smart enough to know I wanted whatever she wanted.” Pat passed away in 2014, and Ron joined her just days ago, peacefully in his sleep at his home in Grand Canyon Village.

Ranger Ron’s popularity among Grand Canyon visitors was undeniable. His foot-long silver beard and boisterous voice were instantly recognizable, and his tours and interpretive programs beloved. He relished in the sound of thousands of visitors gasping at their first sight of the canyon daily. YouTube videos of his speeches are titled with words like “Favorite” and “Best” U.S. Park ranger.

One of the programs Ranger Ron was best known for was his portrayal of the tall-tale spinning “Captain” John Hance.

Many of the details of the life of John Hance are unknown, especially since his own oral history was less than reliable. But what is known, is that he was the first non-Native American to live at the Grand Canyon. It is believed he was born around 1840 in Tennessee, and he likely fought in the Civil War as a Confederate. He used the title “Captain,” though he was never actually made one. Hance improved an old Havasupai trail into the canyon and tried to mine for gold, silver, and asbestos. Very quickly, however, Hance found a more lucrative calling: guiding visitors coming to see the newfound wonder of the west.

As time passed and tourism grew, Hance became a legendary fixture of the canyon. Visitors making their way down the treacherous Old Hance Trail would be entertained by stories of how the old frontiersman had dug the canyon himself or how his horse Darby could cross the canyon from rim to rim by galloping atop banks of fog. As Hance himself would once say, “I’ve got to tell stories to these people for their money; and if I don’t tell it to them, who will? I can make these tenderfeet believe that a frog eats boiled eggs, and I’m going to do it, and I’m going to make ’em believe he carries it a mile to find a rock to crack it on.”

One early visitor declared that “To see the canyon only and not to see Captain John Hance, is to miss half the show.”

Here is the late Ranger Ron Brown as Captain John Hance:

According to a statement from Grand Canyon National Park, over his twenty years of service, Ranger Ron was “a teacher, a mentor to many rangers, and gave thousands of ranger programs to the visiting public. Working until just a week before his passing, he epitomized tenacity and devotion as an Interpretive Park Ranger.

Ron had the innate ability to connect visitors to Grand Canyon and help them find their own reason to love this place. He spent countless hours and devoted much of himself to coaching and encouraging new rangers to perfect his beloved craft of interpretation.”

Ron was one of only a handful of Interpretive Park Rangers to complete the rigorous Interpretive Development Program and accomplish all ten benchmarks. He also was the only Interpretive Park Ranger at Grand Canyon to receive the Interpreter of the Year Award twice.

Captain John Hance died in 1919, the year the Grand Canyon became a National Park. He was the first person buried in what would become the Grand Canyon Pioneer Cemetery. The cemetery holds the stories of the great people who lived at the canyon — famous names from the park’s history, and tragic losses. The remains of 23 of the 128 people who died in the TWA-United mid-air collision over the Canyon in 1956 are buried at the cemetery. The collision took place in uncontrolled airspace, where it was the pilots’ own responsibility to maintain separation. From that tragedy came the development of the FAA and modern aircraft safety.

Ranger Ron gave tours of the cemetery, always ending up at his wife Pat’s grave. When she died from Cancer, he was allowed to choose a plot for both of them. He found the perfect spot, where twin pine trees grew together. Now, Ranger Ron Brown will be interred next to her. And he will be last person to be buried there, 101 years after John Hance, and in the 101st year of Grand Canyon National Park.

Podcast Episodes

A Rescue in the Grand Tetons

  • April 5, 2019July 15, 2019

Mountain climbing is surely one of the most dangerous of the extreme sports. It’s a trial of wills that takes a clear head, teamwork, and unflappable trust in your climbing partners. The challenge is magnified ten-fold when the climb is a rescue operation. On this Episode of America’s National Parks, a harrowing rescue of a climber at Grand Teton National Park.

August 21st, 1967. While climbing the 12,800 ft Mount Owen, two men heard an alarming distant call for help from the neighboring Grand Teton peak.

The men hurried their descent, and rushed to the Ranger’s cabin at Jenny Lake and knocked on the door.

It was one in the morning, and a lanky blonde boy answered. The men asked him if his ranger father was home. The boy informed them that he was the ranger — 22-year-old Ralph Tingey.

Tingey rushed to a scenic turnout with a line of sight to the north face of the mountain. He flashed his headlights in an S.O.S. — three short, three long, three short.

Faintly from high on the mountain, he saw a flashlight respond in kind.

Tingey informed other rangers and all agreed that nothing could be done until the morning. The stranded figures would be on their own for the night.

At the first light of dawn, Tingey returned to the pullout with a spotting scope. As the light increased, he spotted one climber walking around to keep warm and another in a sleeping bag, presumably injured and unable to walk.

In the 60s, climbing was in its infancy. Gear was hard to come by – much of it imported from Europe. There were no cell phones. There was no GPS. There weren’t as many established climbing routes. In fact, a rescue had never been attempted on the north face of Grand.

Lorraine Hough and Gaylord Campbell had nearly completed their climb the day before when their terrifying situation took hold. Campbell had taken the lead while Hough belayed 20 feet below him. Large rocks broke loose, striking him on the leg, and sending him tumbling below.

Hough rushed to tend to his injuries and made a make-shift splint with an ice pick and put him into a sleeping bag while she began to cry for help. She knew they would never make it down on their own.

Hours went by, and as night set in, lightning loomed in the distance. She began to click her flashlight in an S.O.S. She never saw Tingey’s headlights. He had just caught a glimpse of her signal, which she was sending less and less frequently as the batteries began to die out.

A helicopter had been called in, but it took most of the day to get there. When it finally arrived, the pilot flew rangers Rick Reese and Pete Sinclair up past the ledge, where Hough was waving frantically. By chance, Leigh Ortenburger, the world’s leading authority on climbing the Grand Tetons and author of a definitive guidebook, happened to be on the summit with Bob Irvine. Hearing cries for help, they looked down and spotted the stranded climbers. They were trying to figure out a way to notify rangers when the helicopter zoomed by.

Climbing rangers Sinclair, Reese, Irvine and Tingey, park employees Ted Wilson and Mike Ermarth, along with Ortenburger made up the rescue team. Tingey, Reese, Irvine and Wilson had grown up as young climbers together in Salt Lake City. They knew each other’s shorthand, having established some of the climbing routes together still in use today. The whole team was a group of some of the most experienced climbers in the US, but they were about to attempt something that many thought impossible.

Sent ahead to reach the injured climber, Reese used an inflatable splint to immobilize the leg. Had Campbell been suffering just a broken arm, they might have put him in a backpack-style carrier to evacuate him, but the badly broken leg presented the risk of a severed artery if it were jostled around. Reese radioed to the team that they’d need to remove him by basket.

An evacuation decision had to be made — whether to haul Campbell up to an easier route down the mountain or to lower the injured climber roughly 2,000 feet to the Teton Glacier. The team determined it would be too difficult to haul that much weight up the steep and loose-rock terrain and that Campbell might not survive it.

The North Face of Grand is tough and foreboding. In fact, no one had ever been up or down it. But the team decided their best option was to head straight down the North Face.  

First, they got Hough to safety, then radioed for more rope, a bolt kit and morphine. It was getting dark, and the supplies would have to wait until morning.

Wilson kept Campbell company throughout the night. They spoke of trips each had taken to Europe, routes they had climbed and climbers they knew.

At dawn, the helicopter delivered the rope and bolt kit and, hovering near the ledge, tossed a box of morphine to Ortenburger, who caught it.

The team set up a Austrian cable rig – just a quarter-inch-thick cable that would need to hold 500 pounds – Campbell, the litter that carried him, and a climber to keep it horizontal as they descended together, a few inches at a time.

Campbell was secured in the litter and a helmet was placed over his face to protect him from falling rocks. Numerous holes had to be hand-drilled more than four inches into the rock for security bolts to hold the winch, and a second system of belay ropes was set up as a safety backup.

They had 300 feet of cable, but weren’t sure if it was enough. Ortenburger and Irvine dropped rocks down the face and timed their fall, using the gravity velocity formula to calculate distance.

The math looked good, so Ortenburger went down first on a 300-foot rope. When he reached a large ledge big enough for everyone to stand, he yelled up, “It’ll reach.”

The rest went down, and they hauled Campbell down the ledge inch by inch as the steel cable jerked and made sounds as though it wanted to snap.

When everyone reached the ledge safely, they debated what to do next, and decided to go straight down again. They lowered Ortenburger down the 300-foot rope, which barely reached, and then they set up the rig again and tediously brought Campbell down again litter.

The rest of the climbers had to rappel down on a single strand of rope, across a knot joining two 150-foot ropes. They all made it, and prepared for a cold, hungry night on another ledge. There wasn’t enough room for them all to stay in the area, so they split up for Cambell’s third night on the mountain.

The team traveled 1,100 feet the first full day of the rescue, but were still a formidable 900 feet from their goal.

On the third day, they party reached Teton Glacier, where another team met them and all worked for hours to get the litter to a spot where a helicopter could finally pick it up at a level landing pad they had carved out of snow.

After a 20-minute helicopter ride, Campbell was in St. John’s Hospital in Jackson, where he recovered quickly.

When the helicopter brought the rescuers back down to the Jenny Lake cabin, they found the superintendent had left them a case of beer on ice.

None of the rescuers ever heard from Campbell again, until a 2016 documentary in which Campbell criticized the rescue, saying they should have carried him out backpack style, getting him to a hospital on the first day.

“The Impossible Rescue” made national headlines, and Vice President Hubert Humphrey wrote the rescuers a letter praising their courage. Stewart Udall, the Interior secretary, had the rangers flown to Washington, D.C. to receive gold medals for valor.

Several of the rescuers went on to become professors, Wilson would be elected mayor of Salt Lake City, and the lanky Ralph Tingey later became the superintendent of Grand Teton National Park. Looking back, he says there are still times he wakes in the middle of the night clutching his pillow over how dangerous the rescue was over forty years ago.

Few landscapes in the world are as striking as that of Grand Teton National Park. Rising above pristine lakes teeming with wildlife, the Grand Tetons offer over two hundred miles of trails, a float down the Snake River, magnificent vistas, wildflowers, forests, and, of course, mountain climbing. The park also has a rich cultural history with old homesteads and cattle ranches to explore and photograph.

The park is open 24-hours a day, year-round. Most roads, facilities and services are all open or available during the summer, but may be closed at other times of the year.

Six campgrounds operate within the park and parkway during the summer. Most are available on a first-come, first-served basis, although reservations can be made for group camping, the Colter Bay RV Park and the Headwaters Campground and RV Sites at Flagg Ranch. Lodges and cabins are also available, along with restaurants and stores for provisions.

The park experiences long, cold winters, and snow and frost are possible any month.

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Music

Music for this week’s episode is provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.


Podcast Episodes

Apostle of the Cacti

  • March 29, 2019March 29, 2019

If you’re a National Park buff—and you probably are if you listen to this podcast—you probably know of some of the famous people responsible for the very creation of many of our greatest parks. People like John Muir, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Teddy Roosevelt, and Stephan Mather. But we’re guessing you haven’t heard of Minerva Hamilton Hoyt, the hero of the Joshua Tree National Park and the California Desert who made sure they were protected for many lifetimes to come.

Minerva Hamilton was born on March 27, 1866 on a plantation near Durant, Mississippi to an upper-class family. Genteel finishing schools and music conservatories were the routine. She married Dr. Albert Sherman Hoyt, and moved for a time to New York, and then Baltimore, where she gave birth to two sons. In 1897, the family moved to South Pasadena, California, where Minerva immersed herself in southern California high society and civic causes. She developed a talent for organizing charitable events, and eventually became president of the Los Angeles Symphony and head of the Boys and Girls Club of Los Angeles.

She also developed a passion for gardening, which introduced her to some of the native desert vegetation commonly used in southern California landscaping. It was an alien terrain that fascinated her. She had another child, but it tragically died as an infant in 1918, followed by her husband’s untimely death. Among the Joshua Trees of Southern California she found comfort and solace. “During nights in the open, lying in a snug sleeping-bag, I soon learned the charm of a Joshua Forest,” she wrote in 1931 noting the scent of the California juniper, the eerie night winds, and the bright desert constellations. “This desert…possessed me, and I constantly wished that I might find some way to preserve its natural beauty.”

She was awestruck by the beauty and the inventiveness of desert plants that developed unique ways to thrive in the harsh climate. But she also saw the thoughtless and widespread destruction of native desert plants by people who dug up, burned, and otherwise destroyed so many of the cacti and Joshua trees that she found so beautiful.

She became alarmed by the rapid growth of the greater Los Angeles area, as more and more people and automobiles began to roam the Mojave desert to collect exotic desert plants. Whole regions were stripped bare as collectors transplanted palm trees, barrel cacti, and Joshua trees to their gardens.

The Joshua tree, once deemed “the most repulsive tree in the vegetable kingdom,” had become revered for its unique appearance, it’s clustered groupings, and its ability to thrive where few other plants could. The twisted, spiky Joshua trees are a member of the Agave family. Years ago the Joshua tree was recognized by Native Americans for its useful properties: tough leaves were worked into baskets and sandals, and flower buds and raw or roasted seeds made a healthy addition to the diet.

By the mid-19th century, Mormon immigrants had made their way across the Colorado River. Legend has it that these pioneers named the tree after the biblical figure, Joshua, seeing the limbs of the tree as outstretched in prayer. Ranchers and miners also arrived in the high desert with hopes of raising cattle and digging for gold. These homesteaders used the Joshua tree’s limbs and trunks for fencing and corrals. Miners used them as a source of fuel for the steam engines used in processing ore.

The Joshua tree’s life cycle begins with the rare germination of a seed, its survival is dependent upon well-timed rains. Spring rains may bring clusters of white-green flowers on long stalks at branch tips. In addition to ideal weather, the pollination of flowers requires a visit from the yucca moth. The moth collects pollen while laying her eggs inside the flower ovary. As seeds develop and mature, the eggs hatch into larvae, which feed on the seeds. The tree relies on the moth for pollination and the moth relies on the tree for a few seeds for her young. The Joshua tree is also capable of sprouting from roots and branches.

The increasing popularity of the Joshua Tree was hurling it towards extinction as whole groves were moved to gardens or harvested for the pliable wood that made great splints and Hollywood prop furniture. At nearly 50,000 square miles, the Mojave Desert may seem almost unchangeable as its ecosystem survives one of the harshest climates on earth. But Joshua trees are anything but permanent when man gets involved.

Following the deaths of her son and husband, Minerva Hamilton Hoyt dedicated herself to the cause of protecting desert landscapes. She was a large, stately, and cranky Mississippi woman, hardly a weatherbeaten outdoorsman. But she used her wealth and social standing to raise public awareness of these growing threats to the desert.

At the time, the conservation of wooded wilderness, rivers, and other natural resources was becoming more important to people, but the desert was still seen as either a wasteland to be avoided or a barrier to be crossed. When Roger W. Toll, Superintendent of Yellowstone National Park, inspected the area with Hoyt in 1934, he jokingly asked her when they would arrive at her “park.” Hoyt replied that Toll needed to learn to recognize natural beauty beyond that found in waterfalls, lakes, and forests.

Hoyt organized exhibitions of desert plants that were shown in Boston, New York, and London. She founded the International Deserts Conservation League with the goal of establishing parks to preserve desert landscapes. She was tapped by noted landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmstead, Jr. to serve on a California state commission formed to recommend proposals for new state parks. She prepared the commission’s report on desert parks and recommended large parks be created at Death Valley and in the Joshua tree forests, among other places.

Her work helped transform an entire generation’s attitude toward the desert. It was said that after hearing Hoyt speak “No one who heard her talk could ever again regard the subject of conservation of desert flora with indifference.”

The International Deserts Conservation League prodded Mexico to announced the creation of a 10,000-acre cactus forest. The President of Mexico dubbed Hoyt the “Apostle of the Cacti.” At that point it was clear to Minerva that a California state park wasn’t enough for her vision. She needed to inspire the nation with a national park.

She hired well-known biologists and desert ecologists to prepare reports on the virtues of the Joshua Tree region. The Governor of California sent a letter of introduction on her behalf to President Franklin Roosevelt, and she flew to Washington, D.C., to meet with him. She sat on the White House steps until the president would see her. Roosevelt’s New Deal administration became active in the establishment of national parks and monuments as a jobs-creation initiative.

Minerva Hamilton Hoyt’s work paid off when President Roosevelt asked the National Park Service to prepare a recommendation on the site. Problems with the inclusion of certain railroad lands forced a reduction in the size of the proposed park from over one million acres to a more modest 825,000 in the final proposal, but on August 10, 1936, President Roosevelt signed a presidential proclamation establishing Joshua Tree National Monument. Minerva had her grand desert park.

“I stood and looked. Everything was peaceful, and it rested me” reads the inscribed plaque at Inspiration Point on Quail Mountain, the highest peak in Joshua Tree National Park. More than 2.8 million people visit the park every year, and many summit that mountain and read the inscription, but the woman who spoke those words is not widely known. As a country, the United States has canonized the creation of our national parks as a masculine, Gilded Age venture to tame the wild frontier. But it is thanks to the overlooked work of Minerva Hamilton Hoyt that the United States preserved a desert bigger than the state of Rhode Island—a space that is increasingly at risk today.

Near Quail Mountain is the second tallest peak in Joshua Tree, now named Mount Minerva Hoyt.

In 1950, Joshua Tree lost one-third of its acreage due to mining interests. It took the work of more women to reclaim much of that land upgrade Joshua Tree to a National Park. Kathryn Lacey, legislative aide to Senator Alan Cranston, drafted the original Desert Protection Act in 1986, and Senator Dianne Feinstein steered it through Congress in 1994.

In fact, the rugged, masculine, outdoorsman image that Teddy Roosevelt championed has long been the lens through which we’ve seen the creation of many of our national parks. When in fact, women have led the charge for conservation and environmental protection for well over a century in the United States.

Two distinct desert ecosystems, the Mojave and the Colorado, come together in Joshua Tree National Park. A fascinating variety of plants and animals make their homes in a land sculpted by strong winds and occasional torrents of rain. Dark night skies, a rich cultural history, and surreal geologic features add to the wonder of this vast wilderness in southern California.

This spring, Joshua Tree National Park is piloting a free shuttle service, called the RoadRunner Shuttle bus. This service runs throughout the day throughout the northern section of the park. During the two year trial period, all entrance fees are waived for park entrance for shuttle riders.

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Music

Music for this week’s episode is provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

The Chestnut Blight

  • February 1, 2019February 1, 2019

At the turn of the 20th century, the eastern half of the American landscape looked very different than it does today. If you were to hop in a time machine to hike the Appalachian trail in the year 1900 – the wilderness you would find would be entirely different. A tree disease altered America, but a chance at rebirth is taking hold on the site of one of our nation’s greatest tragedies.

1 medium onion
1/4 cup margarine
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
2 quarts chicken broth
1 cup smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup unsalted peanuts, chopped
1 Tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 cup water chestnuts

Sauté the onion in margarine. Stir in the flour to make a roux. Once the roux is ready, add chicken broth and bring to a boil. Remove from heat and strain. Add peanut butter and Worcestershire sauce and stir. Hold over low heat until ready to serve. Garnish with chopped peanuts and water chestnuts.

That’s the Colonial Peanut and Chestnut Soup recipe from the historic Mount Vernon Inn, once part of George and Martha Washington’s estate. Except they wouldn’t have used water chestnuts. The Washington’s farm teemed with towering American chestnut trees. Thomas Jefferson also planted Chestnut trees on his Monticello estate, but he hardly needed to. American chestnut trees once blanketed the east coast.

Up to 100 feet tall and more than 9 feet in diameter, the American variety of chestnut trees were nearly as awe-inspiring as the redwoods of the west coast, and the tree’s natural range stretched from Ontario to Georgia, west through the mountains and highlands to Alabama, and north to the plains of Indiana and Illinois.

The leaves are long and narrow with parallel veins leading to large serrations on the edges. Its straight grain, strength, and rot resistance made the wood unsurpassed for splitting and building most of the early American barns, houses, telephone poles, fencing, and piers. It was lighter than oak, but just as strong. The tree was also the primary source of tannin used to cure leather. But it’s most unique feature was, of course, the edible nut.

Chestnuts were an important part of the diet of colonists, Native Americans, and wildlife alike. It was perfect for roasting over an open fire, or for stuffing a turkey.  Chestnuts were roasted, ground into flour for cakes and bread, and stewed into puddings. Native Americans used chestnut meal with corn to make breads, the leaves to alleviate heart troubles, and sprouts to treat sores. The nuts were taken by the wagonload for rail shipment to big city street corners where they were roasted on vendor carts. Farmers used mature chestnut lots to fatten pigs to bring the highest prices.

