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Pruning the Parks: Six National Parks Acquired via Transfer in 1933 Were Subsequently Abolished

The National Park System grew by 69 units via the Reorganization of 1933, which was signed August 10, 1933. However, six of the “1933T” national parks were subsequently abolished. This serves to remind us that periodic pruning is a natural and healthy function of large, complex systems.

Super Storm Impacts Linger at Guam’s War in the Pacific National Historical Park

Guam's War in the Pacific National Historical Park, which celebrated its 30th birthday August 18, was so badly mauled by supertyphoons that its visitor center, bookstore, museum, and research library have all been put out of action. But visitors are back, so rangers serve them while keeping a wary eye on the weather.

Paddling Dinosaur National Monument and Niobrara National Scenic River

When folks think about paddling trips in the National Park System, quite often floating the Colorado River through Grand Canyon National Park rises to the top of the mind. But there are other paddling treks out there, trips that are just as beautiful and inspiring and which just might offer a tad more solitude.

Will Second Century Commission Succeed With Its National Parks Assessment and Recommendations?

Call it a $1 million question. Will the National Parks Second Century Commission make a difference in the future of the National Park System, or will its findings and suggestions simply collect dust on a back-room shelf as some other studies have done?

That Booming You Hear in the Skies Over Yellowstone National Park? It Soon Could be the Sound of Artillery

Ahh, the sounds of winter in Yellowstone National Park. The raspy rustle in the wind of dried leaves that forgot to fall from aspens. The trickling of a creek beneath its sheath of ice. The eruption of a geyser, the gurgling of mudpots. The explosion of a howitzer round as it smacks into a mountainside.

Pilgrim Places: Civil War Battlefields, Historic Preservation, and America’s First National Military Parks, 1863-1900, Part III

As with the southern Pennsylvania countryside surrounding the town of Gettysburg, the struggles between the United States and Confederate armies from 1861 to 1865 often brought war to beautiful places, with many battles fought in the pastoral landscapes of eastern, southern, and middle America— in rolling fields and woods, along rivers and streams, among farmsteads, and often in or near villages, towns, or cities.