television companies who provide american history tv to viewers as a public service. from 1929 until his retirement in 1954 george alexander grant created more than 30,000 photographs of national parks. he took this photo in utah in 1929. up next the co-authors of the book landscapes for the people george alexander grant first chief photographer of the national park service show examples of his work and discuss his story with a park service historian the national archives hosted this 2016 event and provided the video. my name is tom nastic. i'm a public program producer here at the national archives in washington dc. and it's my pleasure to welcome you all here today to the william g mcgowan theater, and also welcome those of you who are watching us on the national archives youtube channel. today our series of noontime author lectures and book signings continues with landscapes for the people george alexander grant first chief photographer for the national park service. with our special guest today ren and helen davis today's lecture is one of several programs. we will present in the coming months to help celebrate the 100th anniversary of the national park service the story of the national park service is well represented in the holdings of the national archives. in the form of textual documents films and photographs including of course the work of today's subject george alexander grant. but before we get to today's program i would like to tell you about two upcoming programs. that'll take place in this theater as well as on our youtube channel. on thursday, may 19th at noon historian. joe goldstein will be here to discuss his book the white house vice presidency the past two significance mondale to biden. goldstein will discuss how a constitutional office can evolve as well as the critical role of political leadership in institutional development. and later that evening march 19th at 7pm annette gordon reed winner of the pulitzer prize. to find out more about these and other programs exhibits and events here at the national archives. please consult our monthly calendar of events. there are copies outside the theater and it is also available online at our website www.archives.gov. it's a pleasure to welcome renton helen davis back to the national archives. they were here in june of 2012 to discuss their book our mark on this land a guide to the legacy of the civilian conservation corps in america's parks, and we're pleased that they have traveled from their home in atlanta to share with us their research into the largely unknown story of george alexander grant. following their lecture in q&a. they will be signing books one level up in front of the archives store. would you please welcome ren and helen davis? well, thank you very much. we want to thank the national archives for hosting us and tom nastic. thank you for making all the arrangements for today's presentation. i just want to give a little shout out to our nephews patrick and ted mcgee for hosting us in arlington and from pittsburgh my dear aunt gloria and my cousin shari came to hear us today. it's exciting to be part of the centennial celebration of the national park service and to share the story of our new book landscapes for the people we want to acknowledge wade myers media specialist at the national park service historic photographic collection in charlestown, west, virginia. we could not have written this book without his knowledge support and enthusiasm for this project and also to dr. timothy davis right here national park service lead historian who specializes in park historic structures and cultural landscapes. tim generously took the time to review our manuscript add to our research and penned the books forward and we're looking forward to his new book national park roads a legacy in the american landscape due for release this fall by the university of virginia, press and we are delighted that he could join us today to share his perspective. on george grant's role within the national park service. so ren tim and i will take turns presenting today. this first picture you're looking at was taken in 1933. and it is jackson like at the grand tetons national park. the men in the foreground were part of the civilian conservation corps. and when we saw this picture in 2006 while doing research in the national park service historic photographic collection, i said to rent i think this is an ansel adams photograph. and turning it over we were introduced to george grant. after discovering several similar images. we asked archivist tom durant. who is george grant? and we later learned. he was the first staff photographer of the national park service, and we asked well why have we never heard his name? and he said well in his role almost everything he did was labeled national park service. so many have viewed his photographs, but very few know his name. well shortly after we returned from that initial visit to the archives in 2012. i was reading an article in outdoor photographer magazine and the author of the article made reference to ansel adams as an elder in the field of american landscape photography, and we kind of looked at each other and said i think we have discovered an unknown elder someone who deserves recognition. so when we talk about the elders of american landscape photography who might we be talking about so here's a sort of a cliff notes version of a few of those notable photographers. probably the first was carlton watkins born in 1829. he traveled to california for the gold rush but opened up a photography studio in san francisco, and it was his photographs of the yosemite valley in the mariposa grove of redwoods that was instrumental in the