1.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
2.
Nebraska
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Nebraska /nᵻˈbræskə/ is a state that lies in both the Great Plains and the Midwestern United States. Its area is just over 77,220 sq mi with almost 1.9 million people and its largest city is Omaha, which is on the Missouri River. The state is crossed by many trails and was explored by the Lewis. Nebraska was admitted as the 37th state of the United States in 1867 and it is the only state in the United States whose legislature is unicameral and officially nonpartisan. Nebraska is composed of two major regions, the Dissected Till Plains and the Great Plains. The Dissected Till Plains is a region of rolling hills. The Great Plains occupy most of western Nebraska, characterized by treeless prairie, the state has a large agriculture sector and is a major producer of beef, pork, corn, and soybeans. Two major climatic zones are represented in Nebraska, the half of the state has a humid continental climate, and the western half. Indigenous peoples lived in the region of present-day Nebraska for thousands of years before European exploration. The historic tribes in the state included the Omaha, Missouria, Ponca, Pawnee, Otoe, when European exploration, trade, and settlement began, both Spain and France sought to control the region. In the 1690s, Spain established trade connections with the Apaches, by 1703, France had developed a regular trade with the native peoples along the Missouri River in Nebraska, and by 1719 had signed treaties with several of these peoples. After war broke out between the two countries, Spain dispatched an expedition to Nebraska under Lieutenant General Pedro de Villasur in 1720. The party was attacked and destroyed near present-day Columbus by a force of Pawnees and Otoes. The massacre of the Villasur expedition effectively put an end to Spanish exploration of Nebraska for the remainder of the 18th century, in 1762, during the Seven Years War, France ceded the Louisiana territory to Spain. Frances withdrawal from the area left Britain and Spain competing for dominance along the Mississippi, by 1773, later that year, Mackays party built a trading post, dubbed Fort Carlos IV, near present-day Homer. In 1819, the United States established Fort Atkinson as the first U. S. Army post west of the Missouri River, the army abandoned the fort in 1827 as migration moved further west. European-American settlement did not begin in any numbers until after 1848, on May 30,1854, the US Congress created the Kansas and the Nebraska territories, divided by the Parallel 40° North, under the Kansas–Nebraska Act. The Nebraska Territory included parts of the current states of Colorado, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, the territorial capital of Nebraska was Omaha
3.
North Platte River
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The North Platte River is a major tributary of the Platte River and is approximately 716 miles long counting its many curves. It travels about 550 miles distance and its course lies in the U. S. states of Colorado, Wyoming, and Nebraska. The rugged Rocky Mountains surrounding Jackson County have at least twelve peaks over 11,000 feet in height, from Jackson County the river flows north about 200 miles out of the Routt National Forest and North Park near what is now Walden, Colorado to Casper, Wyoming. Shortly after passing Casper the river turns to the east-southeast and flows about 350 miles to the city of North Platte, the North Platte and South Platte River join to form the Platte River in western Nebraska near the city of North Platte, Nebraska. The Platte River flows to the Missouri River which joins the Mississippi River to flow to the Gulf of Mexico, the river provides the major avenue of drainage for northern Colorado, eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska. It is only navigable over most of its length at high water by canoes, kayaks, the North Platte River drainage has been an important westward route in the westward expansion of the United States. To get the two essentials, water and grass for the animals the emigration trails nearly always followed river valleys across the North American continent. These trails extended from the Missouri River, Platte River and North Platte River across Nebraska and parts of Wyoming and on to its confluence with the Sweetwater River. About 50 miles beyond what is now Casper, Wyoming the main emigration trails left the North Platte valley and followed the Sweetwater River valley, the lack of American trappers and settlers in the contested Oregon Territory resulted in this early discovery being unused and nearly forgotten. Mule trains carrying in trading supplies for the men and fur trappers were some of the first to use the trail in 1824. The fur traders on their return trip carried the traded furs back east at the end of the trading season. This fur trade continued to be used to about 1840. Following the fur traders, the emigration trails established along the north and south banks of the North Platte River were the Oregon, California, Mormon. The trails north of the North Platte River originally crossed the North Platte near Fort Laramie to join the original Oregon, in 1850 Childs Route extended the north side trail to what is now Casper, Wyoming. The rugged territory from Laramie, Wyoming to Casper meant that the trails often deviated from the river to find an easier path, up in central north Colorado rests North Park, a valley ringed by 12,000 feet mountains. The rugged Rocky Mountains Continental Divide surrounding Jackson County have at least twelve peaks over 11,000 feet in height, in Jackson county the North Platte is joined by several other small streams draining the mountains around the county. Some of these creeks are, Arapaho Creek, Colorado Creek, East Branch Illinois River, Jack Creek, all these streams are draining the snow melt form the mountains surrounding Jackson County. The North Platte River flows northward from Colorado into Wyoming through the popular rafting site – Northgate Canyon which is along the side of the Medicine Bow Mountains
4.
