Improving the Wilderness: Common Factors in Creating National Parks and Equivalent Reserves During the Nineteenth Century

Well-to -do tourists try theirhand at icehockey in Banff National Park, 1896. At that date, only those with considerable wealth and leisure could access national parks. Photo courtesy of the Whyte Museum of the Rockies, Banff, Alberta. Federal and regional governments throughout the Englishspeaking New World began during the nineteenth century to esta blish a variety of protected areas in the public domain. ' The most famous of these became known as national parks. The United States was the first country to establish this new type of protected area when it established Yellowstone Park in 1872. Within twenty-one years, six other governments designated lands either as national parks or equivalent reserves. Each park served similar funct ions, in large part because the fundamental reason ing behind their creat ion emanated from common social, cultural , economic, and political condition s. The purpose of this articl e is to identify the cultural factors leading to the prol iferation of national parks and equivalent reserves in the nineteenth century, and to distinguish commonalities and differences in th e establ ishment of these areas. Th is art icle will identify the prototypes of nat ional parks, discuss the American "invention" of the national park, and review the establishment of parks in New South Wales , Australia (1879); Canada (1885); New Zealand (1887); and Ontario, Canada (1893). 2 Old World Prototypes