The first two weeks of the winter season at Yellowstone National Park saw a slight decrease in visitors from a year earlier, but those who did come showed a preference for traveling by snowcoach rather than snowmobile.

The history of any national park includes stories of people, places and even empires that predate the parks themselves. Virgin Islands National Park's history involves international politics from centuries past, and a trip to the Spanish archives by the park historian yielded some important new insights.

In the grand scheme of wildlife management, 25 Yellowstone National Park bison are not that big of a deal, not when the park's herds are pushing 4,000 animals. But if 25 are allowed to freely roam into Montana on land just north of Mammoth Hot Springs, they could begin laying the foundation for much greater tolerance of bison in Montana.

It was 50 years ago that, in a move one newspaper ventured could rightly be called "the finest victory ever recorded for the cause of conservation in New England," that President John F. Kennedy created Cape Cod National Seashore.