The nuts fed billions of birds and mammals. Chestnuts four inches deep on the forest floor were common as the tree’s flowers developed after the spring frost. Bears, deer, turkeys, and most other forest animals, including the now extinct passenger pigeons relied on the annual crop. When a chestnut tree died, it rotted from the inside out, creating the perfect den for the then plentiful bear population.

And just as important as their uses was the striking beauty of a grand, mature Chestnut tree.

An estimated 4 billion huge, ancient trees created dense canopies across the east. Grand trees shaded town squares, and city parks. It was said that a squirrel could travel from Main to Georgia by hopping from Chestnut tree to Chestnut tree, and never touch the ground. In fact, over 25% of all eastern American trees were chestnuts.

They were, quite simply, the most important plant in the United States.

And over the course of 50 years – they vanished.

The Bronx zoo was home to an impressive collection of American Chestnuts, and in 1904, this is where a problem was first discovered. The mature trees that lined the zoo’s avenues began to wilt, large cankers appeared, rupturing the bark, and then the tree’s trunk and upper limbs would die.

Trees in the New York Botanical Garden began to exhibit the same symptoms, and before anyone could figure out why, the mysterious malady infected chestnuts across New England. By 1906, it was reported to be in New Jersey, Virginia and Maryland. Spreading 50 miles a year, the blight worked its way across the east, killing virtually every chestnut tree in its path.

By the time it reached Pennsylvania, quarantine lines were carved. Chemical control options were explored in vain. The blight swept through Pennsylvania, hopping quarantine lines, and by 1950, even the remote forests in southern Illinois were decimated.

A decimated Georgia forest of chestnut trees

While some people were trying to stop the blight, others were making it worse. Lumber men scrambled to cut down the remaining trees for their wood before they were infected and began to rot. Farmers were implored to chop down trees with any signs of blight. “Woodman, burn that tree; spare not a single bough,” cried a Pennsylvania newspaper. In an attempt to stop the spread, people may have killed off trees that were immune to the mysterious disease. Trees that could have recovered the species.

The American Chestnut tree was virtually extinct just 50 years after it was so incredibly important to wildlife, the economy, and diets. Millions of acres of land that had once been shaded by the lofty boughs now stood shadowed only by leafless, dead remnants.

Howard Miller, interviewed in 1996 as part of an oral history of West Virginia for the American Folklife Center.

The problem, it was found, was a fungus imported from Asia that attached to animal fur and bird feathers. It may have even originated with trees imported from China to the Bronx Zoo. No quarantine was going to stop birds from perching in trees across the country.

The fungus does not kill the roots of the tree, but it doesn’t allow them to attain an appreciable height before reinfecting the trunks and killing them back to the ground. So the tree still existed, but could grow to little more than a shrub that could not to bear fruit, so the species could not reproduce. The only mature chestnut trees remaining were in scattered isolated groves planted in the far west by early settlers, well beyond the range of the blight, and a few groves in the east kept alive by applying a virus that killed the fungus.

Ever since the American Chestnuts all-but disappeared, there have been efforts to find a cure for the fungus and to bring them back. One method involves breeding American chestnuts with Chinese chestnut trees, which are resistant to the fungus, and then back-breeding the hybrids with pure American trees. Some scientists have began sequencing the DNA of the American chestnut and the fungus that causes the blight.

On Tuesday morning, September 11, 2001, the United States was attacked, as four commercial airliners were hijacked in an attempt to strike targets on the ground. Nearly 3,000 people tragically lost their lives. One of those planes missed its planned target, the U.S. Capitol building, because of the actions of the 40 passengers and crew who bravely thwarted the hijackers plans, after getting word of the fate of the other planes.

The plane crashed into a field in southern pennsylvania, scarring a strip-mined land tract instead of a populated building. On the 10-year anniversary of the crash, an effigy was dedicated to those brave people who lost their lives –  Flight 93 National Memorial.

For several years following the memorial’s dedication, students, scientists, local community members, and family members of those who died braved the cold on those hallowed grounds, with buckets and mud and work gloves, to dig holes and plant trees — American Chestnut trees.

The volunteers worked with the American Chestnut Foundation – an organization dedicated to the return of the tree – to help re-create natural woodlands on the grounds where Flight 93 crashed. The seedlings, it’s hoped, will be the first in more than a century to withstand an invasive chestnut blight fungus. They are the latest batch using the “backcross” technique to hybridize American chestnuts with the blight-resistant Asian species, producing seedlings that are almost identical to the American variety — about 94 percent American chestnut, after generations of backcrossing and intercrossing with other hybrid offspring.  

The Foundation became involved with the Flight 93 project when they heard that the park was looking for trees that grow in thin soil. It seemed an ideal fit.

It’s an experiment. One that has a large chance of failing. And there’s no way to know if the trees will survive until they reach maturity. Meanwhile, scientests continue to breed more generations of American chestnuts in the hopes of sprouting a truly fungus-resistant strain. Each year more trees are planted at the Flight 93 Memorial. With a goal of 150,000 of various types by next year. Volunteers talk about bringing their grandchildren back some day to see the splendid forest they planted in the memory of American heroes.

The Flight 93 National Memorial visitor complex opened on September 10, 2015. It takes about 45 minutes to explore the exhibit space, Flight Path Overlook, and the bookstore. You can then drive about a mile to the Memorial Plaza, or take a walking trail.

The Memorial Plaza marks the edge of the crash site, which is the final resting place of the passengers and crew. It consists of various elements including the Wall of Names and is a self-guided experience. Interpretive panels provide an overview of the story and a cell phone/mobile tour provides for more in-depth exploration.

A massive 93-foot tall wind-chime type sculpture entitled the Tower of Voices is nearly complete, making sure those that perish will always be heard.

Parking is limited, and during peak visitation the lot may fill. Early morning is the best time to visit, and the Visitor Center is open 9:00 am-5:00 pm, weather permitting.

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Music

Music for this week’s episode is provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

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Podcast Episodes

Rangers Make the Difference II

  • January 18, 2019January 18, 2019

As we release this episode, the longest government shutdown in American history is still underway, and 800,000 government workers are on furlough, including rangers and other protectors of our wildlife and national treasures. Those that remain on the job, mainly law enforcement rangers, are working without paychecks, and are facing protecting federal lands that remain open to visitors with very little support.

We thought this was an appropriate time to again highlight those rangers and other federal employees in the interior department.

Listen

Listen in the player below, or on any podcast app. 

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Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode.

Give to the National Parks Foundation’s Restoration Fund or sign up for info about volunteer clean-up efforts at nationalparks.org.

Transcript

JASON
As we release this episode, the longest government shutdown in American history is still underway, and 800,000 government workers are on furlough, including rangers and other protectors of our wildlife and national treasures. Those that remain on the job, mainly law enforcement rangers, are working without paychecks, and are facing protecting federal lands that remain open to visitors with very little support.

We thought this was an appropriate time to again highlight those rangers and other federal employees in the interior department.

We begin with a cowhand turned wildlife champion. Here’s Abigail Trabue.

ABIGAIL
For many years, Mark Haroldson lived as an old-western cowboy, riding a horse across the rugged landscape of Wyoming and Montana. But instead of wrangling cattle, he tracked and captured grizzly bears.

What started as a work-study job when he was 20 years old developed into a lifelong career of studying grizzlies. “It’s been a dream of mine as far back as I can remember,” he said.

Since he first started working with grizzly bears in 1976, Mark has served as a field biologist for the US Geological Survey, responsible for the handling and capture of bears throughout Yellowstone National Park. He currently spearheads the Interagency Grizzly Bear Team, a group of scientists responsible for long-term monitoring of the species.

Each time Mark captures a bear, he tries to obtain all the scientific information possible to “do right by the bear.” He first drugs the animal, takes fur samples for DNA and isotopic analysis, and marks it with a GPS collar — all of which help to determine survival estimates and population projections.

He then opens the bear’s maw and reaches between its massive teeth to pull out a small premolar in the back, which typically falls out naturally over time. By analyzing this single tooth, scientists can determine the bear’s age.

The sight of a bear’s open jaws would terrify most, but Mark works with calm and steady hands. “I’m anxious until I know the bear is ok and up and out of there,” he said.

Only then does he feel a sense of accomplishment.

Mark’s work was integral in reviving the grizzly bear population and bringing them off the endangered species list, which he views as a team accomplishment. While the grizzly’s recovery has had a tremendous impact, he continues to work towards long-term conservation of the Yellowstone ecosystem.

Given the chance, he wouldn’t trade anything for the field time he had in the Yellowstone backcountry. “It was the sense of being in the wilderness on horseback,” said Mark. “My boss would point to an area on the map and say go find some bears.”

Like a cowboy rambling across the Wild West, Mark continues to explore America’s great wilderness, still chasing the wild and magnificent North American grizzly bear.

JASON
Mark Haroldson was honored with the Interior Department’s Distinguished Service Award for his impactful work and lifelong dedication to grizzly bear research.

Next, we look back at the devastating 2016 fires in the Smoky Mountains, and the rangers that didn’t hesitate to save thousands of lives.

ABIGAIL
As smoke and soot filled the air on November 28, 2016, winds ranging up to 90 miles an hour hurled branches and burning embers on park staff at Great Smoky Mountains National Park. They were exposed to snapping trees and falling live power lines while responding to a historic wildfire. Despite these dangers, the rangers forged ahead.

“No one asked that night what needed to be done. They just did it,” said District Park Ranger Jared St. Claire. Over the course of four hours, they evacuated over 14,000 Gatlinburg residents through the park, one of only two escape routes for the neighboring town.

Rangers and staff had to avoid falling trees while pushing broken-down cars and burning trees from the evacuation route. To clear the roads, they used chainsaws and snow plows to remove boulders, trees and other debris. If they had it, they used it to get the job done.

Some were rendered temporarily senseless, blinded by smoke and deafened by explosive noises. One ranger was injured after a falling tree limb hit him on the head. Yet, that didn’t stop him from completing the mission. After he received aid from another ranger, he picked up where he left off and continued clearing the roadway of debris.

“It affected everyone’s home and family, but nobody asked to go. Everyone stayed and pulled together to get it done,” said St. Claire.

Despite the significant risk, they saved countless lives during what would go down as one of the largest natural disasters in Tennessee’s history.

JASON
For their courage and heroism, the team was awarded the Valor Award, one of the highest honors in the Department of the Interior.

Interior Department employees can protect lands and people outside of the United States, too. One incident that could have been a mass tragedy was avoided thanks to the work of U.S. Geological Survey scientists.

ABIGAIL
On June 10, 1991, Mount Pinatubo, a volcano that had been dormant for nearly six centuries, erupted in the Zambales Mountains of the Philippines. While halfway around the world from the U.S., this eruption took place 10 miles west of Clark Air Base — one of our country’s largest overseas air bases. The eruption turned the morning sky into a firmament of thick ash and steam, threatening the safety of nearly 15,000 men, women and children.

U.S. Geological Survey scientist John Ewert played a critical role in saving these lives. He was one of the scientists on a team who forewarned of this cataclysmic event, allowing for the evacuation of everyone stationed at Clark Air Base and the locals in the surrounding area. The predictions made by the USGS team also saved $250 million in property damages.

Since that day, John has devoted himself to improving volcanic activity warning systems and minimizing destruction from volcanoes. “It’s not a matter of if, but a matter of when,” said John. “We need to be ready to respond.”

He is a founding member of the Volcano Disaster Assistance Program, which designed a successful approach to reduce the loss of life and property during eruptions. He also established an accurate methodology for ranking volcanoes based on their societal threat. And — while serving as the Scientist-in-Charge at the USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory — John created a bi-national exchange for state and local officials to meet with their foreign counterparts in South America.

“The binational exchange is about having them meet with people and talk about their experiences,” he said “Firefighters meet firefighters. Teachers meet teachers. It’s about meeting people who lived through the firsthand experience.”

JASON
John’s lifelong dedication to the research of volcanic activity and protection of human life has earned him international recognition and Interior’s Distinguished Service Award.

One of the biggest concerns of the government shutdown is the inability of rangers to take proactive measures to prevent the loss of life, such as closing trails, issuing warnings, and evacuating areas facing severe weather. One such event a few years ago involved an entire Boy Scout troop completely unaware of the possibility of a coming tornado.

ABIGAIL
On May 16th, 2015, a tornado blew through the Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge, where Boy Scout Troop 955 from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, were camping. Federal Wildlife Officer Matt Belew anticipated the storm and evacuated all 65 Scouts and their leaders to the refuge headquarters basement about 30 minutes before the tornado hit.

The tornado traveled 10 to 12 miles across refuge land, causing major damage to the Fawn Creek Youth Campground and destroying nearly all the tents.

“One of those blue tents that was totally smashed by a large tree was the one my son was in,” one of the fathers told rangers. “We had no idea a severe storm was approaching when your officer came and had us evacuate for shelter at the headquarters basement. I fear my son and others would have died had we not left. So, thank you.”

Refuge manager Tony Booth said Belew “got in there when the tornado was forming. He took prompt action to go in there and evacuate them.”

“It looks like many boys and their parents are in your debt this morning,” wrote U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe to Belew. “As a parent myself I know I would be calling you a hero. Thanks so much for your foresight and action.”

The tornado touched down about a quarter mile from the campground. One refuge residence and a camper trailer were damaged but there were no injuries.

Belew was honored with the interior department’s Valor Award for his incredible courage and bravery. And it’s not the first time his emergency response capabilities have been highlighted. In 2013, he volunteered as an emergency medical responder following massive destruction from a huge EF-5 tornado in Moore, Oklahoma. In a night and day of almost nonstop work with his team, Belew searched almost 50 houses for survivors.

JASON

As the shutdown marches on, public lands face damage from the lack of services that employees of the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior provide.

Once the government reopens and rangers assess the full extent of damages, both financial resources and volunteers will be needed to help restore these great places. But, you can do something today to help your national parks recover.

The first is to give to the newly created Parks Restoration Fund with the National Park Foundation. The foundation will work with the National Park Service to assess needs and provide clean up efforts once the parks are back open.

The second way you can help is to sign up for information about volunteer efforts at nationalparks.org. We’ll provide a link in the show notes.

This episode of America’s National Parks was hosted by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

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Podcast Episodes

An Impossible Climb

  • December 14, 2018December 14, 2018

In July of 1982, 5 men set out to conquer the highest peak in Texas, Guadalupe Peak at Guadalupe Mountains National Park. Every day, many people take the 8.5-mile trip that summits the 8,749′ peak, but this party was different—they were all in wheelchairs. For the next 5 days, they climbed their way to the top, building ramps from rocks and crawling up slopes, dragging their wheelchairs behind them. 

Listen

Listen in the player below, or on any podcast app. 

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode.

Three paraplegic climbers whooped and hollered and doused themselves…: Newspaper Article

Guadalupe Mountains Administrative History – NPS Publication

Transcript

Guadalupe Mountains National Park in far West Texas is a wild, withdrawn place. Set near the middle of nowhere, 100 miles from El Paso, it’s often forgotten.

There are no roads leading into the park, no gas stations, motels, or walmarts nearby…nothing. Visitation to the park broke the 200,000 mark for the first time last year, placing it consistently on the list of the 10 least visited parks. That’s all fine with me, as it’s one of my favorite places to escape from the toils of day-to-day life. There are no tour buses, traffic jams, packed trails. It’s a place for solitude and reflection.

Wallace Pratt, an Oil geologist, donated over 5000 acres of his McKittrick Canyon ranch to the U.S. government with the stipulation that the canyon remain as wild as possible. The park opened in 1972, and has endured nearly undeveloped since. McKittrick Canyon is open to visitors only during the day. A small campground has no services. There’s not even a shower in the park, for dozens of miles any direction.

But the last thing that it is is a barren wasteland. The park is comprised of the front wedge of an uplifted range created by an underwater limestone reef 250 million years ago. Six peaks over 8000 feet rise from the desert floor, including the flat-faced crown of El Capitan, not nearly as famous as it’s same-named sister at Yosemite, but an important signpost for centuries of travelers.

The park is home to stunning canyons, hiding away microclimates that birth woodlands where they have no right to be. Even deciduous trees defy the desert here, displaying their bright warm colors every fall. Wind gusts can exceed 120 miles per hour, and the temperature can make drastic swings at the drop of a hat.

And the park is home to Texas’ tallest mountain, the namesake Guadalupe Peak. At 8,749 feet above sea level it doesn’t stack up well to mountains further north and west, but it is higher than anything east of it, and it rises a mile above the surrounding terrain.

The hike up Guadalupe Peak is a strenuous 8 ½ mile round trip with a 3,000
foot elevation gain. It takes most people 6 to 8 hours to complete the round trip hike. The steepest part of the hike is the first mile and a half, as the trail switchbacks up. Then, it passes a cliff and turns around to the
north-facing slope. Here, hikers will pass through a small forest of pinion pine, white pine, and douglas fir. The shade of the mountain protects the vegetation from the harsh sunlight, allowing the pines to survive.

After nearly three miles the trail tops out at a false summit, one mile short of the actual one. It flattens out for a short distance as it passes through a sparse forest of ponderosa pine, which hosts a back backcountry campsite.
From here, the trail descends slightly and crosses a wooden bridge before beginning a final ascent to the summit. The angle of the slope is now very steep. 35 to 45 degrees.

The top of El Capitan rises in the view to the south as you near the summit, which is marked with a small monument commemorating overland stage and air travel. On a clear day you will be rewarded with a majestic panorama of the encircling mountains and desert.

One year, Guadalupe Peak was host to a special climb, one that took 5 days instead of the standard 6-8 hours.

Here’s Abigail Trabue.

In July of 1982, six men set out to reach the summit of Guadalupe Peak at Guadalupe Mountains National park. The trail is a challenge for most hikers, but for this group, it would be a monumental climb. The hikers were all members of a Dallas-based organization known as POINT — Paraplegics on Independent Nature Trails, and they would climb the tallest peak in Texas in wheelchairs. Jack Grimm concocted the idea only a week before it happened, as a part of a fund drive for the West Texas Rehabilitation Center in Abilene.

The hikers would use specially constructed, lightweight wheelchairs outfitted with inflatable tires with deep tread, and no brakes. Park rangers were notified, and expressed deep concern. On a windy day, it’s a challenge for anyone to fight the gusts up the trail, and along with an advance scout for the group who examined the route, they laid out a host of reasons that it shouldn’t be done. For one, the journey would take 5 days, and carrying enough water for that length of a trip was impractical. There are no suitable places along the trail for overnight camping until near the summit. And it was July, when severe electrical storms regularly occur in the high country. Finally, the 15- to 30-percent grades seemed impossible for a wheelchair, and park personnel recommended a less challenging route to a different destination. But that wouldn’t have been the highest peak in Texas. The men refused.

Illness reduced the originally planned group of six men to five: Michael Powers, Robert Leyes, Donny Rodgers, Joe Moss, and Dave Kiley. They set out along the rocky path from the Visitor Center on a Monday morning. They weren’t new to hiking by any means, in fact they were very good at it. Part of the reason for the 5-day time period was that the hikers would have to constantly arrange rocks into rudimentary ramps to pass obstructions.

On the first day, Mike Powers began to experience muscle spasms, and was forced to abandon the climb. By the third day Robert Leyes had to turn back due to physical difficulties. The remaining three systematically proceeded up the mountain. The two “grounded” climbers stayed in radio contact with their comrades, offering moral support until the last day of the climb, when the trail took the climbers behind a ridge that blocked radio reception.

The news media began to report about the group’s impossible journey. Park personnel checked in with the climbers regularly to obtain information for progress reports to relay to reporters. Park Ranger Jon Jarvis joined the group for the last two days of the journey, accompanying them for the final mile. The men had hoped to end their climb shortly after midday on Friday, but were hindered by intense temperatures nearing 100 degrees. The last few hundred yards were a near-impossible stretch of steep grades and loose boulders. The men had to exit their wheelchairs and push or drag them as they crawled to the summit.

It had been feared that a sore hip might keep Dave Kiley from making the final ascent. But he persevered, and the three men reached the top at 7:21 p.m. the evening of July 16. Officials watching through a telescope said the climbers waited and then touched the monument that marks the summit together in front of a magnificent sunset. They doused themselves with champagne, and, now in range again, Keiley called down on the radio: “If you’ve ever done anything unimaginable, this is twice that.”

