107: NPS

 

107 years ago today (August 25, 1916), U.S. President Woodrow Wilson signed what has become known as the “Organic Act.”  This Act created what we know as the National Park Service (NPS).

The new agency was tasked with a very important, and challenging, Mission Statement.  It reads, in part, that the NPS is:

“...to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wildlife therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.”

The NPS employs approximately 20,000 people in 425 individual units covering over 85 million acres in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and U.S. Territories. As of 2019, they had more than 279,000 Volunteers.

The NPS received 327 Million Visits in 2019.