Who said for the benefit and enjoyment of the people

The park was going to get royalties from products derived from the organisms they were allowing Diversa to remove. Two months later we learned that the Park Service was looking to make 15 to18 other deals similar to the one at Yellowstone.

Eventually, we won the first part of the case. The court agreed that the Yellowstone deal was a big change in national policy and as such, required an environmental assessment.

Later, we learned the financial details of the deal. And still later, we lost the second part of the case. The judge said the Department of the Interior did not violate all the laws we thought they had violated; he said they had not violated the public trust, and that it was okay that they had declared Yellowstone a laboratory so as to make the deal fit a law that would allow them to make such a deal.

The Edmonds Institute is, after all, a little public interest organisation doing research and education, not litigation. I still tell people what I put up on our website - we sued because as we understood what was happening in Yellowstone, it seemed that public agencies were acting in ways inconsistent with the missions they had been given by the people.

It seemed they were acting counter to the protection of biodiversity, counter to the public interest, and even counter to the social contract that binds us all together. To discover if we understood correctly, we, together with others, sued. Essentially, we asked the courts to help us do some research. As I wrote to the lawyers when it all began:. Ness have been credited, but modern historians say that documentation is inadequate to know for sure.

To construct the Arch, hundreds of tons of native columnar basalt were hauled from a quarry in the area. The completed Arch rises 50 feet high, and can still be seen from miles away. Original plans called for the curved walls on either side of the Arch to surround a landscaped garden, two ponds, and a waterfall.

It reportedly contains a Bible, a picture of Roosevelt, Masonic documents, local newspapers, U. As you enter the Arch from the Gardiner side, the stone is low on the inside park side corner of the right tower. I speak of our National Park system, founded in with the establishment of Yellowstone National Park. This week, the National Park Service — the federal agency charged with care of the Parks — celebrated its th birthday.

We all do well to stop for a moment and consider, with gratitude, this tremendous gift in our midst. My wife and I first began exploring our National Parks in when we took a six-week camping vacation from New York City to California and back. It is one of the primary reasons that we moved from Boston to Arizona, so we could be in close proximity to the great national parks of the west.

Because I have been one who has benefitted from and enjoyed these parks — places of exceptional beauty and tranquility, wonder and excitement. I have always encouraged my students to get out of the practice room and get outside so their playing would be informed by more than what was on the music stand. Appreciating the natural, created order of the universe does more than release positive endorphins into the blood stream.