The men spent the night of July 16 on the peak and were lifted off the following morning by three U.S. Army helicopters from Fort Bliss. For safety reasons, the climbers did not try to make the descent in their wheelchairs. Later that day they were honored guests at a press conference and public reception at the Civic Center in Carlsbad, where they recieved a congratulatory phone call from the governors of New Mexico and Texas, as well as President Ronald Reagan.

‘It took me five days to get to the top of the mountain,’ Rodgers said. ‘Now I can do anything I want for the rest of my life.’ Moss, a double amputee, said, ‘It’s been 13 years since I’ve worked with a team like this, and if everybody would work together like this, the world would be a better place.’

Guadalupe National Park receives only a third of the visitors that Carlsbad Caverns receives, only 40 miles away in New Mexico. It’s easier to get to from New Mexico than from Texas. As I mentioned before, there are no services near the park, nor roads leading in – and not a bar of cell service to be found. This is a hiker’s park, but there’s still plenty to see if you can only walk short nature trails. There’s a primitive campground that can accommodate small tents in secluded sites amongst thick thornbushes. The $8 a night RV campground is little more than a parking lot. And the trail into the stunning McKitrich Canyon is only open until 5pm daily. Hikers heading to summits should be prepared for heavy winds – hiking poles are a must.

This episode of America’s National Parks was hosted by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #BeanOutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

77 Years Ago

  • December 7, 2018December 7, 2018

The day this episode is released, December 7th, 2018, marks the 77th anniversary of the event that would send the United States into World War II, the devastating surprise attack on Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor.

The U.S.S. Arizona, a Pennsylvania class battleship had been moved from California to Pearl Harbor in an effort to ward off the Japanese from attacking the vulnerable island territory. On December 7th, 1941, the Arizona exploded violently and sank, with the loss of 1,177 officers and crewmen.

Each year, thousands gather at a commemoration ceremony, including survivors of the attack and their families. 2,403 service members and civilians in total were killed during the attack, and 1,178 people were injured. As the years roll on, the ceremony is weighed by the fewer and fewer survivors who are able to attend. This year, only five men who were onboard the Arizona are still living, and none will be able to attend, due to age, health, and the stresses of travel.

It’s twilight for the survivors of the Pearl Harbor attack, and today on America’s National Parks, we honor their memory, along with the World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode.

Transcript

The day this episode is released, December 7th, 2018, marks the 77th anniversary of the event that would send the United States into World War II, the devastating surprise attack on Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor.

The U.S.S. Arizona, a Pennsylvania class battleship had been moved from California to Pearl Harbor in an effort to ward off the Japanese from attacking the vulnerable island territory. On December 7th, 1941, the Arizona exploded violently and sank, with the loss of 1,177 officers and crewmen.

Each year, thousands gather at a commemoration ceremony, including survivors of the attack and their families. 2,403 service members and civilians in total were killed during the attack, and a further 1,178 people were injured. As the years roll on, the ceremony is weighed by the fewer and fewer survivors who are able to attend. This year, only five men who were onboard the Arizona are still living, and none will be able to attend, due to age, health, and the stresses of travel.

It’s twilight for the survivors of the Pearl Harbor attack, and today on America’s National Parks, we honor their memory, along with the World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument.

In his own words, Pearl Harbor Survivor, World War II flight engineer, and Army Air Corps line chief Everest Capra described the attack.

Here’s Abigail Trabue.

—–

It was of no surprise when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec 7, 1941. Most of us had been expecting this, but did not have the actual date.

Like every Sunday morning, I would get up early to play tennis. At 7:00, I finished playing and decided to wash up and have breakfast. Donart and I arrived at the mess hall, Hickam Field, at about 7:31 and were refused entry because we were one minute late. Donart, known for his silence and courtesy, told the warrant officer in charge, I hope this place blows up.

Donart would never say things like that. But at about five minutes to eight that morning, the officer got the surprise of his life. I am still wondering if he thought about what Donart had said.

At that moment, I went over to Lt. Shea’s bachelor quarters and started to make myself breakfast. Throwing out the eggshell, I noted three odd aircraft flying about. Then I noticed the red ball, and I knew right that minute that it was the day. Only wearing tennis shorts and sneakers, I ran about the buildings screaming, “They are here!” and then all hell started to break loose.

I made it back to the barracks just in time, to get some better wear… and just as I exited the barracks, they were hit.

From that moment on, running about trying to escape from being hit, I and two others started picking bodies to take to the hospital which just opened the day before. I was later hit, and knocked out for a while … I was bleeding from a hanging finger and also leg wounds. But did not turn myself in. I managed to put my index finger back together with masking tape and it healed after six weeks. The other wounds, I also took care of myself. Fearing that if I did turn myself in, I would be placed in a bed or whatever, and probably get hit again, because the Japanese did not honor the new hospital. Nevertheless, I did the best I could in trying to save those more unfortunate.
____

Six months later, Everest Capra would fight in the Battle of Midway. He died in 2005.

On December 7, 1941, Gino Gasparelli’s duty station was at Wheeler Field on the Island of Oahu. Wheeler Field was the largest fighter air base on the island, and it had been on an alert status all week long until Saturday morning, December 6.
_____

The alert was called off after morning inspection, but all of the 48 or so fighter planes were left lined up wing tip to wing tip on the ramp in front of the four large plane hangars. All personnel not on weekend duty could go on weekend pass.

I did not leave the field that Saturday because a sergeant friend and I had planned to take a trip around the island on Sunday, 7 December 1941, after breakfast.

After returning to my barrack from the mess hall, which was about twenty minutes to eight, I was talking to Seargent Price and we heard planes that did not sound anything like our own P40 or P36 fighter planes. They also sounded like they were flying very low. This must have been just about five minutes to eight o’clock a.m.

I ran out the back door, looked up, and saw a large black painted plane coming towards my barracks. The plane was flying no higher than treetop level, and I could see the machine gunner in the rear seat. The plane was just about over the barrack when he released a bomb. For a moment I was stunned when I saw this, and realized we were under an attack.

I ran back into the barrack screaming that we were under an attack, and ordered the men in my squad to get out, dressed or not dressed. Some were still in bed, and some still had hangovers from being on pass the night before. That first bomb had just hit one of the hangers.

After telling the men to get out fast, I also ran out the back door and saw Seargent Thomas, our platoon sergeant, ordering the men to head for a row of high shrubs and small trees about seventy yards from our barrack. We had no arms whatsoever, so we just took cover under the high shrubs and small trees. I am positive we were spotted by some of those Japanese pilots because after a few minutes, small twigs and branches began to fall down due to the machine gun fire from those planes. When things began to quiet down, some men were ordered to go to the supply room and break out boxes containing 20 caliber rifles. I was ordered to take my squad and try to get and bring back cement bags which were down on the flight line near one of the hangers.

Out of a few hundred men stationed at Wheeler Field that morning, casualties amounted to eighty dead and wounded.

____

Like Everest Carpra, Gino Gasparelli also died in 2005.

On the morning of December 7, 1941, Sterling Cale had just finished up a long night of work. He was a pharmacist’s mate in the Navy, a self-proclaimed “farm boy from Illinois.” He worked at the dispensary, where Sailors got their medicine. Just after signing out, he noticed planes flying over Battleship Row.

____

“Why are planes over at Battleship Row? That’s a lot of activity for Sunday,” Sterling Cale said to himself after ending his work shift.

He noticed the red circles on the planes. They were Japanese, and this was a real attack. He ran back inside to break out some guns. Outside, he saw and heard planes dropping bombs just over the water. He and his friends knew the men at Battleship Row needed their help. They headed toward the USS Oklahoma. Before they got there, it rolled over.

Sailors filled the waters of Pearl Harbor, swimming for their lives in T-shirts and shorts. The top of the water was burning. The oil leaking from the ships was on fire. Sterling and his friends had to swim underwater as much as possible to avoid getting burned. It was their job to help rescue people from the water. He was right there in the water when the USS Arizona blew up. No one who heard that deafening sound would ever forget it. After the initial explosion, it burned for two-and-a-half days.

“In four hours, I picked up about 45 people. Some were dead, some were badly burned, some were just tired. We would get them in a boat going by.” He still tears up when remembering what it was like.

When he first returned to his duty station, he was scolded for breaking into the armory during “peacetime.” War wasn’t declared until the next day. But instead of getting in trouble, he was rewarded with a carton of cigarettes.

After the attack, it was Sterling’s job, along with a detail of 10 men, to remove bodies from the burning Arizona. They did their best, but it was difficult work. Besides being emotionally draining, it was physically challenging. There weren’t many identifiable bodies to recover.

For three weeks, the detail kept track of the condition and location of the remains they found. The fire was so intense that it even melted ID tags and guns. Overall, Sterling’s work team removed about 107 identifiable bodies and a number of unknowns. Their families would never know exactly what happened.

He can still picture the scene like it was yesterday. It was a trying time in his life and career, but it did not discourage him from serving the United States with pride.

Sterling later continued to fight with the navy in the war, before switching to the Army. He served as the head of the pharmacy at Tripler Hospital and a medical company at Schofield Barracks. He then served over a year on the front lines in Korea in 1950. Eventually, after more service on Oahu, the mainland, and in Vietnam, Sterling retired from the Army as a sergeant major.

____

Sterling Cale wrote a book about his life, called A TRUE AMERICAN. He is now 97 years old, and continues to volunteer at the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center.

Our final story comes from a hero who defied orders to save lives.

—–

Petty Officer First Class Joseph Leon George was 26 years old on December 7, 1941. At the time of the attack, he was a crew member aboard the USS Vestal, a repair ship moored right next to the USS Arizona.

Following the massive explosion on the USS Arizona, six sailors were trapped in the control tower on the Arizona’s main mast, kept there by the fires raging below. Already badly burned, they searched for a way to escape the ship.

Joe George spotted them from the USS Vestal and threw them a line, in spite of being ordered to cut the line between the Vestal and the sinking Arizona. Climbing hand over hand across the rope, all six sailors made it across alive. One would die a few weeks later from his injuries, but the rest survived.

George passed away in 1996, never officially recognized for his heroic actions. But in 2017, the United States Navy finally authorized the award of a combat medal to Joe George.

On Dec. 7, 2017, Rear Admiral Matthew Carter, deputy commander of the US Pacific Fleet, presented the Bronze Star to George’s daughter, Joe Ann Taylor, aboard the USS Arizona Memorial. Lauren Bruner and Don Stratton, two of the men George saved from the USS Arizona, had petitioned for this honorable award for many years and attended the ceremony.

“I am an onboard survivor of the attack on the USS Arizona on Dec. 7, 1941.” said Stratton. “Six men were trapped on the foremast; on the sky control platform one deck above the bridge, where the Admiral and the Captain were killed. We had no way off and were burning alive, when we saw a sailor on the USS Vestal. We waved at him and got his attention, and he threw us a line and we tied it off to a bigger line and proceeded to go hand over hand to the Vestal after we suffered burns. The Japanese were firing at us as the oil in the water under us was burning.

We all made it across the line because of the bravery of the seaman, Joe George. Two men died of their burns that day at the hospital and the four other men, Bruner, Lott, Rhiner, and myself lived. I was in the hospital for a year, but because of Joe George went on to have a family. There are two of us alive today. We attended the 70th USS Arizona reunion in Hawaii.

Joe George was never awarded anything for his bravery and going against a direct order from his Captain, who wanted to pull away from the Arizona and leave us all to die.”

_____

The wreck still lies at the bottom of Pearl Harbor, 40 feet below the water’s surface. The USS Arizona Memorial was dedicated on 30 May 1962 to all those who died during the attack. It straddles but does not touch the ship’s hull. Over 900 bodies remain entombed in the Arizona. Many survivors of the attack have their ashes placed within the ship upon their death, joining their fallen comrades.

The memorial is located on the southern end of the island of Oahu, Hawai’i, and can only be accessed by boat from the Pearl Harbor Visitor Center. The visitor center is not located on a military base and is accessible to the public. The USS Arizona Memorial program is 75 minutes long and starts in the theater with a 23-minute documentary. This is followed by a boat ride to the memorial, time at the memorial, and a boat ride back. Visiting is free, but requires a timed-entry ticket. You can reserve tickets in advance at recreation.gov.

The memorial is closed for repairs until March of 2019. Until then, visitors can take a 30-minute narrated harbor tour of Battleship Row and the area around the USS Arizona Memorial.

This episode of America’s National Parks was hosted by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

The Solitude of Self

  • December 2, 2018December 4, 2018

On July 11, 1848, a local newspaper ran an advertisement announcing a meeting that would happen a week later at the Wesleyan Chapel in Seneca Falls, New York — the first American Women’s Rights Convention. Today on America’s National Parks – The Women’s Rights National Historical Park in Seneca Falls, New York.

Despite the minimal publicity, an estimated 300 attendees filled co-organizer Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s event. Stanton made her first public speech on the initial day of the convention, and read aloud the Declaration of Sentiments, which was then discussed at length. Stanton quickly became a leader in the crusade for women’s rights, as well as for the abolition of slavery.

She gave hundreds of speeches over the course of her life, but it was her final speech, before Congress, entitled The Solitude of Self, that left her with the most pride. Delivered in 1892, the speech declared that as no other person could face death for another, none could decide for them how to educate themselves.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode.

Women’s Rights National Historical Park — National Park Service Website

The Declaration of Sentiments — Wikipedia

The Solitude of Self — The full text of Stanton’s speech to the Judiciary Committee from the Library of Congress

Transcript

On July 11, 1848, a local newspaper ran an advertisement announcing a meeting that would happen a week later at the Wesleyan Chapel in Seneca Falls, New York. A meeting that would forever change the course of American History — the first American women’s rights convention. Today on America’s National Parks – The Women’s Rights National Historical Park in Seneca Falls, New York.

Despite the minimal publicity, an estimated 300 attendees filled co-organizer Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s event. Stanton made her first public speech on the initial day of the convention, and read aloud the Declaration of Sentiments, which was then discussed at length. The Declaration of Sentiments was modeled after the Declaration of Independence, but with the goal of granting women the rights and freedoms that Thomas Jefferson’s words granted to men.

On the second day, the resolutions would again be debated over and put to a vote. While only women were allowed to attend the first day of the Seneca Falls Convention, the general public, including men, were invited to participate in the second day.

Stanton quickly became a leader in the crusade for women’s rights, as well as for the abolition of slavery.

Stanton met Susan B. Anthony, wrote articles on divorce, property rights, and temperence. By 1852, she and Anthony were refining techniques for her to write speeches and Anthony to deliver them. Eventually, Stanton herself began making eloquent and passionate public speeches.

Nothing seemed to stop her. In the 1870s she traveled across the United States giving speeches. In “Our Girls” her most frequent speech, she urged girls to get an education that would develop them as persons and provide an income if needed. In 1876 she helped organize a protest at the nation’s 100th birthday celebration in Philadelphia. In the 1880s, she, Susan B. Anthony and Matilda Joslyn Gage produced three volumes of the History of Woman Suffrage. In 1890, she agreed to serve as president of the combined National American Woman Suffrage Society. In 1895, she published The Woman’s Bible, earning the censure of members of the that same body. Her autobiography, Eighty Years and More, appeared in 1898.

But it was Stanton’s final speech, before Congress, entitled The Solitude of Self, that left her with the most pride. Delivered in 1892, the speech declared that as no other person could face death for another, none could decide for them how to educate themselves.

The following is our dramatization of the speech. It was fairly long, so we’ve edited it slightly for time.

—–

Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee: We have been speaking before Committees of the Judiciary for the last twenty years, and we have gone over all the arguments in favor of a sixteenth amendment which are familiar to all you gentlemen; therefore, it will not be necessary that I should repeat them again.

The point I wish plainly to bring before you on this occasion is the individuality of each human soul; our individual citizenship. In discussing the rights of woman, we are to consider, first, what belongs to her as an individual, in a world of her own, the arbiter of her own destiny, an imaginary Robinson Crusoe with her woman Friday on a solitary island. Her rights under such circumstances are to use all her faculties for her own safety and happiness.

Secondly, if we consider her as a citizen, as a member of a great nation, she must have the same rights as all other members, according to the fundamental principles of our Government.

Thirdly, viewed as a woman, an equal factor in civilization, her rights and duties are still the same–individual happiness and development.

Fourthly, it is only the incidental relations of life, such as mother, wife, sister, daughter, that may involve some special duties and training. In the usual discussion in regard to woman’s sphere, such men as Herbert Spencer, Frederic Harrison, and Grant Allen uniformly subordinate her rights and duties as an individual, as a citizen, as a woman, to the necessities of these incidental relations, some of which a large class of woman may never assume. In discussing the sphere of man we do not decide his rights as an individual, as a citizen, as a man by his duties as a father, a husband, a brother, or a son, relations some of which he may never fill. Moreover he would be better fitted for these very relations and whatever special work he might choose to do to earn his bread by the complete development of all his faculties as an individual.

Just so with woman.

The strongest reason for giving woman all the opportunities for higher education, for the full development of her faculties, forces of mind and body; for giving her the most enlarged freedom of thought and action; a complete emancipation from all forms of bondage, of custom, dependence, superstition; from all the crippling influences of fear, is the solitude and personal responsibility of her own individual life. The strongest reason why we ask for a woman’s voice in the government under which she lives; in the religion she is asked to believe; equality in social life, where she is the chief factor; a place in the trades and professions, where she may earn her bread, is because of her birthright to self-sovereignty; because, as an individual, she must rely on herself.

We ask for the complete development of every individual, first, for his own benefit and happiness. In fitting out an army we give each soldier his own knapsack, arms, powder, his blanket, cup, knife, fork and spoon. We provide alike for all their individual necessities, then each man bears his own burden.

The great lesson that nature seems to teach us at all ages is self-dependence, self-protection, self-support. What a touching instance of a child’s solitude; of that hunger of heart for love and recognition, in the case of the little girl who helped to dress a christmas tree for the children of the family in which she served. On finding there was no present for herself she slipped away in the darkness and spent the night in an open field sitting on a stone, and when found in the morning was weeping as if her heart would break. No mortal will ever know the thoughts that passed through the mind of that friendless child in the long hours of that cold night, with only the silent stars to keep her company. The mention of her case in the daily papers moved many generous hearts to send her presents, but in the hours of her keenest sufferings she was thrown wholly on herself for consolation.

In youth our most bitter disappointments, our brightest hopes and ambitions are known only to otherwise, even our friendship and love we never fully share with another; there is something of every passion in every situation we conceal. Even so in our triumphs and our defeats.

To throw obstacle in the way of a complete education is like putting out the eyes; to deny the rights of property, like cutting off the hands. To deny political equality is to rob the ostracised of all self-respect; of credit in the market place; of recompense in the world of work; of a voice among those who make and administer the law; a choice in the jury before whom they are tried, and in the judge who decides their punishment. Shakespeare’s play of Titus Andronicus contains a terrible satire on woman’s position in the nineteenth century–“Rude men” (the play tells us) “seized the king’s daughter, cut out her tongue, cut off her hands, and then bade her go call for water and wash her hands.” What a picture of woman’s position. Robbed of her natural rights, handicapped by law and custom at every turn, yet compelled to fight her own battles, and in the emergencies of life to fall back on herself for protection.

The girl of sixteen, thrown on the world to support herself, to make her own place in society, to resist the temptations that surrounds her, must do all this by native force or superior education. She does not acquire this power by being trained to trust others and distrust herself. If she wearies of the struggle, finding it hard work to swim upstream, and allow herself to drift with the current, she will find plenty of company, but not one to share her misery in the hour of her deepest humiliation.

The young wife and mother, at the head of some establishment with a kind husband to shield her from the adverse winds of life, with wealth, fortune and position, has a certain harbor of safety, occurs against the ordinary ills of life. But to manage a household, have a deatrable influence in society, keep her friends and the affections of her husband, and train her children well, she must have rare common sense, wisdom, diplomacy, and a knowledge of human nature. To do all this she needs the cardinal virtues and the strong points of character that the most successful statesman possesses.

An uneducated woman, trained to dependence, with no resources in herself must make a failure of any position in life. But society says women do not need a knowledge of the world, the liberal training that experience in public life must give, or all the advantages of collegiate education.

Should they not have all the consolation that the most liberal education can give? When suddenly roused at midnight, with the startling cry of “fire! fire!” to find the house over their heads in flames, do women wait for men to point the way to safety? And are the men, equally bewildered and half suffocated with smoke, in a position to more than try to save themselves?