Oregon Trail
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The Oregon Trail is a 2, 170-mile historic east–west, large-wheeled wagon route and emigrant trail that connected the Missouri River to valleys in Oregon. The eastern part of the Oregon Trail spanned part of the state of Kansas. The western half of the trail spanned most of the states of Idaho. The Oregon Trail was laid by fur traders and traders from about 1811 to 1840, by 1836, when the first migrant wagon train was organized in Independence, Missouri, a wagon trail had been cleared to Fort Hall, Idaho. From the early to mid-1830s the Oregon Trail and its offshoots were used by about 400,000 settlers, farmers, miners, ranchers. The eastern half of the trail was used by travelers on the California Trail, Mormon Trail. Use of the trail declined as the first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869, making the trip west substantially faster, cheaper, and safer. Today, modern highways, such as Interstate 80 and Interstate 84, follow parts of the same course westward and pass through towns originally established to serve those using the Oregon Trail. Although Lewis and William Clark found a path to the Pacific Ocean, it was not until 1859 that a direct and practicable route, the first land route across what is now the United States was mapped by the Lewis and Clark Expedition between 1804 and 1806. On the return trip in 1806 they traveled from the Columbia River to the Snake River and they then traveled overland up the Blackfoot River and crossed the Continental Divide at Lewis and Clark Pass and on to the head of the Missouri River. This was ultimately a shorter and faster route than the one they followed west and this route had the disadvantages of being much too rough for wagons and controlled by the Blackfoot Indians. They did show the way for the men, who within a decade would find a better way across. Founded by John Jacob Astor as a subsidiary of his American Fur Company in 1810, two movements of PFC employees were planned by Astor, one detachment to be sent to the Columbia River by the Tonquin and the other overland under an expedition led by Wilson Price Hunt. Hunt and his party were to find possible routes and trapping territories for further fur trading posts. Upon arriving at the river in March 1811, the Tonquin crew began construction of what became Fort Astoria, the ship left supplies and men to continue work on the station and ventured north up the coast to Clayoquot Sound for a trading expedition. While anchored there, Jonathan Thorn insulted an elder Tla-o-qui-aht who was elected by the natives to negotiate a mutually satisfactory price for animal pelts. Soon after the vessel was attacked and overwhelmed by the indigenous before being blown up, killing all the crew, from there they went over the Teton Range via Teton Pass and then down to the Snake River into modern Idaho. They abandoned their horses at the Snake River, made dugout canoes, after a few days travel they soon discovered that steep canyons, waterfalls and impassable rapids made travel by river impossible
5.
California Trail
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The California Trail was an emigrant trail of about 3,000 miles across the western half of the North American continent from Missouri River towns to what is now the state of California. In the present states of Wyoming, Idaho, and Utah, by 1847, two former fur trading frontier forts marked trailheads for major alternative routes through Utah and Wyoming to Northern California. The first was Jim Bridgers Fort Bridger in present-day Wyoming on the Green River, from Salt Lake the Salt Lake Cutoff went north and west of the Great Salt Lake and rejoined the California Trail in the City of Rocks in present-day Idaho. From Fort Hall the Oregon and California trails went about 50 miles southwest along the Snake River Valley to another parting of the trail junction at the junction of the Raft. The California Trail from the junction followed the Raft River to the City of Rocks in Idaho near the present Nevada-Idaho-Utah tripoint, the Salt Lake and Fort Hall routes were about the same length, about 190 miles. From the City of Rocks the trail went into the present state of Utah following the South Fork of the Junction Creek. By following the crooked, meandering Humboldt River Valley west across the arid Great Basin, emigrants were able to get the water, grass, the water turned increasingly alkaline as they progressed down the Humboldt, and there were almost no trees. Firewood usually consisted of broken brush, and the grass was sparse, few travelers liked the Humboldt River Valley passage. Humboldt is not good for man nor beast, an alternative route across the present states of Utah and Nevada that bypassed both Fort Hall and the Humboldt River trails was developed in 1859. In addition to immigrants and migrants from the East, after 1859 the Pony Express, Overland stages, the main routes initially were the Truckee Trail to the Sacramento Valley and after about 1849 the Carson Trail route to the American River and the Placerville, California gold digging region. Starting about 1859 the Johnson Cutoff and the Henness Pass Route across the Sierras were greatly improved and developed and these main roads across the Sierras were both toll roads so there were funds to pay for maintenance and upkeep on the roads. The Johnson Cutoff, from Placerville to Carson City along todays U. S. Route 50 in California, was used by the Pony Express year-round and in the summer by the stage lines. It was the overland route from the East to California that could be kept partially open for at least horse traffic in the winter. After about 1848 the most popular route was the Carson Route which, while rugged, was easier than most others. The trail was used in the summers until the completion of the First Transcontinental Railroad in 1869 by the Union Pacific. Trail traffic rapidly fell off as the trip was much quicker and easier by train—about seven days. The economy class fare across the western United States of about $69 was affordable by most California-bound travelers, the trail was used by about 2,700 settlers from 1846 up to 1849. These settlers were instrumental in helping convert California to a U. S. possession, fremonts California Battalion assisted the Pacific Squadrons sailors and marines in 1846 and 1847 in conquering California in the Mexican–American War
6.
