Monday, February 24, 2020

The history of National Parks in the United States Research Paper

The history of National Parks in the United States - Research Paper Example This history is also considered as the history of the people who constantly worked hard to preserve and save the land which they loved throughout their lives as United Sates’ residents. The history of United States’ national parks can be traced as far back as the discovery of Yosemite in 1851. The discovery of this place of inspiring beauty elicited events which led to the legislations that were used to protect and preserve land for future generations. White men who were members of an armed battalion entered the Yosemite Valley in 1851 in search of Indians so as to drive them away from their homeland. Those white men then named the valley â€Å"Yosemite†, believing that it was the name of the Indian tribe which lived in that valley. In 1855, James Mason led a group of white men to the discovery of the valley (Gartner 1986). After failing as a gold miner for years, James Mason believed that he could prosper by establishing and running a tourist hotel in Yosemite V alley so as to promote the scenic attractions of California. Four years later, James Mason returned to the same site, but now with a photographer. Later, other writers and artists travelled to the valley and as a result images and word concerning the valley spread fast across the US. This attracted more tourists who were specifically eager to see the beautiful valley by themselves (Gartner 1986). An editor of the New York Tribune called Horace Greeley then wrote about the valley, saying that if the county of California and other relevant authorities do not take care of the safety of the trees in the valley, then he would be sure to deplore it. He perceived that the value of the valley several years later would be very high if care and caution was taken to preserve it. Therefore, the discovery of the valley served as an important path in the history of National Parks in the United States. By late 19th century, actions of the United States to tame the land had come with devastating co nsequences. Entire species of animals had been destroyed and forests had been subjected to outrageous ravage. All these actions were committed in the name of progress. One naturalist named John Muir then expressed his concerns by categorically stating that the great wilds of the United States of America which were once boundless and inexhaustible had now become invaded and destructed completely. Within this period, there were only a handful of concerned Americans who perceived that national parks were the only structures that were considered as the important means to protect the country’s pristine places. A young politician named Theodore Roosevelt was one of the few concerned people as of that moment. Roosevelt was later to become the president of the United States of America and establish five national parks, 51 bird sanctuaries, four national game reserves, 18 monuments and 100 million acres of national forests. In 1890, there were already four national parks established d ue to the concern of the few people who were determined to preserve the environment. Despite the fact that these national parks were under the guard of the army, they were nonetheless subject to great dangers (Albright 1985). Wildlife in the park was constantly killed; park meadows were overgrazed by livestock; tourists provided means for the destruction of rocks and trees through carvings and ancient forests were not spared either. Although the congress had created the

Friday, February 7, 2020

Relationship between western European countries and others Essay

Relationship between western European countries and others - Essay Example Relationship between western European countries and others The European countries, thus, looked down on China since they were at a better position in the industrialization sector, despite China’s size, wealth and high population. John Barrow, the writer of Travels in China contributed to how different writers and citizens of Western Europe thought about China. He made them view their country as superior, because, he reasoned that although in the past China was more developed, the Western Europe in the 1800s had grown to be more industrialized and had advanced more in technology. He emphasized that the education offered in Western Europe was of higher quality than in China because the Chinese did not learn algebra, Chemistry and geometry. The decline of the Qing dynasty, economic growth and China’s defeat by the western powers seemed to reinforce the thought that the country was better than China. The British realized that China’s military had not developed during the opium war due to use of smoke and lack of expertise in using firearms. This led to a more degraded image of China. Although China had invented the compass, gunpowder and printers, it did not advance on these new inventions. Their lack of admitting that the Europe was more developed and; therefore, declining to embrace the technological change, showed China’s inability to embrace change.James Mill, a writer of the History of British India book influenced greatly how the western Europeans viewed the Indians. Basing his argument on Scotsmann Grant views, he argued that the Indians were deficient in education, technology, science, civilization and medicine.2. He argued that although Indians had invented handcraft, there was little advancement made in improving their inventory2. Their poor learning systems did not involve teaching of sciences e.g. anatomy and their teachings in mathematics were not fit for any civilized person. There was belittlement of the Indians discoveries in the mining of iron ore. They described the activity as negligible because it carried out on small scale. They considered it destructive and imperfectly done. There was ridicule on the cotton textiles the Indians produced. The character traits associated to them were dishonesty and morally decayed2. The collapse of the Mughal Empire emphasized these traits together with their lack of masculinity. Although Indians had built buildings similar to the Europeans, the Europeans still considered India barbaric and uncivilized due to lack of roads and pipes. However, this made them pass the lowest set social development stage by the Europeans. The Europeans called the Indians barbaric because of the medicine they took, which they said was not fit for the civilized. Mill created an impression that the Indians were unwise because they spent their time playing chess and hunting tigers unlike the Britons who spent their time and resources in trading and developing their empires. They had poor military weapons as compared to the British although the Europeans did not take into consideration that Indians adopted the Europeans training methods and arms. The thinking of the Western Europeans as better than the other countries made it gain more power and superiority in the world. Europeans based their superiority on how righteous a country was in terms of religion in the past, but this changed