At such times the most timid women have shown a courage and heroism in saving their husbands and children that has surprised everybody. Inasmuch, then, as woman shares equally the joys and sorrows of time and eternity, is it not the height of presumption in man to propose to represent her at the ballot box, do her voting in the state, her praying in the church, and to assume the position of priest at the family alter.

Nothing strengthens the judgment and quickens the conscience like individual responsibility. Nothing adds such dignity to character as the recognition of one’s self-sovereignty; the right to an equal place, every where conceded; a place earned by personal merit, not an artificial attainment, by inheritance, wealth, family, and position. Seeing, then that the responsibilities of life rests equally on man and woman, that their destiny is the same, they need the same preparation for time and eternity. The talk of sheltering woman from the fierce sterns of life is the sheerest mockery, for they beat on her from every point of the compass, just as they do on man, and with more fatal results, for he has been trained to protect himself, to resist, to conquer.

Whatever the theories may be of woman’s dependence on man, in the supreme moments of her life he can not bear her burdens. Alone she goes to the gates of death to give life to every man that is born into the world. No one can share her fears, no one mitigate her pangs; and if her sorrow is greater than she can bear, alone she passes beyond the gates into the vast unknown.

From the mountain tops of Judea, long ago, a heavenly voice bade His disciples, “Bear ye one another’s burdens,” but humanity has not yet risen to that point of self-sacrifice, and if ever so willing, how few the burdens are that one soul can bear for another. In the highways of Palestine; in prayer and fasting on the solitary mountain top; in the Garden of Gethsemane; before the judgment seat of Pilate; betrayed by one of His trusted disciples at His last supper; in His agonies on the cross, even Jesus of Nazareth, in these last sad days on earth, felt the awful solitude of self. Deserted by man, in agony he cries, “My God! My God! why hast Thou forsaken me?” And so it ever must be in the conflicting scenes of life, on the long weary march, each one walks alone. We may have many friends, love, kindness, sympathy and charity to smooth our pathway in everyday life, but in the tragedies and triumphs of human experience each mortal stands alone.

But when all artificial trammels are removed, and women are recognized as individuals, responsible for their own environments, thoroughly educated for all the positions in life they may be called to fill; with all the resources in themselves that liberal thought and broad culture can give; guided by their own conscience an judgment, and stimulated to self-support by the knowledge of the business world and the pleasure that pecuniary independence must ever give; when women are trained in this way they will, in a measure, be fitted for those hours of solitude that come alike to all, whether prepared or otherwise. As in our extremity we must depend on ourselves, the dictates of wisdom point of complete individual development.

In talking of education how shallow the argument that each class must be educated for the special work it proposed to do, and all those faculties not needed in this special walk must lie dormant and utterly wither for want of use, when, perhaps, these will be the very faculties needed in life’s greatest energies. Some say, Where is the use of drilling series in the languages, the Sciences, in law, medicine, theology? As wives, mothers, housekeepers, cooks, they need a different curriculum from boys who are to fill all positions. The chief cooks in our great hotels and ocean steamers are men. In large cities men run the bakries; they make our bread, cake and pies. They manage the laundries; they are now considered our best milliners and dressmakers. Because some men fill these departments of usefulness, shall we regulate the curriculum in Harvard and Yale to their present necessities? If not why this talk in our best colleges of a curriculum for girls who are crowding into the trades and professions; teachers in all our public schools rapidly hiring many lucrative and honorable positions in life? They are showing too, their calmness and courage in the most trying hours of human experience.

Is it, then, consistent to hold the developed woman of this day within the same narrow political limits as the dame with the spinning wheel and knitting needle occupied in the past? No! no! Machinery has taken the labors of woman as well as man on its tireless shoulders; the loom and the spinning wheel are but dreams of the past; the pen, the brush, the easel, the chisel, have taken their places, while the hopes and ambitions of women are essentially changed.

We see reason sufficient in the outer conditions of human being for individual liberty and development, but when we consider the self dependence of every human soul we see the need for courage, judgment, and the exercise of every faculty of mind and body, strengthened and developed for use, in woman as well as man.

And yet, there is a solitude, which each and every one of us has always carried with him, more inaccessible than the ice-cold mountains, more profound than the midnight sea; the solitude of self. Our inner being, which we call ourself, no eye nor touch of man or angel has ever pierced. It is more hidden than the caves of the gnome; for to it only omniscience is permitted to enter.

Such is individual life. Who, I ask you, can take, dare take, on himself the rights, the duties, the responsibilities of another human soul?

_____

10,000 copies of the speech were printed by Congress and sent to constituants nationwide. We’ll link to the full text, as well as the Declaration of Sentiments in the show notes.

The Women’s Rights National Historical Park in Seneca Falls, New York, tells the story of the first Women’s Rights Convention. It’s the story of struggles for civil rights, human rights, and equality – global struggles that continue today.

The park maintains the Wesleyan Church where the convention was held, as well as the Stanton House, and the M’Clintock house, where the Declaration of Sentiments was drafted. There’s a 100 foot long bluestone water feature located in Declaration Park (between the Visitor Center and Wesleyan Chapel) that is inscribed with the words of the Declaration of Sentiments, providing visitors with a space to gather and reflect.

The park is open year-round, but tours of the historic houses operate on a seasonal schedule.

This episode of America’s National Parks was hosted by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

His Name Was Mudd

  • September 13, 2018September 14, 2018

On a Sunday in November of 1864, John Wilkes Booth first made the acquaintance of Dr. Samuel Mudd. The men discussed a horse sale, and Booth was invited to spend the night at Mudd’s home. On December 23, the two men met again, by accident, on a street in Washington, DC.

Four months later, John Wilkes Booth shot and killed President Abraham Lincoln. He broke his left leg in the process, leaping to the stage at Ford’s Theater. He and his getaway man David Harold knocked on the door of Dr. Mudd at four in the morning for assistance. Mudd set, splinted, and bandaged the broken leg. The two stayed for about 12 hours, as the doctor’s handyman made a pair of crutches.

Within days, Dr. Mudd was arrested and charged with conspiracy and with harboring Booth and Harold during their escape. Though he had met Booth on at least two prior occasions, Mudd told authorities he did not recognize him. He was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment, one vote shy of the death penalty.

Mudd was imprisoned in Fort Jefferson, in what is today Dry Tortugas National Park, an isolated Gulf of Mexico island fort. He attempted escape but failed before an epidemic of yellow fever broke out on the island. The fort’s physician died, and Mudd took over the care of the sick. Due to his efforts, he received a full pardon from President Andrew Johnson and was released from prison a hero.

In 1936, a film was made loosely based on Mudd’s story called THE PRISONER OF SHARK ISLAND, and then 2 years later it was adapted into a radio drama, starring Gary Cooper as part of the Lux Radio Theater. On today’s episode of America’s National Parks, we’re playing for you that program, which we’ve remastered and edited lightly.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Download this episode (right click and save)

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You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

Dry Tortugas National Park – National Park Service Website

How Samuel Mudd Went From Lincoln Conspirator to Medical Savior – Smithsonian

Family vow to clear Abraham Lincoln ‘conspirator’ whose name is Mudd – The Guardian

The Prisoner of Shark Island – Full Audio, including introduction, commercials, and a post-show discussion with the actors

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

Stories from the Sands

  • September 7, 2018September 10, 2018

One of the world’s great natural wonders rises from the heart of New Mexico’s Tularosa Basin. Great wave-like dunes of baby powder-like gypsum sand engulf 275 square miles of desert. Towering mountains ring the spectacular white dunes, crowned with electric blue skies, prismatic sunsets, and mystic moonlit nights. Half a million visitors from all over the world enjoy this beautiful place each year. It’s featured prominently in commercials, feature films, fashion catalogs, and music videos. And its neighboring military base has been host to some important events in American history.

On this episode of America’s National Parks, three short stories from the glistening dunes of White Sands National Monument: A spirit from the 16th century who roams the dunes after sunset, searching for her lost love, a legendary gunslinger of the southwest, and a daring record-setter who made high-altitude aviation safer. 

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Download this episode (right click and save)

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode.

Inside the Original Space Dive: Joseph Kittinger on 1960 Record Jump – National Geographic Article

White Sands National Park – National Park Service Website

Transcript

The America’s National Parks Podcast is sponsored by L.L.Bean.

This year, L.L.Bean is joining up with the National Park Foundation, the official nonprofit partner of the National Park Service, to help you find your happy place – in an amazing system of more than 400 national parks, including historic and cultural sites, monuments, preserves, lakeshores, and seashores that dot the American landscape, many of which you’ll find just a short trip from home. L.L.Bean is proud to be an official partner of the National Park Foundation. Discover your perfect day in a park at findyourpark.com

One of the world’s great natural wonders rises from the heart of New Mexico’s Tularosa basin. Great wave-like dunes of baby powder-like gypsum sand engulf 275 square miles of desert.

Towering mountains ring the spectacular white dunes, crowned with electric blue skies, prismatic sunsets, and mystic moonlit nights. Half a million visitors from all over the world enjoy this beautiful place each year. It’s featured prominently in commercials, feature films, fashion catalogs, and music videos. And its neighboring military base has been host to some important events in American history.

On this episode of America’s National Parks, three short stories from the glistening dunes of White Sands National Monument.

We begin with a legend from the 16th century, a Spanish maiden who roams the dunes after sunset, searching for her lost love.

Here’s Abigail Trabue.

In 1540, Spanish conquistadors were in search of national treasures. Francisco Coronado was one of the most successful of these explorers, and he approached the valliant, young the Hernando de Luna from Mexico City to join him on his quest for new adventures and rumors of unearthed treasures.

Hernando had just proposed to Manuela, a beautiful Spanish maiden. Though deeply in love, he set off on an expedition with Coronado and promised to return to Mexico City, and to bestow upon Manuela all the riches and jewels waiting to be discovered.

Manuela waited for her betrothed, until she saw the explorers returning in small groups. She searched each face, looking for the gaze of her husband. She would learn that his expedition was ambushed by the Apache in a vast field of white sand dunes. They fought valiantly but were no match for the Apache warriors. Many of the Spanish died in the desert, the others fled back to Mexico City. When the returning parties stopped coming, Manuela set out for the white sands on her own. She was never seen again.

To this day, it is said that at dusk, as the evening breezes sweep and dip over the stark white dunes, a spirit roams in her flowing white wedding dress, calling out for her lover who has been lost beneath the dunes. They call her the Pavla Blanca —the little white one. She is sad, but peaceful, and never gives up hope of being reunited with her lost husband.

Another legend of the southwest is a man named William Henry McCarty, otherwise known as Billy the Kid. And yes, he was a real man, and the west was every bit as wild as they say it was. The towns of New Mexico were not always as tranquil as they tend to be today.

Billy the Kid’s mother died of tuberculosis while he was just a young boy. As he grew, he began working a slew of odd jobs to make ends meet, and began combining them with a few illegal activities here and there. The owner of a boarding house gave him a room in exchange for work. His first arrest was for stealing food at age 16 in late 1875. Ten days later, he robbed a Chinese laundry and was arrested, but escaped. He tried to stay with his stepfather, and then fled from New Mexico Territory into neighboring Arizona Territory, making him both an outlaw and a federal fugitive.

Billy’s carreer as an infamous gunman began in 1878 after he met a young Englishman named John Tunstall. That year would be the beginning of what was known as the Lincoln County Wars — a series of violent confrontations resulting from a conflict between two groups of businessmen. Tunstall was on the side of attorney Alexander McSween, and cattle baron John Chisum. Their opposition was the town establishment, who had Sheriff William Brady on their side, along with the infamous Jesse Evans gang to take care of any “problems.”

Tunstall and McSween, wanted to establish their own business in Lincoln County. Billy was hired by Tunstall as a ranch hand and became one of the
Regulators, a posse formed to protect Tunstall and McSween.
Tensions escalated, and Jesse Evans and his men went after Tunstall. He was murdered, unarmed which was against the unwritten code of the West.

Billy and the Regulators vowed vengeance. Many skirmishes broke out, and as a result of one, three men, including Sheriff William Brady were killed by by the regulators, sending Billy on the run. The new sheriff, Pat Garrett, caught up with Billy and arrested him, but Billy made a grand escape from the second floor of the Lincoln County courthouse, killing Deputies J.W. Bell and Bob Olinger as he fled. No one really knows how he accomplished such a feat, but Billy became synonymous with “luck.” Billy went on the run again, and hid, among other places, in the giant white gypsum sands of Tularosa Basin.

His luck ran out on July 14, 1881, when Garrett caught up to the legendary outlaw and killed him.

There are many versions of what really happened during the
Lincoln County Wars, so it is hard to tell fact from fiction. Historians
and fans still debate the detail of a man whose legend continues to live on.

Beginning in 1942, only months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order #9029, which created the 1,243,000 acre Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range right next door to White Sands National Monument. Soldiers even practiced tank maneuvers inside the monument’s boundary. By 1945 the military established the White Sands Proving Ground to test missiles, causing the park to experience short-term closures, a practice that continues today. The Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range closed at the end of World War II and re-opened in 1958 as Holloman Air Force Base. The White Sands Proving Ground was later renamed White Sands Missle Range. Both military areas still operate around the park boundaries and in the cooperative use area in the western part of the park. This cooperation mutually benefits both the military by providing them additional space and the park by insuring the lack of development on the surrounding lands.

As jet planes flew higher and faster in the 1950s, the Air Force became increasingly worried about the safety of flight crews who had to eject at high altitude. Tests with dummies had shown that a body in free-fall at high altitude would often go into a flat spin at a rate of up to 200 revolutions per minute (about 3.3 revolutions per second). This would be potentially fatal. A working group set out to make parachute ejections safer, resulting in a world record dive.

Project Excelsior was initiated in 1958 to design a parachute system that would allow a safe, controlled descent after a high-altitude ejection. The problem was to get a person down fast to lower levels before opening their chute, but at the same time to safeguard them against flat spin. A flat spin is a wild, uncontrollable spin that causes blood to rush to the head, and can kill. Francis Beaupre, an Air Force medical unit technician, invented a multi-stage parachute system in an attempt to solve the problem. Beaupre’s system consisted of a small 6 ft stabilizer parachute, designed to prevent uncontrolled spinning at high altitudes, and a 28 ft main parachute that deployed at a lower altitude. Included were timers and altitude sensors that automatically deployed both parachutes at the correct points in the descent, even if the body attached were unconscious.

To test the system, a 200 ft high helium balloon was created that could lift an open gondola and test pilot into the stratosphere. Captain Joseph Kittinger, who was test director for the project, would be the one to test the chute. The gondola was unpressurized, so Kittinger wore a modified partial pressure suit, and additional layers of clothing to protect him from the extreme cold at high altitude. Together with the parachute system, this almost doubled his weight.

The first test, called Excelsior I, was made on November 16, 1959. Kittinger ascended in the gondola and jumped from an altitude of 76,400 feet. “Overhead my onion-shaped balloon spread its 200-foot diameter against a black daytime sky,” Kettinger told National Geographic. “More than 18 1/2 miles below lay the cloud-hidden New Mexico desert to which I shortly would parachute. Sitting in my gondola, which gently twisted with the balloon’s slow turnings, I had begun to sweat lightly, though the temperature read 36° below zero Fahrenheit. Sunlight burned in on me under the edge of an aluminized antiglare curtain and through the gondola’s open door.”

It took over an hour to get to the deployment altitude, and Kittinger was ready to go. Before he jumped from the gondola, however, the timer lanyard of the stabilization unit was pulled prematurely, and the smaller chute deployed after only two seconds of free fall. It caught him around the neck, causing him to spin at 120 revolutions per minute.

“At first I thought I might retard the free spin that began to envelop me, but despite my efforts, I whirled faster and faster. Soon I knew there was nothing I could do. I thought this was the end. I began to pray, and then I lost consciousness,” he said.

The main parachute opened as planned at a height of 10,000 feet, saving Kettinger’s live.

Despite the near-death experience, Kittinger went ahead with another test only three weeks later, from nearly the same height. The chute worked correctly, so a third and final test was planned for August 16, 1960. It would be a world record-breaking ascent, combined with a world record-breaking dive.

On the way up, the pressure seal in Kittinger’s right glove failed, and he began to experience severe pain in his right hand from the exposure to the extreme low pressure. Not wanting to abort the test, he kept this to himself. Over the course of one hour and 31 minutes, he climed to an altitude of 102,800 feet. He stayed at the peak altitude for 12 minutes, waiting for the balloon to drift over the landing target area, then stepped out of the gondola.

The small stabilizer parachute deployed successfully and Kittinger fell for 4 minutes and 36 seconds, setting a long-standing world record for the longest free-fall. During the descent, he experienced temperatures as low as −94 degrees. He reached a top speed of 614 miles per hour. At 17,500 feet the main parachute deployed, and Kittenger landed safely in the New Mexico desert. The whole descent took 13 minutes and 45 seconds.

Kittinger’s efforts during Project Excelsior proved that it was possible for an air crew to descend safely after ejecting at high altitudes. He was also the first man to make a solo crossing of the Atlantic Ocean in a gas balloon. Later, he would serve as a fighter pilot for three combat tours of duty during the Vietnam War, flying a total of 483 missions. He was shot down and captured, spending 11 months as a prisoner of war in a cell next to future Senator John McCain.

Kittinger retired from the Air Force as a Colonel in 1978. He held the world records for highest parachute jump and highest speed of a human in atmosphere until October 14, 2012 when Felix Baumgartner jumped from 127,852 feet, with Kittinger serving as a technical advisor. Kittinger still holds the record for longest freefall.

A visit to White Sands is a joy for anyone. You can travel the Dunes Drive, a blacktop road transitions to compacted sand, plowed daily for automobiles and even big RVs to drive across. Picnicing is a popular activity, as people of all ages sled down the dunes. You can bring your own sled or get one at the gift shop. Make sure to wax it for optimum speed.

There is an accessible elevated and ramped overlook trail through the dunes, as well as ome other, longer hikes. But really, it’s one of the few National Park destinations where off-trail activity is encouraged. You can walk pretty much anywhere, just make sure you know where you are and how to get back. It’s easy to get lost. And always bring plenty of water and wear sunscreen.

Riding horses in the white sands is a wonderful way to experience the expansive scenery of the dune field. Private individual use of horses and other pack animals are welcome at White Sands National Monument with permit.

You can hike a mile into the dunes to designated backcountry camping spots, but there is no campground in the park. Plenty of campgrounds and other accommodations are in surrounding areas, such as the town of Alamogordo, where we highly recommend Oliver Lee State Park.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Podcast Episodes

Ballads of Big Bend

  • August 10, 2018

The shape of the southwestern edge of Texas is carved by The Rio Grande river, as it tranquilly flows bringing life to some of the most remote regions of the country. Here, the Rio takes a giant turn north, a Big Bend creating the heel in Texas’s shape.

The Rio Grande represents something else, though, it’s the border between the United States and Mexico, and at a border crossing, one man welcomed Americans to our southern neighbor through songs that floated among the canyon.

On this episode of America’s National Parks, Victor Valdez, the singing man of Boquillas, and Big Bend National Park.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Download this episode (right click and save)

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

Big Bend National Park — National Park Service Website

Crossing the Border to Boquillas — National Park Service Website

Interview with Victor Valdez on NPR:

“Big Bend crossing brings new life to border town” — Houston Chronicle

Victor singing on the Rio Grande:

Transcript

The America’s National Parks Podcast is sponsored by L.L.Bean.

L.L.Bean believes the more time you spend outside together, the better. That’s why they design products that make it easier to take longer walks, have deeper talks, and never worry about the weather. Discover clothing, outerwear, footwear and gear made for every type of adventure, with the outside built right in. Because on the inside, we’re all outsiders. Be an outsider with L.L.Bean.

—–

The United States can roughly be divided into 7 different geographic regions, four of which — the coastal plains of the southeast, the interior lowlands of the Midwest, the great plains down the center, and the Basin and Ridge region of the west — all converge in one state: Texas.

The shape of the southwestern edge of the state is carved by The Rio Grande river, as it tranquilly flows bringing life to some of the most remote regions of the country. It’s along the Basin and Ridge region where the Rio take a giant turn north, a Big Bend creating the heel in Texas’s shape.

The Rio Grande represents something else, though, it’s the border between the United States and Mexico, and at a border crossing, one man welcomed Americans to our southern neighbor through songs that floated among the canyon.

On this episode of America’s National Parks, the singing man of Boquillas, and Big Bend National Park.

Here’s Abigail Trabue.

—-

In 1994, After visiting the Mexican border village of Boquillas, on the Rio Grande just across the Mexican border at Big Bend National Park, Texas singer-songwriter Robert Earl Keen wrote the song “Gringo Honeymoon.”