Mormon Trail
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The Mormon Trail or Mormon Pioneer Trail is the 1, 300-mile route that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints traveled from 1846 to 1868. Today, the Mormon Trail is a part of the United States National Trails System, known as the Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail. From Council Bluffs, Iowa to Fort Bridger in Wyoming, the trail follows much the same route as the Oregon Trail and the California Trail, the Mormon pioneer run began in 1846, when Young and his followers were driven from Nauvoo. After leaving, they aimed to establish a new home for the church in the Great Basin, along their way, some were assigned to establish settlements and to plant and harvest crops for later emigrants. In the spring of 1847, Young led the company to the Salt Lake Valley. During the first few years, the emigrants were mostly former occupants of Nauvoo who were following Young to Utah, later, the emigrants increasingly comprised converts from the British Isles and Europe. The trail was used for more than 20 years, until the completion of the First Transcontinental Railroad in 1869, among the emigrants were the Mormon handcart pioneers of 1856–60. Two of the companies, led by James G. Willie and Edward Martin. However, the Saints were driven out of each of them in turn and this included the actions of Governor Lilburn Boggs, who issued Missouri Executive Order 44, which called for the extermination of all Mormons in Missouri. The Latter-day Saints were finally forced to abandon Nauvoo in 1846, Although the movement had split into several denominations after Smiths death in 1844, most members aligned themselves with Brigham Young and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Under Youngs leadership, about 14,000 Mormon citizens of Nauvoo set out to find a new home in the West, as the senior apostle of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles after Joseph Smiths death, Brigham Young assumed responsibility of the leadership of the church. He would later be sustained as President of the Church and prophet, Young now had to lead the Saints into the far west, without knowing exactly where to go or where they would end up. He insisted the Mormons should settle in a no one else wanted. Young also organized a company to break trail to the Rocky Mountains, evaluate trail conditions, find sources of water. The Quincy Convention of October 1845 passed resolutions demanding that the Latter-day Saints withdraw from Nauvoo by May 1846, a few days later, the Carthage Convention called for establishment of a militia that would force them out if they failed to meet the May deadline. To try to meet this deadline and to get a start on the trek to the Great Basin. The departure from Nauvoo began on February 4,1846, under the leadership of Brigham Young and this early departure exposed them to the elements in the worst of winter. After crossing the Mississippi River, the journey across Iowa Territory followed primitive territorial roads, Young originally planned to lead an express company of about 300 men to the Great Basin during the summer of 1846
7.
