John Muir Research Paper

Muir wrote many books, most about nature and some about his personal life and adventures. His

John Muir was a muckraker who protested against the expansion of people and animals that would ruin our soon to be national parks. Muir was a man that loved to explore natural formations in nature and traveled around the world to see as much natural land as possible. As he traveled around the world, he found out that California was his place to live. In California, his favorite places to explore and watch were the Sierra Nevada Mountains and Yosemite. As more and more settlers moved West, the land that Muir loved was soon to be destroyed by herds of animals and people looking for a place to build their homes. Muir wrote most of his 300 articles and 10 major books in Oakland, California. In Muir’s writings, he elegantly

It was John Muir one of the first advocates for the national park idea who developed the idea and also scientific theory that Yosemite Valley had been carved by glaciers. Muir was a very spiritual person coming from a religious family in which his father was a itinerant Presbyterian minister. John Muir had such a huge love and appreciation for nature, and being the religious man that he was he believed that “God is revealed

This essay is a case study analysis of the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC), which was formed in 1876. The AMC was established to bring people together to conserve and enjoy the out-door wilderness. Volunteerism has been a major tradition of the AMC, which separates the club from other environmental organizations. AMC’s close group of volunteers gives the club a sense of community. AMC operated for years as a highly decentralized, highly voluntarily managed organization, but as memberships grew, and chapters formed, the organization would need to hire paid staff. By the late 1970s to late 80s, AMC was faced with financial deficits. Thus, by 1989 Harvard MBA graduate Andy Falender was employed as the new executive director of AMC. Falender would restructure the club, and fix its financial crisis.

Thoreau is a hugely influential character in the history of America, helping to define American thought and continue to inspire our modern ideas and authors. “Countless contemporary nature

The Progressive Era was a period of social activism and political reform that grew from the 1890s to the 1920s. Social reformers and journalists, like Jane Addams, Jacob Riis, and Ida Tarbell were some of the powerful voices for progressivism. “They concentrated on exposing the evils of corporate greed, combating fear of immigrants, and urging Americans to think hard about what democracy meant.” Many progressive reformers wanted to end corruption in the government, regulate business practices, address health hazards, and improve working conditions. It was also an era of conservationists. Conservationists are people who protect and preserve the environment and wildlife. Throughout the Progressive Era, there were many conservationists who wrote and described nature, but the most well-known figure in conservation was John Muir. John Muir worked to protect Earth’s beauty by traveling and exploring nature, co-founding the Sierra Club, and by influencing others through his writings and by showing some of the most important people how the wildlife was magnificent.

John Muir is arguably the most influential conservationist in American history. He was an active member in the preservation of the American wilderness from the late 1800’s until he passed in 1914. Muir is often referred to as the “Father of the National Parks” because of his efforts in the establishment of several National Parks. One of the biggest flaws of American history textbooks in need of change is the fact that they do not include the conservationists who have preserved the environment so today the same beauty can be see the way that they saw it. John Muir was involved in many American conservation efforts including the co-founding of Yosemite National Park, founding of the Sierra Club, and his overall career as a

Furthermore the Sierra Club was successfully organized due to the fact that there were so many like-minded individuals interested in environmental preservation. Moreover, a disturbance (the proposed boundary changes), the leadership of John Muir, and numerous like-minded individuals are variables that contributed.

John Muir and Gifford Pinchot were men who both had different opinions about the environment. Both men were active in the early 1900s, and both aimed to protect North American wilderness by opposing rapid deforestation and unregulated economic land development. Muir was a preservationist who believed that nature should be protected for its own sake and that we should protect it for its beauty. He believed nature provided spiritual renewal and met human recreational needs. As such, Muir recognized that nature met human needs in an anthropocentrist view, but he also believed that nature deserved protection for its own inherent value in an ecocentrist view. Pinchot was a conservationist who favored sustainable use of resources for the benefit

Both John Muir and Gifford Pinchot aimed to protect North American wilderness due to unregulated land development but form different perspectives. John Muir is one of the key figure to promote the idea of preservation. (Bulkan J., 2016) In his understanding wilderness offers people an opportunity to revisit and experience nature away from busy city lives. (Difference Between Conservation and Preservation., 2011)

The primary source that I chose to document was on Professor Karl’s suggested list of primary sources. The article was titled Theodore Roosevelt on Conservation and can be found on the website http://www.sageamericanhistory.net/progressive/docs/TRonConserv.htm . It is President Theodore Roosevelt’s address to the Seventh Annual Message to Congress which took place on December 3, 1907.

Slide1- The Sierra Club is a nonprofit, member-supported public interest organization that promotes conservation of the natural environment by influencing public policy decisions. In addition, the Sierra Club organizes participation in wilderness activities for its members, including mountain climbing, backpacking, and camping. It is the oldest and largest nonprofit, grassroots environmental organization in the world, with more than 700,000 members. (seven hundred thousand)

I believe this paper was assigned because it is an important historical document written by the founder of our field Aldo Leopold. This document displays the brilliance that is Aldo Leopold and just how far ahead of his time he actually was. The fact that Aldo Leopold’s concepts and figures are still accurate today, is a testament to his brilliance

An appreciation of all living and non-living things with a view that we live in a complex world of interactions and interrelatedness. The Sierra Club would be an environmental organization that would share or express this value.

Phrases such as “botanising in glorious freedom [...] wandering through innumerable tamarac and arbor-vitae swamps, and forests [...], rejoicing in their bound wealth and strength and beauty, climbing the trees, revelling in their flowers and fruit [...], glorying in the fresh cool beauty and charm of the bog [...] displayed in boundless profusion”, “rarest and most beautiful”, and “I was able to wander many a long wild fertile mile in the forests and bogs, free as the winds, gathering plants, and glorying in God's abounding inexhaustible spiritual beauty bread”, all show how Muir felt about nature and what nature meant to him. A key phrase that shows Muir’s attitude towards nature states, “Storms, thunderclouds, winds in the woods—were welcomed as friends”. These phrases, as well as the words mentioned above, are extremely positive and show the utmost joy Muir found in his surroundings. The long and detailed descriptions of Muir’s surroundings helps to reinforce his joy in nature. The words that Muir uses to describe nature shows that he is close to nature and feels a connection with it. These positive words also show how absolutely stunning Muir finds nature and how he finds peace and joy in the wild. All of this is also supported by one of Muir’s