We took a rowboat ‘cross the Rio Grande
Captain Pablo was our guide
For two dollars in a weathered hand
He rowed us to the other side

It’s very possible that Victor Valdez could have been the man Keen was referring to as Captain Pablo. For 24 years, Valdez rowed a boat across an informal border crossing, leading American citizens to visit our southern neighbors.

The seven-minute boat ride was the easiest of U.S. Mexico border crossings, with no agents, no traffic, no lines, no documentation … just a tip for the boat captain.

The village is several hours’ drive from the nearest Mexican city, having grown from a mining operation that sent silver, lead and other mineral ores from the Sierra del Carmen mountains across the Rio Grande for distribution by train. It boasted a population of more than 2000 in the early 1900s but quickly diminished when the mining stopped. Now, just 2-300 citizens call Boquillas home, and Big Bend National Park is all that keeps it alive.

At the time that Big Bend was established in the 1930s, President Roosevelt was interested in creating an International Peace Park, joining the regions, but the plan never came to fruition. Nature finds its way, though, and the informal border crossing to Boquillas linked Big Bend with natural protected areas on the Mexican side of the border.

The crossing, of course, was illegal without an official port of entry. But Americans visiting the remote wonders of big bend came and crossed, to reach the beauty of Mexico’s nature sanctuaries or to enjoy cheap tequila shots and tacos. The people of Boquillas would cross to buy fresh groceries from Big Bend’s Rio Grande Village convenience store and to visit friends in nearby towns.

Officials had no interest in enforcing the crossing though, and Rangers encouraged visits to Boquillas, treating it almost as an annex of the park. The park even employed citizens from the town as firefighters. They were called Los Diablos and were so effective that they were sent to fight the California wildfires in 1999.

Park visitors would walk to the riverbank, where Mexican boatmen like Victor Valdez waited to take them across for a small fee. Trucks, horses and burros would then take them on the one-mile journey into town.

Valdez served as a boatman for 24 years. There were many boatmen, but Victor was well known for his enthusiasm, and for his serenades. He would sing his charming rendition of the “Cielito Lindo” for his passengers as they slowly rowed across the river. During the busy times of year — Christmas, Thanksgiving and spring break — he could make as much as $300 a day. But everything changed on September 11th, 2001.

The year after the 9/11 attacks, the federal government began enforcing the crossing. Boquillas was effectively closed off from civilization, and the tourism economy that kept it alive. Food, gasoline, mail, and friends all had previously come from the US and were now entirely cut off.

At first, Victor and other villagers squeaked out a meager living selling walking sticks, painted rocks, and other crafts to American’s still walking the Boquillas Canyon trail, but law enforcement quickly began to crack down on any sort of commercial activity.

So Victor, cunning enough, and even encouraged by Big Bend rangers, turned to his other talent. His singing voice. Every day, he and a couple of friends from town would make a mile-long walk through the desert brush and reeds to the river. They built a small shack, and they sat and waited with binoculars on the lookout for hikers making their way over the mountaintop in America. When one appeared, he would begin to stretch his vibrant tenor, permeating the canyon as if invisible borders could not contain him.

Victor was working for tips, but no longer were thousands of people visiting the canyon. Jars were set along the water’s edge, and sometimes he would make as little as $5 a day. Some hikers would wade half-way in the water to meet him and shake hands over the invisible line.

Victor used the money to care for a 94-year-old man, his disabled niece, and his wife, who lived in another town searching for work. Many residents left town, but Victor had lived in Boquillas all his 56 years, and didn’t want to leave.

People loved his singing, and Victor’s presence was more important than he would know. He was more than just a peaceful compliment to hikers’ journeys, he kept the link between Boquillas and Big Bend alive. Word spread of the Singing Man of Boquillas or the Singing Mexican, and Victor became popular. People traveled to the canyon just to hear his voice. All the while, unbeknownst to him, the US and Mexican governments were working on formalizing and re-opening the border crossing.

But the remote location was hardly anything that either government wanted to spend much money on. After nearly a decade of behind-the-scenes reviews and negotiations, the National Park Service along with U.S. Customs and Border Patrol opened a digital port of entry in 2013. It’s a kiosk, essentially, where visitors scan their passports and converse remotely with a Customs and Border Protection agent more than 300 miles away in El Paso. It’s still a bit of an honor system, but people can now cross the border quickly, and for the first time, legally.

The boats were launched once more, along with the trucks and the horses and the donkeys. The bar and restaurant re-opened. “We now hope for better days,” said Valdez. One year later, Boquillas’ population rebounded by 30 percent as tourism began to recover. Victor Valdez was no longer singing to a few hikers, he was again singing to boatloads of visitors, though now he left the rowing to his son.
Boquillas opened a new kindergarten, a clinic, and a second restaurant, and for the first time, electricity flowed through the city with a World-bank financed solar grid. Streetlights, refrigeration, TV, and kitchen appliances became a part of life for residents,130 years after the lightbulb was invented.

The relationship between Big Bend National Park and Boquillas is now viewed as a model for other border towns.

Victor Valdez died on August 10th, 2016 at the age of 65. Word of his passing from a heart attack spread far and wide through the West Texas border communities and nationwide ensuring that the legacy of the singing man of Boquillas would live on.

____

Big Bend National Park is comprised of 1,252 square miles of land, making it larger than the state of Rhode Island. The night skies are dark as coal, lit up by millions of diamond stars, in the temple-like canyons carved by rivers into the ancient limestone.

There’s plenty to do for visitors of all ages. You can take scenic drives, biking tours, and river floats, or hike along the150 miles of trails skirting rivers and snaking through the mountainous desert terrain. 1,200 species of plants and 450 species of birds call Big Bend home, and the geology dates back millions of years.

And of course, you can cross the border, and visit the fine people of Boquillas.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

Rangers Make the Difference

  • August 3, 2018August 3, 2018

July 31st of each year is set aside by the International Ranger Foundation as World Ranger Day to honor park rangers around the globe who are on the front line in the fight to protect our natural heritage. It’s also an opportunity to pay tribute to rangers who have lost their lives in the line of duty.

To honor this past Tuesday’s World Ranger Day, on this episode of America’s National Parks, we highlight three stories of National Park Service rangers who have gone above and beyond the call of duty.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Download this episode (right click and save)

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

The Dutch Creek Incident — National Wildfire Coordinating Group

Notable Women in Yosemite’s History — National Park Service Article

Ozark National Scenic Riverways Rangers Honored with Valor Award — National Park Service Article

Transcript

The America’s National Parks Podcast is sponsored by L.L.Bean.

L.L.Bean believes the more time you spend outside together, the better. That’s why they design products that make it easier to take longer walks, have deeper talks, and never worry about the weather. Discover clothing, outerwear, footwear and gear made for every type of adventure, with the outside built right in. Because on the inside, we’re all outsiders. Be an outsider with L.L.Bean.

—–
July 31st of each year is set aside by the International Ranger Foundation as World Ranger Day to honor park rangers around the globe who are on the front line in the fight to protect our natural heritage. It’s also an opportunity to pay tribute to rangers who have lost their lives in the line of duty.

To honor this past Tuesday’s World Ranger Day, on this episode of America’s National Parks we’re going to highlight three stories of National Park Service rangers who have gone above and beyond the call of duty.

Fighting forest fires is one of the most dangerous occupations there are. With the wildfires raging across the country, we begin with the story of a Wildland Firefighter whose tragedy led to massive changes in wildfire fighting protocol.

Here’s Abigail Trabue
——
Andrew Palmer was 6-foot-5 and 240-pounds, with a winning smile. He was hired to be a firefighter by Olympic National Park just four days after he graduated high school at age 18, ten years ago this June.

Twelve days later he had completed his basic training, and was assigned to an engine crew. On July 22, less than a month after he joined the National Park Service, Andy’s eager four-person team was dispatched to assist in fighting the Eagle Fire that was raging in northern California’s Shasta-Trinity National Forest.

The team headed out at 9pm, and after four hours of driving, they stopped at a motel to catch some sleep. Six hours later, they were back on the road. On the way, the tailpipe of their new truck fell off. They reported the problem but kept going. The check engine light came on, but they still carried on.

They arrived at the fire’s Command Post near Junction City, California at 6 p.m. The team’s captain left to get the truck repaired for two days while Andy and the rest of the group were sent to the fire line to begin cutting trees, with the specific instructions not to cut trees over 24 inches thick, because they were not certified to do so.

The captain was on his way back to the crew, having procured a loner truck, and just as he was stopping for lunch, a heartwrenching call came over his radio.

“Man Down Man Down. We need help. Medical emergency. Dozer pad. Broken leg. Bleeding. Drop Point 72 and dozer line. Call 911, we need help.”

The team had cut a Ponderosa pine 37” in diameter. Downslope from that tree was a 54” diameter sugar pine that had an uphill lean and a large fire scar on the uphill side. The Ponderosa pine fell toward the sugar pine, and its impact caused a 120-foot span of the sugar pine to split off. When it hit the ground, another portion of the trunk, about 8 feet long, broke off, crashing right into Andy.

A request for a helicopter evacuation went out quickly, but the smoky conditions were too risky for an air rescue. A team of ground paramedics reached Andy 55 minutes later, with a vacuum splint and a trauma bag, but they found that his injuries were much worse than were described in the original radio call for help. Along with the broken leg, he had a fractured shoulder, and was bleeding heavily.

Air evacuation was essential. A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter was called in but was told to stand down because a Forest Service helicopter was closer. But the Forest Service unit did not have a hoist and would need a clear landing zone, something the tree-packed mountain slope didn’t offer. The Coast Guard unit was recalled, losing valuable time. Paramedics debated whether it was even wise to even move Andy without further on-site treatment when they decided to clear a zone for the helicopter to hoist him out. The process took twenty minutes while the helicopter waited. Two hours and 47 minutes after being struck by a massive log, Andy was hoisted into the aircraft. He was pronounced dead Thirty-nine minutes later, before he even reached a hospital.

Andrew Palmer’s death, which became known as the Dutch Creek Incident, was a wake up call for the wildland firefighting community. Contingencies for medical emergencies were clearly lacking. An inquiry followed from the interagency Serious Accident Investigation Team. The crew captain was the only member of the team who would agree to an interview.

The investigators pointed to a host of problems that contributed to Andy’s death, including: inadequate supervision with the captain away; failure of the second in command to exercise proper supervisory control by allowing the team to cut down trees above their level of certification and an eagerness by the young crew to obtain a line assignment, among other factors.

The Dutch Creek Protocols were issued by the National Wildfire Coordinating Group in Andy’s honor. His story is part of the “6 Minutes for Safety” program used by thousands of firefighters around the world each day. Every year, on the anniversary of Andy’s death, firefighters train in medical emergency response.

The year after Andy died 100,000 pink stickers were sent to firefighters to insert into their Incident Response Pocket Guide, outlining the communication protocol in the event of a medical emergency.

Today, firefighters on the line ask three questions: What are we going to do if someone gets hurt? How will we get them out of here? and How long will it take to get them to a hospital?

The capability of NPS helicopters to extract an injured firefighter by short-haul is now an important consideration in any fire management plan.

On July 25, 2018, 2 tones sounded over firefighter radios “Stand by for a net message,” the voice said, followed by: “Today, July 25, marks the ten-year anniversary of the tragic events on the Eagle Fire. A fellow firefighter has left us…and we continue on…as friends, co-workers and comrades. We are bound by a common thread as we share in this great loss. Today, let unity bring us together in a special way. Reflect on the moments in life when hope and appreciation serve as guides and change us for tomorrow. Now, please join together to respectfully observe a moment of silence in honor of Andrew Palmer, wildland firefighter from the Olympic National Park.”

“Thank you for joining us in this special moment. Resume normal communication.”

—–

We now turn back the clock almost exactly 100 years. It was the summer of 1918, toward the end of World War I. Able-bodied men were fighting overseas, and women were tapped to work all sorts of jobs traditionally held by men at the time, including police officers and factory workers. In California, Yosemite National Park, which had just been transferred to the new National Park Service, needed rangers.

____

Clare Marie Hodges first came to Yosemite when she was 14 years old on a four-day horseback ride. She fell in love with the valley and came back in 1916 to work at the nearby Yosemite Valley School. She learned the park by heart, and dreamed of being a ranger. Towards the end of the Great War, Hodges learned the park service was short of workers and thought she may have a chance. So she went to see Washington B. Lewis, superintendent of Yosemite National Park, to apply for a job.

“Probably you’ll laugh at me,” she said. “But I want to be a ranger.”

Lewis, either ahead of his time, or just so desperate for workers replied: “I beat you to it, young lady. It’s been on my mind for some time to put a woman on one of these patrols.” He hired her as a seasonal ranger, and just like that, Hodges became the first woman to be a fully-commissioned ranger in the National Park Service.

Hodges spent that first summer on mounted patrol, riding through the night to take entrance receipts to the park headquarters, along with patrolling both the valley and some of the more remote areas of the park.

She had the same duties as her male counterparts, the one difference being that she didn’t carry a gun. It’s not that she wasn’t allowed to, in fact, the other rangers told her she should, in order to ward off animals and attackers, but she decided against it. She wore the uniform Stetson hat but rode in a split skirt. Occasionally the people she encountered were confused. They didn’t understand why a woman had a ranger’s badge.

After the war ended, so did Hodges’ temporary service as a ranger. She married and stayed in the Yosemite area, ranching and guiding church groups through the park. Though her time with the NPS was short, she helped open doors for women whose role in the parks had been limited. National Park Service Director William Penn Mott, Jr., later praised Hodges for refusing to accept conventions and possessing the determination to take on a male-dominated profession.

Women began to be more involved in the park service after the war, but most were relegated to jobs like secretarial work and waitressing, wearing pillbox hats and dresses modeled after flight attendant’s uniforms until the 1970s. It would be thirty years after Hodges before another woman would be appointed a fully-commissioned park ranger. Today, only about a third of National Park employees are women.

—-

On July 4, four National Park Service Rangers from Ozark National Scenic Riverways were honored at the Department of the Interior headquarters in Washington, D.C. with Valor Awards for their heroic efforts during a historic flood that impacted much of southern Missouri in April 2017. The Valor Award is the highest honor the department awards and is presented to employees for demonstrating unusual courage involving a high degree of personal risk in the face of danger while attempting to save the life of another.

_____

Over a period of just two days — April 29 and 30, 2017 — the areas in and around Ozark National Scenic Riverways in southeastern Missouri received more than 15 inches of rainfall. Massive flooding set in on the park’s Jacks Fork and Current rivers. The Current River crested at 39 feet near the park headquarters in Van Buren, a full 10 feet higher than the previous recorded high water mark that was set in 1904.

At 5:30 P.M. on April 29, the Carter County Sheriff requested assistance from National Park Service Rangers to perform swift-water rescues of area residents, trapped in their homes with rising and fast-moving flood waters quickly approaching or already upon them. Park Rangers Joshua Gibbs, Lindel Gregory, Patrick Jackson, and Daniel Newberry jumped into action.

The Rangers were all specially trained in swift-water rescue techniques, and regularly performed one a week during the summer months. On this night, they would successfully conduct 30, exposing themselves to extremely high-risk conditions. They ferried from house to house checking for stranded residents using Park Service boats as the floodwaters rapidly rose. They maneuvered under low-hanging powerlines only a few feet above the rushing water, and through fumes from leaking underwater propane tanks.

They then left the boats to wade in waist-deep waters, among the live electricity and propane and raging river, to retrieve people from their flooded homes, secure them on the rescue boats, and guide them to safety.

The conditions were enough to scare even those who had grown up on the rivers, and the Rangers could see it in the eyes of the residents. Three of the rangers grew up in the area, having graduated from nearby Van Buren High School nearby. They were cut off from their own families during the flood.

“Lives were saved because these four rangers risked their own lives to help Missourians in need,” Senator Claire McCaskill said. “No one hopes for disasters like the historic floods we saw last year, but I’m grateful that we have such brave and selfless first responders in our communities—and I proudly join all Missourians in commending them for their bravery.”

After reviewing rainfall data, the National Weather Service says parts of the area experienced a 1,000-year flood event. The heroic actions of these four rangers saved the lives of 30 stranded men, women, and children as entire houses were swept away.

—–

The toll of devastation from the Carr Fire, one of the most brutal fires in California history rose earlier this week to more than 1,000 homes destroyed and almost 200 damaged. More than 4,000 firefighters are battling the blaze, not far from where Andrew Palmer lost his life. Two have died.

Rangers work so many different types of jobs in the National Park Service, but they’re all there to protect our country’s history and treasured natural preserves. The next time you encounter a National Park Service Ranger, make sure to thank them for their service.

And from Abigail and I to any rangers listening, our deepest gratitude goes out to you for your commitment to protect our lands and history.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

The Land That Made a President

  • July 20, 2018July 20, 2018

On his 22nd birthday, in 1880, Theodore Roosevelt married Alice Hathaway Lee. Their daughter, Alice Lee Roosevelt, was born on February 12, 1884. Two days after his daughter was born, his wife and mother died on the same day in the same house. Distraught, he escaped to a cattle ranch in the Dakotas.

On this episode of America’s National Parks, the 26th President of the United States, and his time in North Dakota, in an area now known as Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Download this episode (right click and save)

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

Theodore Roosevelt National Park – National Park Service Website

Theodore Roosevelt and Conservation -National Park Service Website

Muir, Roosevelt, and Yosemite: A Camping Trip That Changed the World – Our podcast episode on the time Roosevelt ditched his secret service detail to go camping with John Muir, planting the seed for the National Park idea.

Transcript

Click the arrow to read the full text of this episode.

The America’s National Parks Podcast is sponsored by L.L.Bean.

L.L.Bean believes the more time you spend outside together, the better. That’s why they design products that make it easier to take longer walks, have deeper talks, and never worry about the weather. Discover clothing, outerwear, footwear and gear made for every type of adventure, with the outside built right in. Because on the inside, we’re all outsiders. Be an outsider with L.L.Bean.

Not many realize that Theodore Roosevelt, one of our country’s most famous tough guy cowboy personas, grew up a feeble child who suffered from debilitating asthma and generally poor health. He experienced sudden nighttime asthma attacks that created the feeling of being smothered to death, which terrified him and his parents. Nevertheless, he was an energetic and mischievously inquisitive child. Born in New York City, young Theodore grew up homeschooled by his parents — socialite Martha Stewart “Mittie” Bulloch and businessman Theodore Roosevelt Sr. At age seven, he saw a dead seal at a local market, managed to procure its head, and formed the “Roosevelt Museum of Natural History” with his two cousins. He learned the basics of taxidermy and filled his “museum” with animals he caught or hunted … it was a different time.

Family trips included tours of Europe, and when hiking with his family in the Alps in 1869, Teddy found that he could keep pace with his father, who he thought to be the greatest man alive. The physical exertion actually minimized his asthma, beginning his lifelong devotion to exercise. After an altercation with two older boys on a camping trip, he had lessons from a boxing coach to teach him to fight and gain strength.

On his 22nd birthday, in 1880, Theodore Roosevelt married Alice Hathaway Lee. Their daughter, Alice Lee Roosevelt, was born on February 12, 1884. Two days after his daughter was born, his wife and mother died on the same day in the same house. Distraught, he escaped to a cattle ranch in the Dakotas.

On this episode of America’s National Parks, the 26th President of the United States, and his time in North Dakota, in an area now known as Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Here’s Abigail Trabue.

_____

A twenty-four-year-old Theodore Roosevelt first took the Northern Pacific Railroad to the Dakota Territory the year before the tragic loss of his wife and mother. The New York City tenderfoot didn’t receive the warmest of receptions from the local frontiersmen, but Roosevelt’s pocketbook quickly convinced twenty-five-year old Joe Ferris — a Canadian living in the Badlands — to serve as Roosevelt’s guide.

Roosevelt came to the Dakotas to hunt Bison, which proved challenging to find. Commercial hunters had slaughtered most of the herds. But Roosevelt’s grit and determination impressed Ferris. They slept outdoors on the ground for the most part, except through terrible weather when they stayed at the ranch cabin of Gregor Lang. Roosevelt and Lang spent late evenings debating politics and discussing ranching, sparking a fire in Teddy’s mind — he became obsessed with the idea of raising cattle in the northern plains.

Cattle ranching was booming in the area at the time, mainly because of the depleted bison population. Cattle were being driven north from Texas to graze the Dakotas’ nutritious fields. The railroad provided speedy delivery to the east, avoiding the long drives that diminished the quality of the meat.

