Wonderland: An Administrative History of Mount Rainier National Park

Catton, Theodore

The purpose of this administrative history is three-fold: to provide a summary of the park's century-long development, to present a synthesis of the many issues that have concerned park managers from 1899 to the present, and to offer an analysis of local and regional influences that have contributed to making Mount Rainier National Park's history distinct from other national parks. This administrative history is organized both chronologically and topically. The report is divided into six parts corresponding to six distinct eras in the park's history. Within each part, three to five chapters address such recurring topics as resource management, interpretation, development, concessions management, and research. The decision to organize the administrative history in this fashion was based on the judgment that the vital stories of Mount Rainier National Park's physical development, its extraordinarily long history of recreational use, and its hundred-year evolution of resource management could not be told separately from one another. Physical developments affected recreational use just as recreational use affected resource management. Resource management in turn affected physical developments and recreational use. Moreover, these stories are embedded in the history of the National Park Service, the region, and even the nation. It was decided that the nearly century-long administrative history of this important national park could be made more comprehensible if it were presented in a chronological narrative, with an emphasis onhistorical context. The single exception to this organizational scheme will be found in Chapter I, which carries the discussion of Indians and Mount Rainier National Park up to the present time.

Wonderland: An Administrative History of Mount Rainier National Park

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