Did your grandfather know John Muir?
I don’t know if I mentioned to you a little story told to me by my uncle. At one time grandfather may have been enamored with one of Muir’s daughters before he met my grandmother. Once he was thinking of going to see Muir when on a ridge above Martinez, but then decided to go elsewhere. Grandfather knew him on a business basis as a paleontologist.
So he wasn’t involved in the Sierra Club during the early days?
He was involved in the Sierra Club to the degree that he became an honorary vice-president of it. I think this was probably about the time when grandfather became President of the Carnegie Institution, but I’m not sure about that. And he was a honorary member for a long time. Dad was an honorary life member.
But he wasn’t in the early Sierra Club.
Not at the time when Muir, William Fredrick Bade, and Colby founded it. But he knew many of them quite well, particularly Colby.
How did your grandfather develop interpretation in the national parks while being in an advisory role?
We’ve talked about that a little bit. He had a particular interest in places characterized by their geology, such as Crater Lake, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, and Yellowstone.
That question is connected to some correspondence I’ve seen where your grandfather suggested that naturalists should be posted in parks for long periods of time, maybe ten to twenty years?
Of course, this kind of thing would be counter to the Park Service’s practice of moving people around from place to give them experience. For a person to stay any length of time in a park, even back in the 1930s, was thought to be an indication of their being denied promotion.