To Roosevelt, it was a sound business opportunity. He put down an investment of $14,000 in the Chimney Butte Ranch, more than his annual salary, and went into business with a couple local cattlemen. More than just an investment, though, Roosevelt saw this venture as an opportunity to immerse himself in the western lifestyle that he had long romanticized.

Roosevelt returned to New York, resuming his legislative duties in Albany. He was a member of the New York State Assembly, where he acted more like an investigator than a legislator. He took on corporate and government corruption, exposing high-profile figures, including a federal judge, making newspaper headlines in the process.

His political career was gaining traction. He was becoming a key player in the 1884 presidential election, when, on February 12, 1884, a telegram arrived announcing the birth of his first child. He celebrated with his colleagues until he received a second telegram that would hurry him home. His wife and mother were had both taken ill. On Valentines Day morning, Roosevelt sat by his mother’s side as she succumbed to typhoid fever. That evening he held his wife’s hand as she died from kidney failure that had been masked by the pregnancy. Devastated, Roosevelt wrote a large ‘X’ as that day’s diary entry, along with “The light has gone out of my life.”

Roosevelt never spoke of his wife Alice again, even to their daughter. He set out to erase her memory, destroying any letter that mentioned her name.

Roosevelt single-mindedly immersed himself in his work, and then, when the legislative session ended a couple months later, he left his newborn daughter in the care of his sister and went west again. His new profession would now be his escape, and he set forth with the idea that he would eventually spend the rest of his life as a rancher.

Roosevelt had instructed his partners to build a cabin before he left, and he found it easily upon his return. It was dubbed the Maltese Cross Ranch, but, only seven miles from the town of Medora, it wasn’t quite remote enough for the solitude Roosevelt required. He headed north along the Little Missouri River another 30 miles and built a second ranch he named Elkhorn, which would become his home. He threw himself into badlands cowboy life. He helped stop stampedes, he participated in month-long roundups, arrested thieves, even punched out a drunken gunslinger in a bar.

He had been riding for enjoyment through the western part of the Dakota Territory and into eastern Montana Territory for many days when he stopped at a hotel bar for the night. Roosevelt described the incident in his autobiography:

“It was late in the evening when I reached the place. I heard one or two shots in the bar-room as I came up, and I disliked going in. But there was nowhere else to go, and it was a cold night. Inside the room were several men, who, including the bartender, were wearing the kind of smile worn by men who are making believe to like what they don’t like. A shabby individual in a broad hat with a cocked gun in each hand was walking up and down the floor talking with strident profanity. He had evidently been shooting at the clock, which had two or three holes in its face.

…As soon as he saw me he hailed me as ‘Four Eyes,’ in reference to my spectacles, and said, ‘Four Eyes is going to treat.’ I joined in the laugh and got behind the stove and sat down, thinking to escape notice. He followed me, however, and though I tried to pass it off as a jest this merely made him more offensive, and he stood leaning over me, a gun in each hand, using very foul language… In response to his reiterated command that I should set up the drinks, I said, ‘Well, if I’ve got to, I’ve got to,’ and rose, looking past him.

As I rose, I struck quick and hard with my right just to one side of the point of his jaw, hitting with my left as I straightened out, and then again with my right. He fired the guns, but I do not know whether this was merely a convulsive action of his hands, or whether he was trying to shoot at me. When he went down he struck the corner of the bar with his head… if he had moved I was about to drop on my knees; but he was senseless. I took away his guns, and the other people in the room, who were now loud in their denunciation of him, hustled him out and put him in the shed.”

By the next morning, the man had left town on a freight train.

On a more political level, Roosevelt led efforts to organize ranchers to address overgrazing and other shared concerns, forming the Little Missouri Stockmen’s Association. He coordinated conservation efforts, establishing the Boone and Crockett Club, whose primary goal was the preservation of large game animals and their habitats.

He split his time between New York and his Dakota ranches over the next few years. Not yet 30 years old, New York Republicans tapped him to run for mayor of New York City in 1886. He accepted, despite having little hope of winning. He campaigned hard, but took third place with 27% of the vote. He thought the loss spelled the end of his political career, and focused his attentions to ranching again.

He began writing “Hunting Trips of a Ranchman,” the first of three books on his experiences ranching and hunting. He wrote, fatefully, about how the cattle industry in the Dakotas was unsustainable. With no regulation, the region became overgrazed. That year, a late thaw and sweltering summer delivered a brief growing season. Wildfires raged, and the cattle were underfed. Ranchers were ill-prepared to feed their livestock through the winter. As fate would have it, the winter weather would also present a challenge. Blizzards piled on top of one another, burying the grazing land, and cattle were found “frozen to death where they stood” in temperatures that reached as low as -41°. Once the snow melted, Cows were found dead in trees having climbed snowdrifts to reach anything edible. Nearly 80% of all cattle in the Badlands died. Roosevelt lost over half of his herd.

Roosevelt was not around for that winter, however. He had been in London, where he married his childhood friend Edith. He was unaware of the devastation until he returned to the U.S. in late March of 1887, where, in the spring thaw, an unimaginable number of cattle carcasses floated down the flooded Little Missouri river. His investment destroyed, he cut his losses and decided to be done with cattle ranching. He sold his interest in the Maltese Cross. He began to divest from Elkhorn, but still used the cabin as a basecamp for excursions and hunting trips, as he returned to New York to focus on politics. In the next 14 years, he would rise from New York City Police Commissioner to Assistant Secretary of the Navy, to the Governor of New York, Vice-President, and President.

Although ranching in the Dakotas proved a financial disaster, the experience fed the rest of Roosevelt’s life — as a steward of the land, as a politician, as a person. Roosevelt’s last visit to North Dakota came in the fall of 1918, just a few months before his death at the age of 60.

“I have always said I would not have been President had it not been for my experience in North Dakota,” he once said. “It was here that the romance of my life began.”

____

Theodore Roosevelt National Park was named in honor of the man who felt the North Dakota lands he roamed so vital, but also for the man who would double the number of sites in the National Park system, creating Crater Lake, Wind Cave, and Mesa Verde, and then passing the antiquities act enabling Roosevelt and succeeding Presidents to proclaim national monuments. By the end of his presidency, he had proclaimed 18 of them.

During Roosevelt’s time in office, the Maltese Cross cabin was hosted in St. Louis at the Word’s Fair, before traveling to Portland, Oregon, for the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition. It then headed back to Fargo, and then Bismarck, North Dakota, and in 1959, twelve years after the park was established, the Maltese Cross Cabin returned home, restored to its original state behind the South Unit Visitor Center.

Only the foundation stones of the Elkhorn Ranch residence remain, still sitting where they were originally laid, accessible by a long gravel road in a detached unit of the park.

Visitors to the Theodore Roosevelt National Park can experience the land much as Roosevelt did. A diverse array of wildlife – Elk, Bison, Deer, Pronghorns, and Golden Eagles – roam the nearly treeless plains. “Prairie dog towns,” where hundreds of prairie dogs conduct their business, amuse the 500,000 visitors a year that take the short detour from Interstate 94 through western North Dakota.

Isolation is on the menu in these wild lands. In fact, the entire state only has about 250,000 more people than the number that visit the National Park each year. The prairie skies are free of light pollution, allowing infinite stars to shine through the night. And it’s palpably quiet. The silent sunsets are an out-of-body experience.

Two primitive campgrounds are available, with most sites first-come first-served. Backcountry camping is nearly limitless, and an incredible way to see the park, sleeping on the ground, just like Teddy Roosevelt did.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to subscribe, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, music credits, and more in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com.

Today’s show was sponsored by L.L.Bean, follow the hashtag #beanoutsider, and visit LLBean.com to find great gear for exploring the National Parks.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

Dred and Harriet Scott

  • May 31, 2018July 16, 2018

On April 6th, 1846, Dred and Harriet Scott walked into the unfinished St. Louis Courthouse in downtown Saint Louis, Missouri, and in an act of bravery, filed separate petitions against Irene Emerson for their freedom.

On that day, one of the most important lawsuits in American history, one that would ultimately hasten the start of the Civil War and divide an already divided country, began. It would take ten years and reach as far as the supreme court before it ended.

On this episode of America’s National Parks Podcast, the Dred Scott Case, and Gateway Arch National Park.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Download this episode (right click and save)

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You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Join the America’s National Parks Facebook Group here.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

Gateway Arch National Park – National Park Service Website

Dred Scott Case Collection – Washington University in St. Louis

Dred Scott Case Collection – Library of Congress

Scott v. Sanford – Thoroughly detailed Wikipedia entry

The Dred Scott Decision – Video and info from The History Channel

Transcript

On April 6th, 1846, Dred and Harriet Scott walked into the unfinished St. Louis Courthouse in downtown Saint Louis, Missouri, and in an act of bravery, filed separate petitions against Irene Emerson for their freedom.
On that day, one of the most important lawsuits in American history, one that would ultimately hasten the start of the Civil War and divide an already divided country, began. It would take ten years and reach as far as the supreme court before it ended.

On this episode of America’s National Parks Podcast, the Dred Scott Case, and Gateway Arch National Park.

Here’s Abigail Trabue
—–

Dred Scott was born to enslaved parents in Southampton County, Virginia sometime around the turn of the nineteenth century. Their owner was a man named Peter Blow. After a failed farming stint in Alabama, Peter Blow settled his family and six slaves in St. Louis in 1830, where he ran a boarding house. Within two years, both Peter Blow and his wife were dead.

Just before his death, Peter Blow sold Dred Scott to Dr. John Emerson. Emerson served as a civilian doctor at Jefferson Barracks before being appointed as an assistant surgeon in the United States Army. He left St. Louis on November 19, 1833, to report for duty at Fort Armstrong in Rock Island, Illinois, taking Dred Scott with him.

Of course, slavery was prohibited in Illinois, both under the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 and the Illinois state constitution, which had been in place for 15 years prior to Scott’s arrival at Rock Island. Assuming Scott knew all this, he could have sued for his freedom in Illinois, but he didn’t, and he moved to Fort Snelling in the new Wisconsin territory with Emerson in 1836. Wisconsin was governed by the 1820 Missouri Compromise, prohibiting slavery north of 36 and a half degrees latitude, except for within the boundaries of Missouri. Scott could have again sued for his freedom, but he did not.

In the late 1830s, Dred Scott married Harriet Robinson, who was owned by the Indian agent for the Wisconsin territory. Ownership of Harriet was transferred to Dr. Emerson.

Emerson requested from the Army a transfer back to St. Louis, which was granted. On October 20, 1837, Emerson left Fort Snelling, traveling down the Mississippi by canoe, since steamboats had ended operations for the season. He left behind most of his possessions, including Dred and Harriet Scott, in the care of an unknown party.

Upon arriving in St. Louis, Emerson was transferred to Fort Jesup, Louisiana. In April 1838, he sent for Dred and Harriet Scott to join him and his new wife Irene Sanford in Louisiana, a slave state. That September, the Emersons and the Scotts returned to St. Louis, then traveled back to Fort Snelling in October for a short time, before returning to St. Louis again. All of these movements will become incredibly important for the Scotts’ future attempt for freedom. On the trip back to Fort Snelling, Eliza Scott was born on a steamboat in free territory.

The Army then transferred Emerson to Florida. He left Dred and Harriet behind with Irene’s father, Alexander Sanford, who owned a plantation in north St. Louis County. Emerson was discharged from the Army in 1842 and returned to St. Louis for a short time, and then settled permanently in Davenport, Iowa. Irene Emerson joined him and gave birth to their daughter Henrietta in November 1843.

On December 29, 1843, Emerson suddenly died at age 40. A record of his Iowa estate mentioned slaves, but it is impossible to determine if this reference was to the Scott family. The Scotts never joined them in Davenport. There is no mention of slaves in Emerson’s Missouri estate inventory.

Irene Emerson and her daughter returned to St. Louis.

Dred and Harriet Scott had been hired out to several parties over the years, and in 1846, they were working for Samuel Russell, the owner of a wholesale grocery.

Even though slavery was legal in Missouri, the law allowed enslaved people to sue for their freedom if they were held wrongfully. First, a petition to sue had to be filed in the circuit court. If the petition contained sufficient evidence that the plaintiff was being wrongfully held, the judge would allow the case after provisions were provided to cover court costs by the plaintiff. The judge would also order that the enslaved person could be allowed to attend court and not removed from the vicinity.

The legal principle that affected the Scotts was the idea that once a person was free, they could not be enslaved again. The Missouri Supreme Court had ruled that a master who took his slave to reside in a state or territory where slavery was prohibited thereby freed him. “Once free, always free” was standard judicial practice.

On April 6, 1846, Dred and Harriet Scott each filed petitions against Irene Emerson in the St. Louis Circuit Court to obtain their freedom. The identical documents indicated that the Scotts were entitled to their freedom based on their residences in the free state of Illinois and the free Wisconsin Territory. But the Missouri courts had been gradually turning more and more pro-slavery. From 1844 to 1846, twenty-five freedom suits had been filed in the St. Louis Circuit Court and only one resulted in freedom. Pro-slavery Judge John M. Krum approved the petitions, which Dred and Harriet Scott signed with their marks, an “X.”

Attorney Francis B. Murdoch helped the Scotts initiate their freedom suits, and posted the required security for them. For some reason, he moved to California in 1847 before their cases came to trial.

At this point, the children of Dred Scott’s first owner became involved. The 7 Blow children became well established in St. Louis society by marrying into notable families: The abolitionist publisher of the first newspaper west of the Mississipi. A drug store owner. An attorney who would later play a role in creating Missouri’s 1865 constitution, stripping rights from southern sympathizers. Peter E. Blow married into a French banking family. His brother-in-law was a St. Louis County sheriff and another was a St. Louis attorney. The Blows provided financial and legal assistance to the Scotts. Samuel Mansfield Bay, former Missouri legislator and attorney general, became the Scotts’ attorney through a connection with the Blow family, who also signed for the Scotts’ court fee security.

The case came before the St. Louis Circuit Court on June 30, 1847. Judge Hamilton presided. He had replaced proslavery Judge Krum and held sympathy toward slave freedom suits. Missouri law was clearly on the side of the Scotts. Bay only needed to prove that Emerson had taken Dred Scott, and then Harriet, to reside on free soil.

Henry Taylor Blow testified that his father had sold Dred Scott to Dr. John Emerson. Depositions were presented from both military posts, establishing that Dred and Harriet Scott had resided there in service to Emerson. Samuel Russell testified that he had hired the Scotts from Irene Emerson and paid her father, Alexander Sanford, for their services.

On cross-examination, though, Russel revealed that his wife Adeline had, in fact, made the initial arrangements to hire Dred and Harriet from Irene Emerson. His testimony was dismissed as hearsay, by the judge and because of this technicality, the jury decided against the Scotts. In an absurd twist of the legal system, they did not hear testimony sufficient enough to prove that Irene Emerson claimed Dred and Harriet Scott as her slaves…so they were returned to her ownership.

Bay moved for a new trial, arguing that a technicality in the legal proceedings that could be easily remedied should not hold the Scotts in slavery. Judge Hamilton granted. Irene Emerson had the sheriff take charge of the Scott family. He was responsible for their hiring out, and maintained the wages until the outcome of the freedom suit was determined.

There was a lengthy delay before the new trial took place. A year and a half, due to a heavy court schedule. Then a fire that swept through St. Louis and a cholera outbreak. The case was finally heard on January 12, 1850, a little over two years after the retrial was granted. In the meantime, Irene Emerson moved to Massachusetts and married Dr. Calvin C. Chaffee. Chaffee, an abolitionist, was apparently unaware of his wife’s involvement in a slave freedom suit and was elected to the United States Congress shortly after their marriage.

The Scotts had new attornies, again through the Blow family, Alexander P. Field and David N. Hall. Field was an expert trial lawyer and prominent figure in Illinois and Wisconsin politics. Hugh Garland and Lyman D. Norris represented Emerson.

Field and Hall again established the Scotts’ residence in free territories. They presented a new deposition from Adeline Russell, who indicated that she hired Dred and Harriet Scott from Emerson. Samuel Russell appeared in court to testify that he paid to hire the Scotts.

Garland and Norris tried to claim that the two free-territory residencies were not subject to civil law since they were on military bases, but precedent from a previous case wasn’t in their favor. The jury found for the plaintiffs. Dred and Harriet Scott were free.

At this point, the Scotts’ case was just another successful Freedom Suit. There was no national or even local attention paid to it. But Emerson’s attorneys appealed to the Missouri Supreme Court, which granted a hearing. All parties agreed that only Dred Scott’s case would be heard and that whatever decision applied to Dred would apply to Harriet.

In the State Supreme Court trial, Emerson’s attorneys forwarded the argument that military law was different from civil law when slave property was involved. They claimed that because Emerson was ordered to the military posts, there was no consent on his part to willingly take his slaves into free areas.

The Missouri Supreme Court had, in essence, decided the case in advance. William Napton, James H. Birch, and John F. Ryland were looking for a case that would allow them to hand down a pro-slavery decision, and overturn all previous supreme court opinions that recognized slavery prohibitions. An election of new judges between the trial and delivering a supreme court opinion further complicated things. Napton and Birch were both voted off the bench, and new justices Hamilton Gamble, and William Scott joined Ryland.

On March 22, 1852, the new court rendered their 2-1 decision reversing the lower court’s findings. Justice William Scott wrote the opinion, claiming that Missouri should not have to recognize laws that were in opposition to its own. He acknowledged the right of slaves to obtain their freedom when taken to free states but determined that slavery status was regained upon return to a slave state. The opinion, with a thread of racist rhetoric, was clearly politically motivated.

The next day, Irene Emerson Chaffee’s attorneys filed an order back in the circuit court for the Blow family’s bonds to cover the court costs, and that the Scotts be returned to them, along with slaves’ wages of four years at 6% interest. Judge Hamilton denied the order, and no explanation was recorded.

But Dred Scott and Harriet Scott were not done. Their friends helped them file a suit in the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Missouri. The Blow family decided they could no longer financially support the Scotts, especially once the case seemed hopeless. Tensions over slavery were at a boiling point in the United States, less than a decade before the Civil War broke out. Attorney Roswell M. Field took on the case for no fee.

At this point, Irene Emerson’s brother John Sanford claimed ownership of the Scott family, in what was likely a political move to help ensure the rights of slave owners, and so that Irene’s abolitionist husband would not find out. The court found in favor of Sanford, leaving Dred Scott and his family in slavery. Field appealed to the United States Supreme Court for the December 1854 term.

The United States Supreme Court did not hear the case until February 1856. Roswell Field arranged for Montgomery Blair, a high-profile St. Louis attorney living in Washington D.C., to argue Dred Scott’s case.

Reverdy Johnson, a nationally-known constitutional lawyer and Henry S. Geyer, U.S. Senator for Missouri represented John Sanford. In May, arguments, much along similar lines as the previous trials, were concluded. The justices called for the case to be reargued in December. At that time, the brother of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Curtis assisted Blair in arguing the constitutional questions of the case. A final decision was delivered on March 6, 1857. Eight of the nine justices wrote separate opinions. Seven justices, primarily pro-Southern, followed individual lines of reasoning that led to a shared opinion that, by law, Dred Scott was still a slave. Chief Justice Roger B. Taney wrote what is considered to be the majority opinion, stating that African-Americans were, quote: “beings of an inferior order. so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” The opinion decided that slaves were not citizens of the United States and had no right to bring suit in a federal court. In addition, the court ruled the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional, stating that Congress had no authority to prohibit slavery in the federal territories.

Shortly before the decision was handed down Irene Emerson’s second husband, Dr. Calvin Chaffee, now a Massachusetts congressman, found out his wife owned the most famous slave in America, and so did his opponents. He was chastised for his perceived hypocrisy on the house floor. Chaffee immediately worked to free the Scotts. Since Missouri law only allowed a citizen of the state to emancipate a slave, he transferred ownership of the Scotts to Taylor Blow. On May 26, 1857, Dred and Harriet Scott appeared in the St. Louis Circuit Court and were formally freed before Judge Hamilton. Dred Scott took a job as a porter at Barnum’s Hotel at Second and Walnut street, where he became a local celebrity. Harriet ran a laundry out of their home. Dred Scott died on September 17, 1858 of tuberculosis, only 16 months after gaining his freedom. Harriet Scott died on June 17, 1876, 100 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, which argues the self-evident truth that “all men are created equal.

——

President James Buchanan‘s supporters considered the Dred Scott case a final answer to the sectional controversy, although Buchanan had influenced Justice Robert Grier of Pennsylvania to join the southern majority so that it would look less like a sectional decision.