Lakota people
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They speak the Lakota language, the westernmost of the three Siouan language groups, occupying lands in both North and South Dakota. Siouan language speakers may have originated in the lower Mississippi River region and they were agriculturalists and may have been part of the Mound Builder civilization during the 9th–12th centuries CE. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, Dakota-Lakota speakers lived in the upper Mississippi Region in present-day Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, conflicts with Anishnaabe and Cree peoples pushed the Lakota west onto the Great Plains in the mid- to late-17th century. Early Lakota history is recorded in their Winter counts, pictorial calendars painted on hides or later recorded on paper, the Battiste Good winter count records Lakota history back to 900 CE, when White Buffalo Calf Woman gave the Lakota people the White Buffalo Calf Pipe. Around 1730, Cheyenne people introduced the Lakota to horses, called šuŋkawakaŋ, after their adoption of horse culture, Lakota society centered on the buffalo hunt on horseback. The total population of the Sioux was estimated at 28,000 by French explorers in 1660, the Lakota population was first estimated at 8,500 in 1805, growing steadily and reaching 16,110 in 1881. The Lakota were, thus, one of the few Native American tribes to increase in population in the 19th century, the number of Lakota has now increased to more than 170,000, of whom about 2,000 still speak the Lakota language. However, by about 1750 the Saône had moved to the east bank of the Missouri River, followed 10 years later by the Oglála, the large and powerful Arikara, Mandan, and Hidatsa villages had long prevented the Lakota from crossing the Missouri. However, the smallpox epidemic of 1772–1780 destroyed three-quarters of these tribes. The Lakota crossed the river into the drier, short-grass prairies of the High Plains and these newcomers were the Saône, well-mounted and increasingly confident, who spread out quickly. In 1765, a Saône exploring and raiding party led by Chief Standing Bear discovered the Black Hills, ten years later, the Oglála and Brulé also crossed the river. In 1776, the Lakota defeated the Cheyenne, who had taken the region from the Kiowa. The Cheyenne then moved west to the Powder River country, initial United States contact with the Lakota during the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804–1806 was marked by a standoff. Lakota bands refused to allow the explorers to continue upstream, and the expedition prepared for battle, some bands of Lakotas became the first Indians to help the United States Army in an Indian war west of the Missiouri during the Arikara War in 1823. In 1843, the southern Lakotas attacked Pawnee Chief Blue Coats village near the Loup in Nebraska, killing many, next time the Lakotas inflicted a blow so severe on the Pawnee would be in 1873, during the Massacre Canyon battle near Republican River. The Cheyenne and Lakota had previously attacked emigrant parties in a competition for resources, the Fort Laramie Treaty acknowledged Lakota sovereignty over the Great Plains in exchange for free passage on the Oregon Trail for as long as the river flows and the eagle flies. The United States government did not enforce the treaty restriction against unauthorized settlement, Lakota and other bands attacked settlers and even emigrant trains, causing public pressure on the U. S. Army to punish the hostiles. On September 3,1855,700 soldiers under American General William S. Harney avenged the Grattan Massacre by attacking a Lakota village in Nebraska, killing about 100 men, women, and children
8.
Erosion
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In earth science, erosion is the action of surface processes that remove soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earths crust, then transport it away to another location. Eroded sediment or solutes may be transported just a few millimetres, the rates at which such processes act control how fast a surface is eroded. Feedbacks are also possible between rates of erosion and the amount of eroded material that is carried by, for example. Processes of erosion that produce sediment or solutes from a place contrast with those of deposition, while erosion is a natural process, human activities have increased by 10-40 times the rate at which erosion is occurring globally. At well-known agriculture sites such as the Appalachian Mountains, intensive farming practices have caused erosion up to 100x the speed of the rate of erosion in the region. Excessive erosion causes both on-site and off-site problems, on-site impacts include decreases in agricultural productivity and ecological collapse, both because of loss of the nutrient-rich upper soil layers. In some cases, the end result is desertification. Off-site effects include sedimentation of waterways and eutrophication of bodies, as well as sediment-related damage to roads. Intensive agriculture, deforestation, roads, anthropogenic climate change and urban sprawl are amongst the most significant human activities in regard to their effect on stimulating erosion, however, there are many prevention and remediation practices that can curtail or limit erosion of vulnerable soils. Rainfall, and the surface runoff which may result from rainfall, produces four types of soil erosion, splash erosion, sheet erosion, rill erosion. Splash erosion is generally seen as the first and least severe stage in the erosion process. In splash erosion, the impact of a falling raindrop creates a crater in the soil. The distance these soil particles travel can be as much as 0.6 m vertically and 1.5 m horizontally on level ground. If the soil is saturated, or if the rate is greater than the rate at which water can infiltrate into the soil. If the runoff has sufficient flow energy, it will transport loosened soil particles down the slope, sheet erosion is the transport of loosened soil particles by overland flow. Rill erosion refers to the development of small, ephemeral concentrated flow paths which function as both sediment source and sediment delivery systems for erosion on hillslopes, generally, where water erosion rates on disturbed upland areas are greatest, rills are active. Flow depths in rills are typically of the order of a few centimetres or less and this means that rills exhibit hydraulic physics very different from water flowing through the deeper, wider channels of streams and rivers. Gully erosion occurs when water accumulates and rapidly flows in narrow channels during or immediately after heavy rains or melting snow
9.
