-
Period: 184 to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Frederick Law Olmstead pushes for protection of Yosemite Valley and is first to advance the idea of placing certain areas under government protection. -
Timeline: 1850-1900
African American fur trapper and explorer James P. Beckwourth finds an important route through the Sierra Nevadas, leading the first wagon train of settlers through what would become "Beckwourth Pass." -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau, author of Walden, writes that wilderness sanctuaries are the "need of civilized man." -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Artist Thomas A. Ayers' lithographs introduce Yosemite to the East. Country Gentleman republishes articles that declare the Yosemite Valley to be "the most striking natural wonder on the Pacific." -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Photographs by Carleton E. Watkins make Yosemite Valley famous. -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
The Alaska Purchase is signed by President Andrew Johnson, adding 365 million acres of public lands to the United States. -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Surveyors, escorted by the 7th U.S. Cavalry under the command of Lieutenant George A. Custer, penetrate the Black Hills of South Dakota, an area considered sacred by the Sioux tribes. -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Battle of the Little Bighorn occurs in Montana on what is now the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument. -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Casa Grande Ruins N.M. becomes the first prehistoric cultural site to be protected by the federal government. -
Period: to
Timeline: 1850-1900
Gifford Pinchot takes office as Chief of the Division of Forestry, later organized into the National Forest Service in 1905, advancing conservation of natural resources.