The Yellowstone National Park: Historical and Descriptive

by Hiram Martin Chittenden

“This is probably the most remarkable region of natural attractions in the world; and, while we already have our Niagara and Yosemite, this new field of wonders should be at once withdrawn from occupancy, and set apart as a public National Park for the enjoyment of the American people for all time.”

Such is the origin of the idea which has found realization in our present Yellowstone Park. The history of the Act of Dedication, by which the Park was created, may be briefly told. The general plan for a vigorous prosecution of the project was arranged in Helena, Montana, mainly by Nathaniel P. Langford, Cornelius Hedges, and William H. Clagett, who had just been elected delegate to Congress from Montana, and who had already himself independently urged the importance of converting this region into a public park. Mr. Langford went to Washington when Congress convened, and he and Mr. Clagett drew the Park Bill, except as to description of boundaries, which was furnished by Dr. Hayden. The bill was introduced in the House by Mr. Clagett, December 18, 1871. Senator Pomeroy, of Kansas, had expressed a desire to perform a like service in the Senate, and accordingly Mr. Clagett, as soon as he had presented the measure to the House, took a copy to the Senate chamber and gave it to Senator Pomeroy, who immediately introduced it. In each House it was referred to the Committee on Public Lands. In the Senate no formal report was prepared. In the House the Hon. Mark H. Dunnell, of Minnesota, chairman of the sub-committee having the bill in charge, addressed a letter under date of January 27, 1872, to the Secretary of the Interior, asking his opinion upon the proposed measure. The Secretary replied, under date of January 29th, fully indorsing the project, and submitting a brief report by Dr. Hayden, which forcibly presented all the main features of the case.

The bill, being thus before Congress, was put through mainly by the efforts of three men, Dr. F. V. Hayden, N. P. Langford, and Delegate William H. Clagett. Dr. Hayden occupied a commanding position in this work, as representative of the government in the explorations of 1871. He was thoroughly familiar with the subject, and was equipped with an exhaustive collection of photographs and specimens gathered the previous summer. These were placed on exhibition, and were probably seen by all members of Congress. They did a work which no other agency could do, and doubtless convinced every one who saw them that the region where such wonders existed should be carefully preserved to the people forever. Dr. Hayden gave to the cause the energy of a genuine enthusiasm, and his work that winter will always hold a prominent place in the history of the Park.

Mr. Langford, as already stated, had publicly advocated the measure in the previous winter. He had rendered service of the utmost importance, through his publications in Scribner’s Magazine in the preceding May and June. Four hundred copies of these magazines were brought and placed upon the desks of members of Congress on the days when the measure was to be brought to vote. During the entire winter, Mr. Langford devoted much of his time to the promotion of this work.

The Hon. William H. Clagett, as delegate from the Territory most directly interested in the passage of the bill, took an active personal part in its advocacy from beginning to end.

Through the efforts of these three gentlemen, and others less conspicuously identified with the work, this measure received perhaps the most thorough canvass of any bill that has ever passed Congress. All the members were personally visited and, with few exceptions, won to the cause. The result was a practical unanimity of opinion when the measure came to a vote. This first took place in the Senate, the bill being passed by that body January 30th. It was warmly supported upon its passage by several members and opposed by one, Senator Cole, of California; a fact the more remarkable because that Senator had in his own state—in the preemption by private parties of the Yosemite wonderland—the most convincing example possible of the wisdom of such a measure as that proposed.

The Senate bill came up from the Speaker’s table in the House of Representatives, February 27th. Mr. Dunnell stated that the Committee on Public Lands had instructed him to ask the House to pass the Senate bill. Hon. H. L. Dawes, of Massachusetts, warmly advocated the measure, which was then passed by a decisive vote. [AG] The bill received the President’s signature March 1, 1872.

[AG] No yea and nay vote was taken in the Senate. The vote in the House was—yeas, 115; nays, 65; not voting, 60.

This subject has been treated somewhat in detail because there has long been a false impression among the people as to who it was that first put forward this important project. To no individual is the public more indebted for the creation of the Park than to Dr. F. V. Hayden, who was long prominently connected with the geological surveys of the government. But he did not, as is generally supposed, originate the idea. His statement in his report for 1878, Vol. II, p. xvii, that, “so far as is now known, the idea of setting apart a large tract about the sources of the Yellowstone River, as a National Park, originated with the writer,” is entirely erroneous; and there is the less excuse for the error in that Dr. Hayden had himself heard the measure advocated by Mr. Langford in his Washington lecture. In fact, he is known to have said in later years, only a short time before his death, while residing in Philadelphia, that when the project was first talked of among the members of his party, in the summer of 1871, he personally disapproved it because he doubted the practicability of adequately guarding so vast a region; but that, upon further reflection, he became converted to the measure and was thereafter its most ardent advocate.

But it is not so much actual facts, as what men believe these facts to be, that controls human action; and it is unquestionably true that the above quotation correctly expresses the views of the great majority of members of Congress when the Park measure was before that body. It is not too much to say that Dr. Hayden’s influence, as the official representative of the government, was a controlling factor in the passage of that measure.