Our national parks are places of incredible beauty and rich history. But they also are under siege. Across the National Park System, the landscape is being invaded by non-native species that are not just out of place, when you consider what should be growing, but in some cases are actually driving out the natives.

Today, well over a century after the Civil War ended in 1865, it is difficult to imagine the battlefields of Antietam, Vicksburg, Shiloh, Gettysburg, Chickamauga, and Chattanooga had they been neglected, instead of preserved as military parks. As compelling historic landscapes of great natural beauty and public interest, these early military parks have been familiar to generations of Americans.

A 50-year-old woman has died in North Cascades National Park from injuries sustained in a fall on Klawatti Peak. The woman's husband told authorities he nearly drowned crossing a river while trying to find help.

South Dakota’s Fossil Cycad National Monument was supposed to protect a geologic treasure when it was established in 1922, but its marvelous surface deposits of fossilized plants had already been stripped from the site. A bill signed into law on August 1, 1956, abolished the park, which has served ever since as a cautionary tale. If you don’t protect park resources, they won’t be there for future generations.