The case contributed heavily to the divisions that lead to Abraham Lincoln‘s election and the Civil War.

St. Louis’s Old Courthouse is now the visitors’ center for the Gateway Arch National Park, the Nation’s newest park, which is about to finish a massive redevelopment, linking the Arch with the courthouse on a grand front lawn for the city. The Old Courthouse was the site of the first two trials of the Dred and Harriet Scott cases. It was also where Virginia Minor’s case for a woman’s right to vote came to trial in the 1870s. You can tour this historic structure and visit the restored courtrooms, along with exhibits related to St. Louis history.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written by me, Jason Epperson, and narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to hit the subscribe button, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group for national park lovers. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

The America’s National Parks Podcast is part of the RV Miles Network of web resources for United States travelers. If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast.

You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com, and all over social media.

The America’s National Parks Podcast is a production of Lotus Theatricals, LLC.

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.

Podcast Episodes

An Island Prison

  • April 10, 2018July 16, 2018

If you only know the name Geronimo from the call that paratroopers in old war movies and Bugs Bunny cartoons shout, it’s a nickname bestowed upon a Native American hero by Mexican soldiers. During repeated conflicts, The Apache warrior attacked them with nothing but a knife, surviving each time despite being continually shot at. The soldiers would plead to Saint Jerome as they faced him. Geronimo is Spanish for “Jerome.”

On this episode of America’s National Parks, Geronimo, and his imprisonment at Fort Pickens, now a part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore in Pensacola, Florida.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

or download this episode (right click here and save)

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You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

Gulf Islands National Seashore – National Park Service Website

Chiricahua National Monument – National Park Service Website

Transcript

If you only know the name Geronimo from the call that paratroopers in old war movies and Bugs Bunny cartoons shout, it’s a nickname bestowed upon a Native American hero by Mexican soldiers. During repeated conflicts, The Apache warrior attacked them with nothing but a knife, surviving each time despite being continually shot at. The soldiers would plead to Saint Jerome as they faced him. Geronimo is Spanish for “Jerome.”

On today’s episode of America’s National Parks, Geronimo, and his imprisonment at Fort Pickens, now a part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore in Pensacola, Florida.

Here’s Abigail Trabue.

One of the leading causes of the Civil War was westward expansion, and whether new states like Kansas would be slave states or not, tipping the scales of power toward to the North or South. After the Civil War ended and the question of slavery was decided, the U.S. government turned its military prowess towards the native people of the West. Tribes gave up most of their traditional lands and ways of life as they were forced onto reservations.

Eventually, the reservations were encroached upon as miners and settlers moved in and demanded more land. The Chiricahua Apache reservation shrank to nearly one-third of its original size. Bands of Apaches hostile to one another were forced to live together on the shrinking lands, and as conditions on the reservation deteriorated, some bands escaped. Including a band led by a man named Geronimo, who lost fear when he lost his family during a Mexican raid. In the summer of 1850, a contingent of Apaches went on a trading mission into Mexico. While the men were in town, a force of Mexican troops attacked the lightly-guarded camp. When Geronimo returned, he found his mother, his first wife, and his three children all dead.

Geronimo became the #1 target of the U.S. Army and President Grover Cleveland, who made Geronimo’s capture his personal mission, saying “I hope nothing will be done with Geronimo which will prevent our treating him as a prisoner of war…if we cannot hang him, which I would much prefer.”

In 1886, Cleveland dispatched a full quarter of the U.S. Army, 5000 soldiers, in an effort to capture Geronimo, who was also evading 3000 Mexican soldiers as he raided across the Southwestern United States and Northern Mexico. Eventually, the Army hired 500 scouts from rival Apache bands to track Geronimo, two of which found his band and negotiated a surrender to General Miles in Arizona’s Skeleton Canyon.

After the surrender at Skeleton Canyon, the entire Chiricahua tribe were exiled to Florida where they were to be held as prisoners. President Cleveland publicly stated that they were “guilty of the worst crimes known to the law, committed under circumstances of great atrocity, and public safety requires them be removed far from the scene of their depredations and guarded with strictest vigilance.”

His orders to the Army commanders stated that “all the hostiles should be very safely kept as prisoners until they can be tried for their crimes, or otherwise disposed of.”

Three days before the dedication of the Statue of Liberty — October 25th, 1886. A train arrived in Pensacola, Florida. Onboard, 16 Apaches who surrendered at Skeleton Canyon in Arizona. Their leader – the renowned warrior Geronimo.

The rest of the Chiricahua were sent to Fort Marion in St. Augustine, but it was claimed that Geronimo himself and his warriors would be better guarded at Fort Pickens than at the overcrowded Fort Marion. However, an editorial in a local newspaper noted that Geronimo would be “an attraction which will bring here a great many visitors.” Upon their arrival, the paper’s editor said: “we welcome the nation’s distinguished guests and promise to keep them so safely under lock and key that they will forget their hair-raising proclivities and become good Indians.” In fact, it was local business leaders that lobbied for the move. President Cleveland himself approved the petition, separating the men from their families, breaking the terms of the surrender.

In February 1887, tourists from all over the country began arriving in Pensacola, crossing Pensacola Bay on a ferry to visit the island fort and see the Apache prisoners and the famed warrior Geronimo. Admission was fifty cents for adults and twenty-five cents for children. Visitors talked with the captives, bought souvenirs from them, and brought them gifts. Geronimo learned his part. He became a genial sideshow attraction, doing what he could to coax tourists to hand over a few nickles. He was well-liked, particularly by the women who visited. A writer from the local paper gave this advice to visitors: “We think that the ladies who visit these savages indulge in too much gush, and we are certain they would not do it if they were to pause and reflect upon the barbarities practiced upon the people of their own race by these cutthroats.” One woman asked a guard what kind of gift would be appropriate for Geronimo, and he responded by saying “a piece of lead in the forehead.”

Now that Geronimo was of no concern for harm, he was a celebrity. Were he alive today, he’d be making the talk show circuit and guest-judging on cooking shows. But Geronimo was still a prisoner. He and his warriors spent many days working hard labor at the fort, another violation of the agreements made at Skeleton Canyon. “they put me to sawing up large logs,” Geronimo said. “There were several other Apache warriors with me, and all of us had to work every day. For nearly two years we were kept at hard labor in this place and we did not see our families until May 1887.”

The families of the warriors were moved to Fort Pickens, creating an even bigger attraction. The Indians held traditional dances. Soldiers would put pennies on the posts for the Indian boys to shoot off with their arrows.

After Grover Cleveland left office, Geronimo, his warriors, and their families were moved to Vermont, Alabama, where they stayed another five years, working for the Government. “We were not healthy in this place,” Geronimo said, “for the climate disagreed with us. Many died, others committed suicide.

They were then sent to Fort Sill in Oklahoma, where, though imprisoned, houses were built for them by the Government. They were also given cattle, hogs, turkeys and chickens. They were operating upon the understanding that they could raise the stock and sell grain in order to establish their own support system, but again the government had misled Geronimo. Part of the money was given to the Indians and part was placed in what the officers call the “Apache Fund,” to go towards clothing and other care, but the government-issued clothing eventually ceased, and the Apache were never given account of their earnings.

Geronimo lived the rest of his days as a prisoner. He visited the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904 and according to his own accounts made a great deal of money signing autographs and pictures, though he could do little with it. He died in 1909 at Fort Sill, Oklahoma. The captivity of the Chiricahua Apache ended four years later.

To the settlers of Arizona, Geronimo’s band were raiders and murderers. The Apaches’ exile and captivity eased their fears. The price of Geronimo and the Chiricahua Apache’s resistance was lost loved ones, lost lands, lost traditions, and 27 years their freedom. From 1850 to 1914, the Apache population dropped 95%.

On his deathbed, Geronimo confessed that he regretted his decision to surrender to the U.S. His last words were reported to be “I should have never surrendered. I should have fought until I was the last man alive.”

_____

The Gulf Islands National Seashore protects a chain of barrier islands between Mississippi and the Florida Panhandle, several with intact fortresses from the early 1800s. On the eastern end, you can take a ferry from Gulfport, Mississippi to West Ship Island, for swimming, hiking, and touring the historic Fort Massachusetts. In nearby Ocean Springs, Mississippi, the Davis Bayou portion of the seashore offers trails through the wetlands, with plenty of opportunities to view alligators and other wildlife. There’s a developed campground on site, with water and electric hookups and a modern bathhouse.

In the Florida panhandle, historic Fort Barrancas lives on the Pensacola Naval Air Station. Crossing the Pensacola Bay Bridge into the town of Gulf Breeze, you can find the park headquarters at the Naval Live Oaks area. This is the first piece of federally managed land in the United States. The Live Oak trees with their thick, crooked branches, were excellent for ship-building. The original United States Naval fleet was built largely from this grove of trees.

Crossing a $1 toll bridge onto the community of Pensacola Beach you’ll find a typical Florida beach town full of sugar sand, sunbathers, and outdoor eateries. But as you pay your entrance fee at the gate for the Gulf Islands and drive the 6 miles to the end of Santa Rosa Island, the world changes. The party atmosphere, the music, and the people disappear, but the sugar sand remains. You can explore miles of pristine beaches, watching osprey hatchlings leave their tiny footprints while the wide-winged adults loom overhead. Ghost crab almost disappears into white shores, and dolphin leap in the bay. At the end of the island is Fort Pickens, Geronimo’s tourist-attraction prison, which offers self-guided and ranger-led tours. All around the island are cannon batteries that developed over time as the armed forces protected Pensacola Bay, an important naval harbor. The giant cast-iron cannons of the 1800s and large-caliber disappearing grey gun batteries of the early 1900s are set among the palm trees and sand dunes all over the island. It’s like being in an episode of LOST, as you climb and play on the deprecated war equipment, almost wondering what decade you are in.

The campground near Fort Pickens at the end of the island is one of the best places to camp in all the National Park system. For $25 a night, you have water, electricity, and private access to the sugar sand beaches and trails to the fort and gun batteries. The legendary Blue Angels team of stunt jets is based across the bay at the Pensacola Naval Station, and they regularly practice right overhead and fly low over the water. It’s a particularly interesting affair since warplanes are the entire reason the gun batteries along the island are no longer necessary.

National Park Service sites across the southwest also relate closely to Geronimo’s history, especially Chiricahua National Monument in Arizona, which is also a place of wondrous natural beauty.

The tradition of yelling “Geronimo” comes from the forties, when the Army was testing parachute jumps. A unit had gone out drinking and watched the 1939 film “Geronimo.” As fellow soldiers were harassing a young private who was acting tough about the jump. Early paratroopers didn’t have the greatest survival rates. His comrades said he’d be so scared, he wouldn’t remember his own name. He told them that to prove he wasn’t scared, he’d yell “Geronimo” as he jumped, referencing the warrior’s bravery in battle against the Mexican Army. He did, and his company followed suit, starting the tradition of making the expression in the face of death.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written by me, Jason Epperson, and Narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to hit the subscribe button, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.” You can also join our new America’s National Parks Facebook group for national park lovers. We’ll link to all of our social media, as well as National Park Service resources, in the show notes at National Park Podcast dot com.

The America’s National Parks Podcast is part of the RV Miles Network of web resources for United States travelers. If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast. 

You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com, and all over social media. 

The America’s National Parks Podcast is a production of Lotus Theatricals, LLC. 

Music

Provided through the generosity of the artists under a creative commons license.



Podcast Episodes

The Grand Dame of the Everglades

  • March 13, 2018July 16, 2018

At the southern tip of Florida lie the Everglades, a crucial ecosystem to America and the world. Everglades National Park has spent its entire life under siege, with Marjory Stoneman Douglas out front as its chief warrior.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Or Download this episode (right click and save)

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

“The Everglades: River of Grass” -by Marjory Stoneman Douglas
Buy the seminal text on Amazon

“The Wonder of It All: 100 Stories from the National Park Service”
A great collection of stories from National Park Service rangers and employees.

Everglades National Park Official Website

Friends of the Everglades Website
A great bio of Marjory Stoneman Douglas, and a timeline of her life

Everglades Digital Library 
Audio interviews with Marjory Stoneman Douglas

Marjory Stoneman Douglas on Wikipedia
One of the more thorough Wikipedia biographies you’ll find

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School
Donate to Marjory’s namesake school, which suffered one of the worst school shootings in history in February.

Transcript

“Back in 1870, when only eighty-five people lived along the coast of southeastern Florida, an estimated two million wading birds inhabited the Everglades during dry seasons. During the late nineteenth century, plume-hunting reduced these birds to only several hundred thousand. This dramatic loss spurred protective laws in Florida — and in New York, where the plumes had been shipped to millinery houses. Thus protected, the wading-bird population rebounded to near its original level. Then, in the 1940s and after, the character of the Everglades itself began to change. As South Florida grew, the Everglades shrank, its waters controlled for man’s uses. By the mid-1970s, wading-bird numbers had dropped back to a few hundred thousand, about 10 percent of what it had been a century before. Biologists actively study these birds, looking for clues that might lead to stopping or even reversing the decline. As yet the only thing that is certain is that life in the Everglades is more fragile than anyone ever thought.”

That’s a passage from Jack de Golia’s “Everglades: The Story Behind the Scenery,” from 1978.

I’m Jason Epperson, and on this episode of America’s National Parks, Everglades National Park protects 1.5 million acres of Florida’s southern tip. It’s the first federal land protected not for beauty but, but for conservation, but the creation of the park was only the beginning. The Everglades have spent the last 100 years under siege. Our story is of the woman who protected them time and time again, Marjory Stoneman Douglas.

These are the opening words from Marjory Stoneman Douglas’ seminal book “The Everglades: River of Grass”:

“There are no other Everglades in the world. They are, they have always been, one of the unique regions of the earth; remote, never wholly known. Nothing anywhere else is like them…”

An apt description of the land, but also of Marjory herself. A true American hero, whose story is anything but average.

As a young child in Minnesota, before the turn of the 20th century, Marjory Stoneman’s father Frank read her “The Song of Hiawatha,” Longfellow’s Native American lore poem, set in the Pictured Rocks on the south shore of Lake Superior. The young Marjory burst into tears upon realizing a tree would give its life to provide Hiawatha the wood for a canoe.

At the age of six, Marjory’s parents separated. Her father’s failed business ventures caused her mother Lillian, a concert violinist, to take Marjory to her grandparents Massachusetts home, where she lived with her mother, aunt, and grandparents, who disparaged her father whenever they had the chance. Throughout her childhood, Marjory, who suffered from night terrors, would watch as her mother battled with mental illness, a battle she was never fully able to overcome.

Marjory escaped the turmoils at home in books, eventually beginning to write herself. By her late teens, she had multiple short stories published and had been awarded a prize by the Boston Herald for a story about a boy who watches a sunrise from a canoe.

But as her mother’s health declined, Marjory took on many of the family responsibilities, eventually managing the family finances. Despite her burdens, her aunt and grandmother sent her off for Wellesley College in 1908 recognizing that she needed to begin her own life. A model student, she graduated with a BA in English in 1912 – her mother died of breast cancer shortly after.

Marjory Stoneman met Kenneth Douglas, a newspaper editor 30-years her senior in 1914. In a whirlwind romance, they married in three months. It’s not exactly known what his misdeeds were, but it became clear that Kenneth Douglas was a con artist. Marjory stayed with him while he spent six months in jail for writing a bad check, but when he tried to scam her estranged father, she ended the marriage.

The con turned out to be fortuitous, as Marjory Stoneman Douglas was reunited with Frank Stoneman, whom she had not seen since moving away. In the fall of 1915, she left Massachusetts for Miami to live with her father who was the editor of the paper which would eventually become the Miami Herald.

Already an accomplished writer, Marjory joined the paper as a society columnist, but since fewer than 5,000 people lived in Miami at the time, the news was slow, and she’d have to make up many of the people and stories. Residents would ask about the characters they had never met, and she’d concoct elaborate accounts of their recent arrival to Miami.

In print, Frank Stoneman intensely attacked the governor of Florida, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, for his endeavors to drain the Everglades. When Stoneman ran for a circuit judgeship and won, Broward refused to certify the election. Frank Stoneman was referred to as “Judge” for the rest of his life without ever taking the bench.

In 1917, as World War I was raging in Europe, the Navy sent a ship to enlist men and women into the reserves. Marjory was assigned to cover the story of a local woman who was to be the first Miami woman to enlist. The woman didn’t show, so Marjory decided that she would take her place. She joined the Navy, became a yoeman first class, and was stationed in Miami.

Already leading a tough life, forced into early maturity, the military didn’t suit Marjory Stoneman Douglas. She was no fan of rising early, and the officers were not fans of her grammar corrections. She requested and was granted a discharge, at which time she joined the American Red Cross, who sent her off to Paris. There, she cared for refugees until the war ended and her father cabled for her to come home and take over as the assistant editor at the now Miami Herald.

Her new column, “The Galley,” made Stoneman Douglas a local celebrity. “The Galley” was about whatever she wanted it to be about that week. She spoke out for responsible urban planning when Miami’s population increased ten-fold in a decade. She supported women’s suffrage and civil rights, and opposed prohibition and tariffs. She began to talk about Florida’s landscape and geography.

By 1923, her success and the pressure of writing her column and conflicts with the paper’s publisher got to Marjory. She began to experience blackouts and was diagnosed with nerve fatigue. She left the Herald and began to recover by sleeping late and writing short stories. The Saturday Evening Post published 40 of them, along with those of Fitzgerald and Hemingway. Most were fiction. Her protagonists were often independent women who encountered social injustices. The people and animals of the Everglades were the background of others, and some were non-fiction. “Wings” addressed the slaughter of Everglade birds for fashionable ladies’ hats.

She was commissioned to write a pamphlet called “An argument for the establishment of a tropical botanical garden in South Florida, causing her to become a fixture at garden clubs where she delivered speeches. She became a part of the Miami theater scene, writing one-act plays, one loosely modeled on the life of Al Capone, who’s henchmen showed up to check in on it. In 1926 she designed and built the cottage in which she lived for the rest of her life. Becoming ever more the socialite, she became a forceful pioneer in the fights for feminism, racial justice, and conservation. She fought against poverty, slumlords, and poor sanitation.

And she fought for the Everglades.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas served on the committee that argued for the creation of Everglades National Park, along with the force behind the idea, Ernest F. Coe. In 1934 Everglades National Park was designated by Congress, but it took another 13 years to acquire land and secure funding.

In the early 40s, Douglas was approached to contribute to a book series called the “Rivers of America.” She was asked to write about the Miami River, which she said was about “an inch long,” and instead persuaded the publisher to allow her to write about the Everglades. She spent five years researching the little-known ecology of the area, spending time with a geologist who discovered that South Florida’s sole freshwater source was the Biscayne Aquifer, which was filled by the Everglades. “The Everglades: River of Grass” was published in 1947 and sold out in a month. The book’s first line, “There are no other Everglades in the world” is easily the most famous line written about South Florida. She wrote about an ecosystem inescapably connected to South Florida’s people and cultures.

Everglades National Park officially opened in 1947, the same year River of Grass was published. The book became one of the most famous environmental calls to action in history, causing citizens and politicians to take notice. It was, in fact, a blueprint for many of the Everglades restoration projects that are still on-going today.

By the 1960s, the Everglades were in imminent danger of disappearing forever. In response to floods caused by hurricanes in 1947, the Central and Southern Florida Flood Control Project was established to construct flood control mechanisms in the Everglades. 1,400 miles of canals and levees were built over the course of 20 years. The C-38 canal, the last built, straightened the Kissimmee River, inflicting catastrophic damage on the habitats and water quality of South Florida.

Douglas initially gave the project her approval, as it promised to deliver much-needed water to the shrinking Everglades. But, in reality, it diverted water away from the Everglades to meet sugarcane farmers’ needs. The Army Corps of Engineers refused to release water to Everglades National Park until much of the land was unrecognizable.

Douglas fought fervently against the Corps of Engineers and Sugarcane Farmers, saying “their mommies must have never let them play with mud pies, so now they play with cement.” She was giving a speech addressing the harmful practices of the Army Corps of Engineers when the colonel in attendance dropped his pen. As he stooped to pick it up, she stopped her speech and said, “Colonel! You can crawl under that table and hide, but you can’t get away from me!”

In 1969, at age 79, Douglas formed Friends of the Everglades. Dues were $1.00, and the purpose was to raise awareness of the potential devastation a huge jetport slated for construction in the fragile wetlands would cause. Due to Marjory’s perseverance, and the support of her 3000 Friends of the Everglades members and other environmental groups, President Nixon scrapped funding for the project after one runway was built, which still exists today.

