Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
The campaign to create the Yellowstone National Park in the
United States - the world's first national park - was also assisted by
potential revenues from tourism. Though Yellowstone's champions,
such as Thomas Meagher, Cornelius Hedges and Ferdinand Hayden,
were motivated by their love for the land, the proposal was to a large
extent driven and financed by Jay Cooke, owner of the Northern
Pacific Railroad. 18 He hoped that the tourist trade would boost his
railway's income. (Cooke failed to benefit from its establishment in
1872, however, as his company collapsed in 1873.)
The act which created the park states that the land
is hereby reserved and withdrawn from settlement, occupancy, or sale
under the laws of the United States . . . and all persons who shall locate,
or settle upon, or occupy the same or any part therof, except as
hereinafter provided, shall be considered trespassers and removed
therefrom. 19
The provision was necessary to preserve the character of the land
from encroachment by European Americans, at a time in which the West
was being rapidly transformed. But Congress overlooked the fact that it
had been settled for some 11,000 years, and appears still to have been
used by the Crow, the Shoshone Tukadika and the Blackfoot.* They too
were transformed into trespassers in the park and were eventually
removed therefrom. The act preserving Yellowstone - and its clearance
of native people - became the model for the creation of national parks
throughout the Union, and in many other parts of the world.
Though the mores of modern wildlife agencies are not comparable
to those of the Nazis, there are common themes, which long predate
the Third Reich and which have continued long beyond its collapse,
informing a process that could be described as forced rewilding.
Since Schama's topic was published, further research has cast new
light on Nazi attitudes to nature and attempts at rewilding. Fascinating
* Not everyone accepts this account. Susan Hughes claims that 'the Sheepeaters
[Shosone Tukadika] as depicted in northwestern Wyoming folklore are predominantly
a myth derived from the medieval wild man and an Indian stereotype passed down
through colonial history . . . a permanent band of Sheepeaters in Yellowstone National
Park may never have existed.' 20
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