passage of legislation in 1864 setting those natural wonders assad for preservation. possibly the finest and best known pioneer landscape photographer was william henry jackson a civil war veteran. he accompanied the hayden expedition to the yellowstone in 1871 and 72 and it was his photographs along with thomas moran's monumental paintings that were instrumental in persuading congress to establish yellowstone as the world's first national park in 1872. and this photograph here at the bottom. this is a photograph of william henry jackson. he's in his mid-90s in the national park service. dark room in the mid-1930s. the portrait was taken by george grant. now possibly the finest landscape photographer of the 20th century by all accounts would have been ansel adams noted for his stunning black and white images. oftentimes of iconic national park sites at why so often associated with the national parks? he did a number of commissioned projects for the park service the best known might be as murals project that he began in the early 1940s and was completed later. and while he's associated with the park service nearly all of his work done for the park service and for the department of the interior was as a commissioned artist not as an employee, but to stunning beautiful black and white photographs. this is a very recognized when clearing storm at yosemite valley that he took in 1944. elliot porter was a student of ansel adams and alfred stieglitz actually trained as a physician, but he gave up his medical practice in 1938 to pursue photography full-time and he chose color photography as his his genre if you would and he was very active in working with the sierra club and other organizations to promote environmental his preservation and it was his milestone book in 1962 in wildness is the preservation of the world that paired his beautiful color photographs with the words of henry david thoreau. another student of ansel adams was philip hyde, and he joined hide and excuse me adams and porter as a regular photographer for the sierra club if you have sierra club calendars and books from the 60s and 70s. you've got some hide porter and adams photographs in your collection and two of his books. i at the point raised peninsula island in time published in 1962 and later. the wild cascades are forgotten parkland published in 1965 were instrumental in the establishment of the point race national seashore and north cascades national park. now the one elder that's still actively working is david munch often called the ansel adams of color photography vivid beautiful landscapes principally of the american west but iconic beautiful images if you've subscribe to arizona highways you have seen a lot of david munch's photography and his father joseph muntz was a renowned photographer as is david's son mark well, six years after our introduction to george grant in august of 2012. we returned to the photo archives to learn more about george grant and to determine if there was enough information to write a book about him. we were pleased to learn of the interest and a book about george grant and we began to look at some of his photographs and scanned several. in january of 2013 we gave a presentation at the metropolitan atlanta group of the sierra club and in the audience was elizabeth knowlton a retired archivist with the georgia archives and she offered her expertise to help track down some family of lifelong bachelor george grant. she found an address for his niece mary grant mcmullen and that led to us communicating with his three nieces nancy mary and anne who are now all in their 80s and his grand-niece, diana hastings. in april of 2013 we made a trip to saint michael's public library in maryland. and there we met with some of the family and opened a brown paper bag and said this belonged to my uncle george. after seeing all the places that he had driven from 1929 to 1962 and reading the quote that he had inscribed at the bottom of the map of all the sciences geography finds its origins and action and what is more adventurous action. we knew we were ready for a grand adventure as we learned more about the life and the work of george alexander grant. george grant was born in milton, pennsylvania in 1891 and he grew up in nearby sunbury, pennsylvania. he loved watching the boats on the susquehanna river and the trains traveling the rails through town. he dreamed of experiencing far away adventures one day. he was not an especially good student, but he was always working with his hands. and after high school, he went to work for several factories. he ended up at the roycroft community in new york. the center of the american arts and crafts movement of the early 20th century there. he developed his artistic eye and became a master craftsman and metal smith. these are some objects that the family shared with us that he had made an engraved for family members. in 1917. he left roycroft to enlist in the army. during world war i was sent sent to fort russell, wyoming. for artillery training and he remained there till the end of the war while there he fell in love with the west. returning home after the war george walked worked on road crews as a supervisor and in several factories. but yearning to return to the west george sent letters and telegrams pleading for job at yellowstone national park. finally in 1922 a seasonal rangers position was offered to him at a very large cut in pay. but that didn't stop george. he was excited and happily headed west. wow there park superintendent horse albright noticed the photographs he was taking and it appears that this may have been the first time in george's life that he picked up a camera to take pictures