Douglas spent the rest of her life defending the Everglades. In his introduction to her autobiography “Voice of the River,” John Rothchild described her appearance at 1973 at a public meeting as “half the size of her fellow speakers and she wore huge dark glasses, which along with the huge floppy hat made her look like Scarlet O’Hara as played by Igor Stravinsky. When she spoke, everybody stopped slapping mosquitoes and more or less came to order. She reminded us all of our responsibility to nature and I don’t remember what else. Her voice had the sobering effect of a one-room schoolmarm’s. The tone itself seemed to tame the rowdiest of the local stone crabbers, plus the developers, and the lawyers on both sides. I wonder if it didn’t also intimidate the mosquitoes. . . . The request for a Corps of Engineers permit was eventually turned down. This was no surprise to those of us who’d heard her speak.”

Douglas also opposed the drainage of a suburb in Dade County named East Everglades. After the county approved building permits, the land flooded as it had for centuries. Homeowners demanded the Army Corps of Engineers drain their neighborhoods, and Marjory was the only opposition. At a 1983 hearing, the 93-year-old was booed and shouted at by the residents. “Can’t you boo any louder than that?” she said. “Look. I’m an old lady. I’ve been here since eight o’clock. It’s now eleven. I’ve got all night, and I’m used to the heat.” County commissioners eventually decided not to drain the land.

Until the day she died Douglas continued to fight for her causes. She served as a charter member of the first American Civil Liberties Union chapter organized in the South. She spoke on the floor of the Florida state legislature, urging them to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. She bolstered the Florida Rural Legal Services, a group that worked to protect migrant farm workers employed by the sugarcane industry. She co-founded the Friends of the Miami-Dade Public Libraries and served as its first president.

The Florida Department of Natural Resources named its headquarters in Tallahassee after her in 1980, to which she said she would have rather seen the Everglades restored than her name on a building. In 1986 the National Parks Conservation Association instituted the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Award, honoring individuals who advocate and fight for the protection of the National Park System. And in 1991, at the age of 100, blind and near deaf, Douglas was visited by Queen Elizabeth II, to whom she gave a signed copy of “The Everglades: River of Grass.”

Douglas asked that trees be planted on her hundredth birthday in lieu of gifts, resulting in over 100,000 planted across the state of Florida, including a bald cypress on the lawn of the governor’s mansion.

In 1993, President Clinton awarded Marjory Stoneman Douglas the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor given to a civilian. She donated it to Wellesley College.

Douglas once said that “Conservation is now a dead word… You can’t conserve what you haven’t got.” She died in 1998 at the age of 108. Her ashes were scattered in the Everglades she worked so tirelessly to preserve.

That was Abigail Trabue.

Daniel Beard, who would be the first superintendent of the Everglades National Park, wrote in 1938 that “The southern Florida wilderness scenery is a study in halftones, not bright, broad strokes of a full brush as is the case of most of our other national parks. There are no knife-edged mountains protruding up into the sky. There are no valleys of any kind. No glaciers exist, no gaudy canyons, no geysers, no mighty trees unless we except the few royal palms, not even a rockbound coast with the spray of ocean waves — none of the things we are used to seeing in our parks. Instead, there are lonely distances, intricate and monotonous waterways, birds, sky, and water. To put it crudely, there is nothing (and we include the bird rookeries) in the Everglades that will make Mr. Jonnie Q. Public suck in his breath. This is not an indictment against the Everglades as a national park, because “breath sucking” is still not the thing we are striving for in preserving wilderness areas.”

The sentiment aside, Daniel Beard was wrong. There’s plenty to suck in your breath at in the Everglades. No, you won’t be brought to your knees like many are at the first sight of the Grand Canyon, but I challenge anyone to tell me of another national park with such an array of wildlife immediately on display. It is, indeed, a magical place. But it’s true, more than beauty, The Everglades National Park is an important place.

There’s a great book called “The Wonder of It All: 100 Stories from the National Park Service.” It’s a collection of stories from park service employees and volunteers. In it, Ranger David Kronk talks of a 1990 visit to the Everglades from President George H.W. Bush. Kronk lead the President and some children who were finishing a 3-day educational program on a walk. He asked the children to tell the President what the Everglades meant to them. Among some other pithy answers, one girl described the limited water supply in South Florida, saying we need to conserve and share the water so that there is enough for the animals and plants in the park.

Later that month, President Bush would mention meeting some budding young environmentalists at the Everglades in his State of the Union address. An eight-year study was commissioned by Congress the following year, and the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Project was authorized in 2000. At a cost of more than $10.5 billion and with a 35-year timeline, it is the largest hydrologic restoration project ever undertaken in the United States.

To help restore water flow, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service established the Everglades Headwaters National Wildlife Refuge and Conservation Area in 2011.

Though the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Project continues today, it has been compromised by politics and funding problems, and the Everglades are still in danger.

The primary access to the Everglades National Park is through Florida City, 30 miles southeast of Miami, at the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center. A few miles into the park is the Royal Palm Visitors Center, where you can hike two popular wheelchair-accessible half-mile trails, seeing the marshes, alligators and wading birds, along with Royal Palms and Gumbo-Limbo trees with their peeling bark.

You can then journey on the main park road 38 miles to the Flamingo Visitor Center on the southern tip of the state. On the way, you’ll wander through the parks various ecosystems, and can stop at three short walks, including an overlook where you can get a view of Marjory Stoneman Douglas’s “River of Grass,” and another, where you can see the largest Mahogany tree in the U.S.

At Flamingo, you’ll see the true diversity of the park’s waterfowl. Spoonbills, ibises, snowy egrets, blue herons, and the like, wading among the mangrove trees. The area was heavily damaged during hurricane Irma, but the campground has partially re-opened. Boat tours that depart here have been suspended, but canoe and kayak rentals are now available again.

From the north on US 41, visitors can enter the park at Shark Valley, named because its water flows southwest toward Shark River. Here, you can walk, bike, or ride a tram along a 15-mile loop road and see some of the park’s best wildlife concentrations. The Shark Valley observation tower offers a 360-degree view of the Everglades, and a bird’s-eye view of alligators, turtles, fish, and birds.

From the Gulf Coast Visitor Center in the town of Everglades City, you can launch your boat or take a scheduled sightseeing boat tour to explore the vast mangrove estuary of the Ten Thousand Islands.

Backcountry camping, accessible by boat, is available from both the Flamingo and Gulf Coast areas. You can take an 8-day canoe trip down the maze of waterways, camping on elevated platforms along the way.

The park is open year-round, but summers can be steamy, hot, and buggy.

You may have heard Marjory Stoneman Douglas’s name in the news recently. The Florida high school that suffered one of the world’s deadliest school shootings on February 14th is named after her. You can donate to the school at msdstrong.us.

This episode of America’s National Parks was written and produced by me, Jason Epperson, and Narrated by Abigail Trabue. If you enjoyed the show, we’d love a 5-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. Don’t forget to hit the subscribe button, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Just search “National Park Podcast.”

The America’s National Parks Podcast is part of the RV Miles Network of web resources for United States travelers. If you are interested in RV travel, give us a listen over at the RV Miles Podcast.

You can also follow Abigail and I as we travel the country in our converted school bus with our three boys at Our Wandering Family dot com, and all over social media.

The America’s National Parks Podcast is a production of Lotus Theatricals, LLC.

Music

Podcast Episodes

Grand, Gloomy, and Peculiar

  • March 6, 2018July 16, 2018

Deep within Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave National Park, one can find so much more than rock formations. The shale-capped mass of 400 known miles of caverns holds the history of America, told by the Black enslaved cave guides that made it one of the country’s top tourist attractions, then and now.

Listen

Listen to the episode in the player below, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

or Download this episode (right click and save)

Connect & Subscribe

You can find America’s National Parks Podcast on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and make sure to subscribe on Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, so you’ll never miss an episode.

Learn More

Links to some of the resources we used and the website links we mentioned in this episode. 

In Kentucky, a Family at the Center of the Earth
A 2014 in-depth interview with Jerry Bransford and New York Times reporter Kenan Christiansen.

bransfordmemorial.com

Jerry Bransford’s dream is to build a memorial in the Bransford cemetery at Mammoth Cave as a tribute to all the past slave guides and the entire Bransford family, especially Mat and Nick. He also would like to pass on his stories and memories to his future descendants utilizing the cemetery and memorial. You can the website to contribute, and it’s also full of much more detailed information on the Bransford family history at Mammoth.

Ranger Lore: The Occupational Folklife of Parks – Jerry Bransford Discusses Family Legacy

A YouTube interview with Jerry Bransford about visiting Mammoth as a child with his family:

Mammoth Cave National Park Website

Info on all of the cave tours, camping, and other activities at Mammoth Cave National Park.

Transcript

PROLOGUE: HOUCHINS AND THE BEAR

According to legend, at the turn of the 19th Century, a Kentucky hunter named John Houchins found a black bear, and shot. He failed to kill the bear, and it ran, wounded, while Houchins gave chase until it led him to the entrance of a cave. Some say the bear chased Houchins, who, either way, is credited with the modern discovery of a cave system that sprawls for nearly 400 documented miles, so large that it is yet to be fully mapped, and may go on for up to 1000 miles.

On this episode of America’s National parks, the world’s largest cave system, Mammoth Cave.

On the ceilings and walls of Mammoth, one can find thousands of names written in smoke from a time when such a thing was encouraged. One of the oldest and most prolific names — sometimes written backward — is simply “Stephen.” Stephen Bishop, Mammoth’s most famous explorer, would take his candle to the ceiling and trace his name, sometimes in reverse due to the mirror he was looking in to avoid the wax dipping in his eyes.

In 1838, the 17-year-old Bishop was brought to explore and lead expeditions into Mammoth by the cave’s new owner Franklin Gorin, a lawyer from nearby Glasgow, Kentucky, who purchased the property, seeing the cave’s potential as a public attraction. Previously, the cave had been used as a Saltpetre mine during the War of 1812, when slaves mined valuable potassium nitrate, a primary ingredient in gunpowder.

Bishop quickly got to work, guiding tourists and exploring the depths of the cave, and creating its first map. This is what Gorin had to say about Bishop: he was “handsome, good-humored, intelligent, the most complete of guides, the presiding genius of this territory. He has occupied himself so frequently in exploring the various passages of the cavern, that there is now no living being who knows it so well,” Gorin said. “The discoveries made have been the result of his courage, intelligence, and untiring zeal. He is extremely attentive and polite, particularly so to the ladies, and he runs over what he has to say with such ease and readiness, and mingles his statement of facts with such lofty language, that all classes, male and female, listen with respect, and involuntarily smile at his remark. His business as a guide brought him so often in contact with the intellectual and scientific, that he has become acquainted with every geological specimen in the cave.”

Stephen wore a chocolate-colored slouch hat, a jacket for warmth, and striped trousers. Over his shoulder on a strap swung a canister of lamp oil. In one hand he carried a basket of provisions for the longer trips – fried chicken, apples, biscuits, and often a bottle of white lightning for refreshment. In the other hand, he carried an oil lantern – a tin dish holding oil and a wick, with a small heat shield held above the flame by wires.

A visitor described Stephen bishop’s “perfectly chiseled features,” his “keen, dark eye and glossy hair, and mustache. He is the model of a guide” the visitor said, “quick, daring, enthusiastic, persevering, with a lively appreciation of the wonders he shows, and a degree of intelligence unusual in one of his class…I think no one can travel under his guidance without being interested in the man, and associating him in memory with the realm over which he is chief ruler.”

But a ruler of Mammoth, Bishop was not. Quite the opposite, Stephen Bishop, like the saltpeter miners before him, was an enslaved, black man.

Each week, on the America’s National Parks Podcast, we plan to focus on a specific story or two behind a National Park Service unit. But for this, our first episode, The epic tale of Mammoth Cave was too juicy to pass up. It’s really the story of America, warts and all. We begin, as most National Park histories do, with the first people to call America home.

ACT I: NATIVE AMERICANS

The hunter John Houchins may be credited with Mammoth Cave’s modern discovery, but Stephen Bishop quickly found that man had been deep within the cave long before him.

In the summer of his first year in the cave, Stephen began to probe the obscure passageways. In what was then known as the Main Cave, behind an enormous rock called the “Giant’s Coffin,” he squeezed into a small room and down through a crack into a maze of passages beneath. Here he found the fragments of a burned cane torch and grapevine ties left by natives who had explored Mammoth Cave long before.

Nearly one hundred years later, in 1935, Civilian Conservation Corps workers Grover Campbell and Lyman Cutliff were exploring a new passageway. They climbed a ledge and discovered the unnerving scene of an ancient tragedy. A human head and arm, the only visible parts of a body pinned beneath a six-ton boulder. A digging stick lay nearby, the cause of the boulder’s collapse – its owner had dug too deeply.

Like the cane torches found by Stephen Bishop, the twenty-three-hundred-year-old body had been well preserved by the cave’s steadfast temperature and humidity, and by the salt in the soil.

Thousands of ancient artifacts have been found in Mammoth — gourd bowls, pottery, woven cloth, and a handful of petroglyphs. From 4,000 years ago until nearly 2,000 years ago, Native Americans explored at least six miles of the cave, until one day, for reasons unknown, they disappeared.

ACT II: THE SLAVE GUIDES

Stephen Bishop and the other slave guides such as Materson and Nick Bransford continued to escort the curious along their choice of two routes. The short route, a 6-hour journey, and the long route, a 14-hour journey, took visitors through all the curious formations, rooms, and obscurities Mammoth had to offer.

For a nickel, they’d lash a candle to a stick and write your name upon the ceiling. Theywould journey down Echo River in small boats and entertain tourists with songs in a round with the echo of the cave.

On one such tour, Bishop’s boat full of travelers capsized, and all the oil lamps were extinguished. In complete darkness, he led his party through the neck-deep water for five hours, until Materson Bransford arrived to save them.

Materson went by Mat, with one T. He was the son of affluent Tennessean Thomas Bransford and a slave woman named Hannah. He began guiding at Mammoth Cave in 1838, and ultimately became the property of his own half-brother after the death of his father. He married a slave girl named Parthena, and built a home for her and their four children. As the children grew, however, Mat was powerless to stop his wife’s owner from selling first his two daughters, and then his youngest son.

Mat Bransford

Many did not view such an act as horrendous, including opponents of slavery. In the 1860’s Mat guided abolitionist John Fowler Rusling on a tour. Rusling remarked, “I don’t suppose you missed these children much? You colored people never do they say.” Mat was quick to inform him differently.

Just months before the civil war ended and slaves were emancipated, Mat used his life savings from cave tour tips to buy back one of his daughters, who was fifteen years old and pregnant at the time. His other two children were never found.

Mat remained a Mammoth Cave guide for the remainder of his life. His Eldest son Henry became a guide, and then his grandson, too, whose name was also Matt, but with two “T”s. Matt with two Ts Bransford decided that, after the civil war, Black people shouldn’t just work Mammoth Cave, they should visit it. Blacks were still not welcome in most establishments. They were not allowed to be on the same tours with whites or stay in the same hotel. Matt traveled to larger cities to appeal to the African American community to visit the world-famous Cave. He led Special tours for them, and provided lodging and meals for black visitors with his wife Zemmie at their home called the Bransford Resort. White visitors had been touring Mammoth for a century, and now, thanks to the younger Matt Bransford, Black visitors could share the experience.

ACT III: CAVE WARS

There are more cave attractions throughout the Midwest than you can shake a stick at, but Mammoth is different.

“A grand, gloomy and peculiar place,” Bishop called it. Instead of the elaborate configurations of drip formations that you’ll find elsewhere, Mammoth is full of gigantic rooms formed by ancient underground rivers that sculpted the sandstone and limestone, capped by a shale roof. It’s more labyrinths and domes than wedding cakes.

As the industrial revolution raged on, railways brought more and more visitors to Mammoth. By the 1880s, tens of thousands of yearly visitors were arriving by a rail line built specifically to accomplish that task. The Mammoth Cave Railroad would operate successfully for 50 years, making runs from Glasgow Junction every 25 minutes in the summer.

Shortly after the turn of the 20th century, the great National Park idea had taken hold. Half a dozen parks had been proclaimed by Congress, including one cave — South Dakota’s Wind Cave National Park. Interest in protecting Mammoth in the same fashion began to spring up, but by 1920, a war of economics had broken out in the Kentucky Cave Country. The Mammoth Cave Estate and dozens of other caves that had been discovered in the area competed for the massive profit in showing tourists the wonders below the earth.

Colossal Cave, Long Cave, Short’s Cave, Great Onyx Cave, Indian Cave, Salts Cave and Crystal Cave all tried to snag motorists bound for the world-famous Mammoth, often by stopping them on the road using ringers dressed as authorities saying that Mammoth was the other direction, or that Mammoth was flooded.

An oilman named George Morrison believed that the Cave’s length extended beyond the surface boundaries of the Mammoth Cave Estate. He searched for clues in the cave and above ground until he got word of a sinkhole where kids played in the summer because cool air came up from below.

Morrison bought the property and drilled until he found a cave that was revealed to have a direct connection to the rest of Mammoth. He dubbed his site “the New Entrance to Mammoth Cave” and began selling tickets to motorists on their way to the Old Entrance.

The Kentucky cave wars were not without casualty. When cave owner Floyd Collins was exploring for a more profitable cave and became lodged underground in 1925, a circus atmosphere developed around his entrapment, as the story drew national attention. Thousands of sightseers descended on Cave City, hawkers sold food and souvenirs. Reporters drafted hourly updates for the nation, including aviator Charles Lindbergh, who delivered news reports by air as federal troops were dispatched to keep order.

Rescue attempts failed, and Collins died on his eighteenth day below the surface.

Rampant commercialism aside, Kentuckians held a deep pride for the caves at Mammoth, and many initiatives were floated to transition the area into a National Park. For 30 years, surveys were taken up, bills were introduced and passed, land was purchased, and finally, in 1941, Mammoth Cave National Park was dedicated.

ACT III: JERRY BRANSFORD

On Memorial Day and 4th of July weekends, a young Jerry Bransford — the great-great-grandson of a Mat Bransford — would ride the half-hour drive from his home in Glasgow to visit Mammoth with his family in the back seat of their ’49 Chevy.

On those holiday family Picnics, Jerry’s father, David Bransford Sr, would tell him the history of his family at Mammoth — how the cave is a part of their heritage, even though they still weren’t allowed to go inside the hotel for refreshments. The staff, who still knew Jerry’s father, would give them ice creams and Cokes at the back door.

Post-slavery, the Bransfords, and other black men were still the preeminent tour guides at Mammoth, famous even, but when the cave became a National Park, those guides had to look for new jobs. Many of their homes were forced to be sold to the government. The great act of protecting the underground wonderland turned away the people who knew it best.

When Jerry retired — nearly 200 years after the slaves mined the saltpeter for the War of 1812 — he began discussions with the National Park Service to return the Bransford family to the park. Jerry Bransford is now a 5th generation cave guide, and a National Park Service Ranger. His mission? To tell the stories of the great Black cave guides who were so instrumental in the discovery and interpretation of Mammoth Cave, so that they should never be forgotten again.

EPILOGUE: VISITING MAMMOTH

Today, when Jerry Bransford gives tours, he always notices the names scratched into the walls that were made by his ancestors. He’s found 14, including, the one that says simply, “Mat 1850.”

“Whenever I see a signature from my kin, I feel awed by what they did,” he told the New York Times. “But when I see Mat’s, it just knocks me down. I don’t know how anyone can have their kids taken away and never get them back.”

Mammoth Cave is one of the most conveniently located national parks, along I-65 just 30 miles outside of Bowling Green, Kentucky. Several different daily cave tours provide visitors with a wide range of sights to see, including the Gothic Avenue Tour, where you can see Stephen Bishop’s candle-written signature, and hundreds more. The more adventurous visitors can climb, crawl, and squeeze through the 6-hour Wild Cave Tour, seeing places only a small number of humans have visited. Along with the half-dozen or so paid cave tours, visitors can experience a wide array of above-ground activities, including, hiking, biking, kayaking and horseback riding. There’s still a small hotel on-site, as well as several primitive campgrounds. Several private campgrounds are just a stones’ throw from the park as well.

Jerry Bransford still gives cave tours on a seasonal schedule — he swore our three sons in as Mammoth Cave Junior Rangers. He’s raising money for a memorial to better honor the many Bransfords and other Black cave guides buried at the simple cemetery in the park. You can donate at bransfordmemorial.com.

Music

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