Lightning
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Lightning is a sudden electrostatic discharge that occurs during a thunder storm. This discharge occurs between electrically charged regions of a cloud, between two clouds, or between a cloud and the ground. The charged regions in the atmosphere temporarily equalize themselves through this discharge referred to as an if it hits an object on the ground. Lightning causes light in the form of plasma, and sound in the form of thunder, Lightning may be seen and not heard when it occurs at a distance too great for the sound to carry as far as the light from the strike or flash. This article incorporates public domain material from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration document Understanding Lightning, the details of the charging process are still being studied by scientists, but there is general agreement on some of the basic concepts of thunderstorm electrification. The main charging area in a thunderstorm occurs in the part of the storm where air is moving upward rapidly and temperatures range from -15 to -25 Celsius. At that place, the combination of temperature and rapid upward air movement produces a mixture of super-cooled cloud droplets, small ice crystals, the updraft carries the super-cooled cloud droplets and very small ice crystals upward. At the same time, the graupel, which is larger and denser. The differences in the movement of the precipitation cause collisions to occur, when the rising ice crystals collide with graupel, the ice crystals become positively charged and the graupel becomes negatively charged. The updraft carries the positively charged ice crystals upward toward the top of the storm cloud, the larger and denser graupel is either suspended in the middle of the thunderstorm cloud or falls toward the lower part of the storm. The result is that the part of the thunderstorm cloud becomes positively charged while the middle to lower part of the thunderstorm cloud becomes negatively charged. This part of the cloud is called the anvil. While this is the charging process for the thunderstorm cloud. In addition, there is a small but important positive charge buildup near the bottom of the cloud due to the precipitation. Many factors affect the frequency, distribution, strength and physical properties of a lightning flash in a particular region of the world. These factors include ground elevation, latitude, prevailing wind currents, relative humidity, proximity to warm and cold bodies of water, to a certain degree, the ratio between IC, CC and CG lightning may also vary by season in middle latitudes. Lightnings relative unpredictability limits a complete explanation of how or why it occurs, the actual discharge is the final stage of a very complex process. At its peak, a thunderstorm produces three or more strikes to the Earth per minute
10.
Volcanic ash
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Volcanic ash consists of fragments of pulverized rock, minerals and volcanic glass, created during volcanic eruptions and measuring less than 2 mm in diameter. The term volcanic ash is often loosely used to refer to all explosive eruption products. Volcanic ash is formed during volcanic eruptions when dissolved gases in magma expand. The force of the escaping gas shatters the magma and propels it into the atmosphere where it solidifies into fragments of volcanic rock and glass. Ash is also produced when magma comes into contact with water during phreatomagmatic eruptions, once in the air, ash is transported by wind up to thousands of kilometers away. Volcanic ash is formed during volcanic eruptions, phreatomagmatic eruptions. Explosive eruptions occur when magma decompresses as it rises, allowing dissolved volatiles to exsolve into gas bubbles, as more bubbles nucleate a foam is produced, which decreases the density of the magma, accelerating it up the conduit. Fragmentation occurs when bubbles occupy ~70-80 vol% of the erupting mixture, when fragmentation occurs, violently expanding bubbles tear the magma apart into fragments which are ejected into the atmosphere where they solidify into ash particles. Fragmentation is an efficient process of ash formation and is capable of generating very fine ash even without the addition of water. Volcanic ash is produced during phreatomagmatic eruptions. During these eruptions fragmentation occurs when magma comes into contact with bodies of water groundwater, as the magma, which is significantly hotter than the boiling point of water, comes into contact with water an insulating vapor film forms. Eventually this vapor film will collapse leading to direct coupling of the cold water and this increases the heat transfer which leads to the rapid expansion of water and fragmentation of the magma into small particles which are subsequently ejected from the volcanic vent. Fragmentation causes an increase in area between magma and water creating a feedback mechanism, leading to further fragmentation and production of fine ash particles. Pyroclastic density currents can also produce ash particles and these are typically produced by lava dome collapse or collapse of the eruption column. Within pyroclastic density currents particle abrasion occurs as particles interact with each resulting in a reduction in grain size. In addition, ash can be produced during secondary fragmentation of pumice fragments and these processes produce large quantities of very fine grained ash which is removed from pyroclastic density currents in co-ignimbrite ash plumes. Physical and chemical characteristics of volcanic ash are primarily controlled by the style of volcanic eruption, another parameter controlling the amount of ash produced is the duration of the eruption, the longer the eruption is sustained, the more ash will be produced. The types of minerals present in volcanic ash are dependent on the chemistry of the magma from which it erupted, low energy eruptions of basalt produce a characteristically dark coloured ash containing ~45 - 55% silica that is generally rich in iron and magnesium
11.
