Galen Clark

File:Galen Clark - Project Gutenberg eText 16572.jpg

Galen Clark

Galen Clark in the Big Tree Grove

Galen Clark (March 28, 1814 – March 24, 1910) is known as the first European American to discover the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoia trees, and is notable for his role in gaining legislation to protect it and the Yosemite area, and for 24 years serving as Guardian of Yosemite National Park.

Early life and education

Galen Clark was born in Shipton, Canada East (now Quebec) in 1814.

Marriage and family

He joined the westward migration as a youth. In Missouri he met and married Rebecca McCoy. They had two children who survived until after their parents' deaths: Elvira M., who married and became a doctor in Oakland, California; and another daughter who married John T. Regan of Springfield, Massachusetts.

Move to California

After his wife died young, Clark moved to California to seek his fortune, probably about 1848 at the time of the California Gold Rush. In 1853 at the age of 39, Clark contracted a severe lung infection that was diagnosed as consumption (as tuberculosis was called in his time). Doctors gave him six months to live, as they had no antibiotic treatment at the time, but counseled rest and outdoor air.

Clark moved to the Wawona, California area. "I went to the mountains to take my chances of dying or growing better, which I thought were about even." (Galen Clark, 1856) Upon his discovery of the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias, Galen Clark spent most of his time exploring the area and teaching others about the mysteries of the giant, cinnamon-colored trees.

He wrote about protecting the grove to friends and the US Congress. He contributed to the writing and passage of legislation to protect the area, gaining support of US Senator John Conness from California. The act for the Yosemite Grant was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln. Ceding the land to the state of California for preservation, the grant was the first of its kind. The legislation was to protect Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias for "public use, resort, and recreation ... to be left inalienable for all time." Galen became the first "guardian of the grant". His lungs healed, and he explored and climbed much of the area.

File:Portrait of Galen Clark, the first white man in Yosemite Valley.jpg

Portrait of Clark in his later years

Clark did not seek to enrich himself from Yosemite Valley or the Sequoia trees. He ran a modest hotel and guide service. A poor businessman, he was constantly in debt. His Clark's Station, for example, had several more employees than required for the number of guests and its short season.

Toward the end of his life, Clark was desperately poor. He wrote three books on Yosemite. These include Indians of the Yosemite (1904) and The Yosemite Valley (1910). Clark's book on the sequoia trees is simple, factual, and direct. He left out his personal role in the discovery, popularization, and protection of the Mariposa Grove of Big Trees. He served as hotel keeper, guide, and guardian of Yosemite and the Mariposa Grove.

Clark spent some time living in Summerland, a Spiritualist colony in Southern California, near Santa Barbara. His house still stands on Shelby Street.

In 1910 he died at the home of his daughter Dr. Elvira M. Lee in Oakland, California.

Legacy and honors

• Clark gained preservation of what became Yosemite National Park, and raised awareness of the wilderness, setting an example for the preservation of other ecosystems and wilderness areas.
• Today, the Giant Sequoia that would have been the first of its kind to be seen by Clark at the Mariposa Grove is named and marked "Galen Clark Tree" (240 feet; diameter 15.3 at 10 feet above mean base) in memory of his contribution to the preservation of the Giant Sequoia ecosystem and the idea of the national park.
• Mount Clark and the Clark Range, located east of Yosemite Valley, were named in his honor.

Popular culture

• Clark's life and efforts to preserve the Giant Sequoias of Yosemite were depicted in the 1976 TV movie Guardian of the Wilderness (also known as Mountain Man). He was portrayed by Denver Pyle.

Bibliography

• Originally published as "A Plea for Yosemite" in Yosemite Nature Notes (February 1927), from a manuscript written c. 1907.

Legacy

• Mount Clark (California)
• Clark Range (California)

See also

• History of the Yosemite area

External links

• Works by Galen Clark at Project Gutenberg
• Short radio episode Samoset about John Muir showing Ralph Waldo Emerson the Mariposa Grove and Galen Clark asking Emerson to name a tree, from The Life and Letters of John Muir, 1923. California Legacy Project.
• Galen Clark at Find a Grave