John Muir - Guardian of the West

Born in Scotland in 1838, John Muir came to America in 1849 with his family to farm in Wisconsin's wilderness.  Although he had no formal education in Wisconsin, John read every book he could find.  His father was a stern taskmaster and would not allow John to read after chores in the evenings. Not to be dissuaded, John build a wooden clock and rigged an "early rising machine" that would raise his bed so he could find the time to read early in the day.

Muir enrolled in the University of Wisconsin  at the age of 22.  When he left, he wandered through the Midwest and Ohio Valley, studying plants.  He worked for a time in a wagon factory in Indianapolis until he injured his eye and decided that machinery work was not for him.  From Indiana he traveled on foot to the Gulf of Mexico, recording his observations on plants.

In 1868, Muir went to California where he spent six years exploring Yosemite.  He wandered through Nevada, Utah, Oregon, Washington and Alaska, sketching and recording the flora and fauna of what he found.

After marrying a California rancher's daughter, John set out to become an expert on horticulture.  In 1889 he enlisted one of the editors of Century Magazine to survey Yosemite Valley.  Together they observed what Muir had claimed - the forest's upland was being ruined by sheep (hoofed locust, he called them).  The land was stripped of all grass, causing spring floods and summer droughts.  The two men launched a campaign that resulted in Congress establishing Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks in 1890.

In 1891 Muir's articles pressed Congress to pass the Forest Reserve Act which allowed the president to set aside timberlands.  Muir proposed the forest commission, and finally it became a reality in 1896 when Cleveland created 13 forest reserves to protect over 21 million acres.

Next time...Muir Declares War
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Today in Pioneer History: "On December 13, Joseph Reddeford Walker, one of the greatest trailblazing mountain men and the first Anglo-American to see Yosemite, is born in Tennessee.
For more on Walker - see earlier blog posts where we spent a year traveling with Joe across the U.S.