Press Release - Exhibition on National Parks to Explore the Paradox of Public Demand vs. the Need to Safeguard

SAN MARINO, Calif.—The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens continues to celebrate the centennial of the U.S. National Park Service in the second of two consecutive exhibitions that focus on the critical role that national parks have played in the history of the United States. “Geographies of Wonder: Evolution of the National Park Idea, 1933–2016” depicts the unceasing public enthusiasm for national park spaces, as well as the steady pace of change in the concept of a “national park” that grew to include national lakeshores and seashores, wild and scenic rivers, battlefields, industrial sites, parkways, and trails.

The exhibition—on view in the West Hall of the Library from Oct. 22, 2016, to Feb. 13, 2017—will illuminate the great paradox established by the National Park Service’s founding legislation: how to make the lands under its management available for public enjoyment, while at the same time ensuring the preservation of those lands for the use of future generations.

Drawing on nearly 100 items gathered from The Huntington’s library holdings, as well as from various private collections, “Geographies of Wonder: Evolution of the National Park Idea” will include maps, advertisements, illustrated guide books, travel narratives, promotional brochures, scientific surveys, reports, and correspondence that will highlight the experiences of visitors to the parks and the many—sometimes conflicting—visions of national parks that have taken shape over the past 80 years.

Among the most indelible images in the exhibition is a view of the Grand Canyon and the Colorado River from its southern rim, as depicted in 1911 by William R. Leigh for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Co., which promoted tourist travel throughout the Southwest. Leigh’s image, used by the Santa Fe Railway for various promotional purposes, aptly captures the canyon’s scenic magnificence, which many Americans equated with a unique national identity. In subsequent decades, however, popular understanding of the park’s significance has shifted as Americans have gained a deeper understanding of the intricate ecologies of the natural world. The presence on the Colorado River of structures such as Glen Canyon Dam have changed the river by altering the temperature of the water, its peak flows, and the flora and fauna that can survive along its banks.

“The example of the Grand Canyon reminds us of one of the most challenging aspects of the National Park Service’s existence,” said Peter Blodgett, H. Russell Smith Foundation Curator of Western Historical Manuscripts at The Huntington, and exhibition curator. “At the heart of the 1916 Organic Act that created the service is the stipulation that the Park Service must manage resources to provide for their use by current visitors, while also ensuring the conservation of those resources unimpaired for future generations. Implications of this conundrum—how to make the parks available for public use while preserving them—run throughout the exhibition.”