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Show U. S. Park System History Related By Supt. P. P. Patraw Radio address delivered hy P. P. Patraw, Superintendent, Superinten-dent, Zion and Bryce Canyon National Park, recently given giv-en over radio -station KSL. It was in the region that is now Yellowstone National .'ark that was born the National Park idea, an inspired thought that has since had its growth and fulfillment over ov-er the length and breadth of our own country. It has also spread to several foreign countries. That thought or dream was conceived on the basis that areas of outstanding out-standing inspirational character should be reserved and preserved for all peoples of all times, as opposed op-posed to private ownership and commercial exploration. Beginninfg in 18 78 with Yellowstone Yel-lowstone as its first member, the rate of adoption into the National Park family was slow', only four being added in the next twenty-five twenty-five years. The rate has gradually gradu-ally quickened and the family now has twenty-four members. The experience, of years has cry-stalized cry-stalized the principles governing the standards, for admittance into the family and has more fully de-j de-j veloped the units of measure i which determine the fitness of a i proposed area. The most impor-! impor-! tant unit of measure is the one which requires that an area must j possess the quality of unique, and i inspirational scenic,, scientific or j historic interest., Another rule I generally applied is that the area ! must be sufficiently extensive that I its principal features may be ade-j ade-j quately protected in an unsoiled ' I natural state, Jj Increasingly .more and more areas have been offered for adoption adop-tion into the family because of its growing popularity, but in each ' case the measuring process has - - Jfbeen or Is being more carefully applied. Some proposed areas have been discarded on first examination; exam-ination; others have been welgh- ed time and again before being 'I found deficient in some respect; ' j a few have from time to time rbeen found to measure up to requirements re-quirements and been admitteed; others are still heinff measured. j It is only through such careful i processes that the National Park Service can maintain the high ! standard set for family membership. member-ship. Had the bars been lowered i to admit all or even a fair share of the areas proposed for mem-, mem-, bership, quality would have be-j be-j come so diluted as to be little ! above commonplace. In contrast, the application of the name National Na-tional Park to an area today means and will continue to mean that here is a place in which na-I na-I ture has created a masterpiece. ! For many years national parks j were administered in one of the branches of the office of Secretary of the Interior, mixed in with ' other departmental affairs. By 1916 the family had grown to 1 such size and importance that a separate bureau called the National Na-tional Park Service was set up in ; the Interior Department to administer ad-minister it. I There are two main branelms of the National Park Service with i which we are here concerned, one . i j (Continued on page seven) Hory of U. S. Park System Told P. P. Patraw, Zion Park Supt. beT"" f,'m PaS8) i nlC the though t h , I mom,me"ts. A1. finprt u,"es a'e not closely de. at,1aenalaCtUally 0VP. there t-, m , Natlonal Parks are es- 1 An H '! knWn 88 le Ame'-Ant.qmt.es Ame'-Ant.qmt.es Act, for the me -vafon ot an area-sman'o,- ' 8e--containing something of "est. such as the' ruins of pre-h'stonc pre-h'stonc Indian habitations, the TT remainS dinurS and Sltes of early American colon-wation colon-wation and history. However, as I have stated, lines do overlap; we do have both parks and monuments, monu-ments, containing prehistoric Indian In-dian cliff dwellings, for instance and there have been in the past several instances of a national park first being a national mnn-ment, mnn-ment, as was the case of Zion National Na-tional Park. In the administration and development de-velopment of these places our rule and guide are contained in the following concise words quoted from the act establishing the National Na-tional Park Service: "The fundamental purpose of the parks and monuments is to conserve the scenery and the natural na-tural and historic objects and the wildlife therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations." genera-tions." The requirement for preservation preserva-tion is an ideal; the provision for development calls 'for the application applica-tion of practical principles so that the parks may be freely visited without the loss of that ideal of preservation. There is an anom-oly anom-oly here a gap between development develop-ment and complete preservation, because you cannot have development, develop-ment, you cannot have large numbers num-bers of visitors, without some impairment im-pairment of nature and natural features. We have bridged this gap, and we think, successfully, by the careful way in which we have planned and execulted our developments, by excluding all non-essential things, and by setting set-ting up certain restrictive regulations. regula-tions. In planning developments so as to make a national park accessible