This spring, we’re highlighting three of a different kind of hero: John Muir, Theodore Roosevelt, and John Wesley Powell, three amazing environmentalists who each had a huge effect on how America saw, well, America. Ever been to a national park? Ever been on a hike in unspoiled woods? Ever been to the Grand Canyon? One way or another, you have these guys to thank.
John Muir was born in Scotland in 1838. When he was 11, his family moved to Wisconsin to farm. He was kind of a rebel: college was fun and all, but he was really only interested in botany and geology, and wouldn’t study anything else. After college, he worked as an engineer and in a sawmill till an accident nearly blinded him. Bingo! He swore, after that, to be true to his dream to explore nature and study plants.
In 1867, he hiked from Indiana to Florida. Then he lit out for California, where he fell in love – with Yosemite Valley. He moved right in, designing his cabin home so that a stream ran right through it, so he’d always hear running water (did he just always have to pee?!). He became a local fixture, the kind of mountain man character that people traveled miles to see and talk to.
He kept exploring and studying; the articles he wrote while living there were read around the world and had a huge influence. He was the one who figured out Yosemite was created by glaciers, not earthquakes. It was his influence that got Yosemite namd a national park. He was the first president of the Sierra Club. And when President Theodore Roosevelt visited him, he took him camping overnight, and convinced him that it wasn’t enough just to declare Yosemite a national park – it needed federal protection. He was the first American environmentalist, a crazy mountain man who took a president on a camping trip.
Born in 1858, Theodore Roosevelt, or Teedee as his parents called him, was horribly sick as a child. His asthma was so bad, he couldn’t go to school and had to study at home. But at the age of 7, he saw a seal skull and was so fascinated, a lifetime obsession began. He spent the rest of his childhood obsessively collecting and studying animals and insects. In fact, his father founded the American Museum of Natural History, and many of young Teedee’s specimens found their way into the permanent collection.
He studied natural history at Harvard, and became an avid sportsman. Yes, that means a hunter. Ironically, it was the hunters and sportsmen of the day who were closest to nature and able to see how important it was to be responsible with nature. He was one of the first conservationists, helpoing to found the Boone and Crockett Club. They were the ones who got Yellowstone named a national park.
When he became president, his conservation work really began. He created more than 50 animal refuges, including one that protected bird populations devastated by … women’s hats. (You know, those big plumes? They nearly wiped out entire bird populations.) He created the federal Reclamation Service, which used irrigation to create acres of farmland. He created the Bureau of Forestry, which limited how much logging could be done so that forests could be sustained, not destroyed. He created reserves in Alaska, Hawaii, Mount Olympus, the Grand Canyon. Muir Woods? That was him. Teddy Roosevelt knew that if we took care of nature, nature would be able to continue to take care of us – so we’d always have wood to build with, animals to eat, and water to drink.
John Wesley Powell was born in 1834. He was a self-taught scientist who couldn’t be fenced in. In 1855, he took a four-month hike across Wisconsin. In 1856, he rowed along the Mississippi River from Minnesota to the sea. He worked as a mapmaker and fought for the North during the Civil War, lost an arm in battle – and continued to serve for three years.
After the war, he tried to settle down and become a teacher. But when he and his wife took some students on a field trip to Colorado, he realized he had to go back to exploring. He’d heard there was a big blank spot past the Green River – and rumors of a huge canyon.
He put together a ten-man expedition and set out to explore this mysterious area. The trip was plagued with disaster, he lost four men, but in the end, he discovered the Grand Canyon and became a national hero. The dramatic story became a uniquely American myth. On a second trip, he studied and documented the Native American tribes of that area, becoming an early anthropologist as well. After that, he tried hard to stop expansion and overdevelopment in the west. He did what he could, but in the end, his legacy is the magnificent natural monument nobody had the courage to explore before he did. Not bad.