National Historic Site (United States)
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A National Historic Site is a protected area of national historic significance in the United States. An NHS usually contains a historical feature directly associated with its subject. As of 2015, there are 50 NHPs and 90 NHSs, most NHPs and NHSs are managed by the National Park Service. Some federally designated sites are owned by local authorities or privately owned, one property, Grey Towers National Historic Site, is managed by the U. S. Forest Service. As of October 15,1966, all areas, including NHPs and NHSs. There are also about 80,000 NRHP sites, the majority of which are neither owned nor managed by the NPS. Of these, about 2,500 have been designated at the highest status as National Historic Landmark sites, National Historic Sites are generally federally owned and administered properties, though some remain under private or local government ownership. There are currently 90 NHSs, of which 78 are official NPS units,11 are NPS affiliated areas, one is managed by the US Forest Service, and one by the Bureau of Land Management. Derived from the Historic Sites Act of 1935, a number of NHSs were established by United States Secretaries of the Interior, in 1937, the first NHS was created in Salem, Massachusetts in order to preserve and interpret the maritime history of New England and the United States. There is one International Historic Site in the US park system, the title, given to the site of the first permanent French settlement in America, recognizes the influence that has had on both Canada and the United States. The NPS does not distinguish among these designations in terms of their preservation or management policies, in the United States, sites are historic, while parks are historical. The NPS explains that a site can be intrinsically historic, while a park is a legal invention. As such, a park is not itself historic, but can be called historical when it contains historic resources and it is the resources which are historic, not the park. Klondike Gold Rush International Historical Park was formally established in 1998 by the United States and Canada, the park comprises Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park in Washington and Alaska, and Chilkoot Trail National Historic Site in British Columbia. It was this trail which so many prospectors took in hopes of making their fortunes in the Klondike River district of Yukon, list of World Heritage Sites in the Americas Designation of National Park System Units
12.
National Park Service
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It was created on August 25,1916, by Congress through the National Park Service Organic Act and is an agency of the United States Department of the Interior. As of 2014, the NPS employs 21,651 employees who oversee 417 units, the National Park Service celebrated its centennial in 2016. National parks and national monuments in the United States were originally individually managed under the auspices of the Department of the Interior, the movement for an independent agency to oversee these federal lands was spearheaded by business magnate and conservationist Stephen Mather, as well as J. Horace McFarland. With the help of journalist Robert Sterling Yard, Mather ran a publicity campaign for the Department of the Interior and they wrote numerous articles that praised the scenic and historic qualities of the parks and their possibilities for educational, inspirational, and recreational benefits. This campaign resulted in the creation of a National Park Service, Mather became the first director of the newly formed NPS. On March 3,1933, President Herbert Hoover signed the Reorganization Act of 1933, the act would allow the President to reorganize the executive branch of the United States government. It wasnt until later that summer when the new President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, President Roosevelt agreed and issued two Executive orders to make it happen. In 1951, Conrad Wirth became director of the National Park Service, the demand for parks after the end of the World War II had left the parks overburdened with demands that could not be met. In 1952, with the support of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, he began Mission 66, New parks were added to preserve unique resources and existing park facilities were upgraded and expanded. In 1966, as the Park Service turned 50 years old, emphasis began to turn from just saving great and wonderful scenery, Director George Hartzog began the process with the creation of the National Lakeshores and then National Recreation Areas. Since its inception in 1916, the National Park Service has managed each of the United States national parks, Yellowstone National Park was the first national park in the United States. In 1872, there was no government to manage it. Yosemite National Park began as a park, the land for the park was donated by the federal government to the state of California in 1864 for perpetual conservation. Yosemite was later returned to federal ownership, at first, each national park was managed independently, with varying degrees of success. In Yellowstone, the staff was replaced by the U. S. Army in 1886. Due to the irregularities in managing these national treasures, Stephen Mather petitioned the government to improve the situation. In response, Secretary of the Interior Franklin K. Lane challenged him to lobby for creating a new agency, Mather was successful with the ratification of the National Park Service Organic Act in 1916. Later, the agency was given authority over other protected areas, the National Park System includes all properties managed by the National Park Service