to its visitors, with roads, trails, hotels, camps and auxiliary services, we follow a general rule of concentrating such facilities and limiting them to only portions of the entire park area. In this manner all the visitors vis-itors of today and tomorrow may enter and enjoy a cross-section of the park's natural features, in ,omfort equivalent to that iouud in a city; many of them will walk over the easier footpaths branching branch-ing off from the roads; some will hike or ride over the horse trails into more remote parts, and a few the more adventuresome will get off the the beaten routes into the undisturbed wilderness beyond. It is by this sliding scale of devolopment and use that we hope to maintain a park in good state of preservation of nature as far into the future as we can fore-00 fore-00 on that in these national parks,, if no other places, there will in the future still be found areas where the disfigurement of rock and trees by inscriptions cannot can-not be seen, where a person can get beyond the sound Of automobile automo-bile horns, and where native wildlife wild-life continues its existence in a .state of nature 'similar to that existing ex-isting when modern civilized men came in to settle the region. It is because of the ideal of preservation preser-vation that those things common to so-called resorts are not to be found in national parks. It is Se belief of the National Park Service that the parks should primarily pri-marily be places for inspiration rather than for amusement. I have spoken of national parks as masterpieces of nature and having unique character. I do not Having u h perfect illus- SnZion Bryce5 and Grand Canyon the majesty of the cl.ff Tlon, and the rare beauty of Bryce Canyon. All three are call- ranindiWauality entirely different dif-ferent .:rom the others. Utah be.u5 blessed with an Utan u e lflcent scenery, TTi 3 thl Mn -her borders, two of the Canyon and Z on montiments SiXf Bre? r Vtnr.1 Bridges, C6daL Bridge, Arches. Dino-Rainbow Dino-Rainbow Bridge, saur, and Timpanogos Cav. is aiso srsSo ado :w8tni D- 8hares TvUh Cor Ree Jn other a-! een lveD Wayne conty--to Iavorabl8condnafflember pected -soon ecw of the monument family. These park areas in Utah must be considered an important part of the natural resources of the state, along with the forests, mines, range and farming lands. I There is one material difference I economically between national park areas as a resource and the ; other resources mentioned. A : mine becomes exhausted; forests' may yield only their annual growth; farm and grazing lands' have their maximum limit of pro-: dtiction. On the other hand the ' more a national park area is used : the more productive it promises ! to become. Taking Zion National' Park as an example, it was only! a few years ago that the numbers! of visitors were counted in a few ! thousand. In the single month ! of August of this year "more than ! 21,000 visitors came to the park,1 and the total for the year will' I about reach 100,000. Of this j number about 70,000 will have come from outside the State of ; Utah, .from all parts of the United I States and from many foreign 1 countries throughout the world. Visitation to Bryce Canyon has likewise increased many fold. The economic depression through which we have been passing pass-ing has had its silver lining in the j national parks because they have shared liberally in some of the emergency measures adopted to j combat depressed conditions j Emergency Conservation Work,' Public Works and Civil Works.' j Through emergency appropriations appropria-tions for public works we have , brought our scenic highways up to ! a high standard, improved our ! trails, installed modern water and j sewer systems, and erected pub- ! lie service buildings. In Zion, Bryce and Cedar Breaks we have I had the benefit of work of one Civilian Conservation Corps camp continuously since the beginning Of Emergency Conservation Work over two years ago. We have had a second camp for more than a year, and are about to be assigned a third. With these CCC boys we have undertaken and executed I projects of untold benefit to the park areas erosion control to protect pro-tect areas threatened with damage from storms and floods; fences to exclude trespass stock so that native na-tive vegetation and. wildlife may I thrive undisturbed; trails and mo- j torways for quicker access in case j of fire in isolated forested areas; i public campgrounds for accomo- dating more visitors; road slopes! improved so that they may the j sooner heal their wounds with vegetative cover, and many other similar beneficial projects. In the normal rate of federal appropriations appropria-tions there would have been many years before we should have reached reach-ed the state of protective and public pub-lic service development in the parks and monuments that we have now gained through these emergency organizations. Through them we have gainfully employed hundreds of men in practical, worthwhile projects, and have at the same time tremendously improved im-proved the parks' position to receive re-ceive and accommodate the large increases in the use of the parks by visitors of this year, and the even greater increases anticipated next year and the Eucceeeding years. |