The Conservation Biologists
The Conservation Biologists
Here I describe conservation’s convoluted and evolving history in America. As it became clear that extinctions at the hand of man should be avoided, the question became “how do we save these imperilled species?” The first solution came from Gifford Pinchot’s concepts of “wise use” and “the greatest good for the greatest number.” But Pinchot’s conservation philosophy also perpetuated ecologically destructive policies such as grazing in national forests and damning the Hetch Hetchy Valley. John Muir, with his preservationist philosophy, opposed such policies, and the tension between these two perspectives—conservation vs. preservation—defined the struggle to delineate land-use policies on America’s federal lands, including national forests and grasslands, national parks, national wildlife refuges, and wilderness areas. These were, and continue to be, bitter fights, producing civil wars among biologists and administrators within, but also across and beyond, federal agencies.
Keywords: Gifford Pinchot, John Muir, Howard Zahniser, Bob Marshall, Sigurd Olson, Joseph Grinnell, U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Biological Survey/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
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