at age 31. at the end of the season grant was offered that coveted full-time position. following a horseback riding accident grant realized the rigors and the work of a back country. ranger really did not get him to his new goal to become an a master photographer. he reluctantly resigned but said to superintendent albright. i hope one day to come back as the official photographer for the national park service. following albright's suggestion that he get further education and photography. he took classes in new york city. and upon completion accepted photography position with penn state from 1923 to 1927 while he was there. he kept up by five year correspondence with all bright seeking to return to the park service. you know, i think his letters almost became what would you call it ren harassment harassment? okay, one of the letters he puts the national park service needs me. finally there was a position approved in the fall of 1928, but no funding. well, that didn't stop george. he went out and he bought a new set of photography equipment packed up his car and headed to southern california. he was going to stay with some friends he had there because he knew that he would be located in berkeley. once the funding came through. well not until april of 1929 did some outside funding. was acquired for 18 months and grant was hired as the first national park service staff photographer that 18 months was so important because it helped to prove the value of his role as a photographer and he was then promoted in 1931 to the chief photographer. he held that position for an additional 23 years. and was moved into washington dc. grant used both the large format 8 by 10 camera and other equipment that ren will share later. during his 25 years of service. he traveled over 140,000 miles to photograph more than 100 national parks monuments historic sites battlefields and other destinations that run will talk about later now. we have to remember this is before interstates and many of the roads. he was was on were dirt and gravel. at times to reach remote locations he traveled by horseback and on foot but most often he traveled in a specially outfitted panel truck and he had a series of these panel trucks during his 25 years. he affectionately called the truck his hearse and nightly in the back of the hearse. grant had to process the film that was exposed that day reload new film unto the holders. he had to carry his camping equipment his provisions all his camera equipment and his chemicals as he would be out on site for many months at a time. was helen mentioned, he was hired in april of 1929 and we know that a few months later the nation had plunged into the depths of the great depression. and at that point the park service was cut back to true austerity budgets and so it's likely had he not had the option to take that position april 1929. it might have been years before this position would have been created. but with the election inauguration of franklin roosevelt in march of 1933, it truly ushered in what's often been described as a golden age for the national parks. it might seem counterintuitive that the depression would be the golden age for anything. but in fact for the parks it proved to be so for two principal initiatives that were undertaken. the first was the establishment of the civilian conservation corps in march of 1933 over the nine years of the ccc more than three million young men were employed in forestry work in erosion control, but also in state and national parks and the resources in manpower were instrumental in further developing and improving our national parks and making them more accessible. so that was one the second was in june of 1933 president roosevelt signed an executive order that brought into the national park service many of the national monuments. national battlefields and military parks national cemeteries if the stroke of a pen literally doubling the size of the national park service. so here is george grant is the chief photographer with this. dramatic expansion of the park service so many many new opportunities for him to work and to to chronicle and visually document the national parks and one of the aspects of that was he did a lot of documentation of the men of the ccc working in the national parks, and we've got two examples of the many of them here the bottom left. this is a crew of ccc men clearing the snow from the upper elevation roadway at rocky mountain national park in june of 1933 and then a nice young group of young ccc men on their lunch break at glacier national park in montana. so in 1933, another thing that was also happening if if you think back to the 1920s nearly all of the national parks were in the west but nearly most americans lived in the east so it's a consequence the national parks were really not accessible to everyday americans unless you had the time and the money to get there. so beginning in the 1920s with stephen mather and then horace albright and then with franklin roosevelt and others there was a strong impetus to develop eastern national parks. so we saw coming online in that year. we saw great smoky mountains national park. we saw shenandoah national park. we would then see mammoth cave national park and later the everglades in the expansion of acadia. so there was a real interest in desire to make the parts more accessible to all the people. so one of the assignments that grant would take was to accompany teams of park service staff. it might be landscape architects historians engineers management staff to survey proposed and planned national parks, and these are four examples of places where he traveled with with these survey teams the top left. this is the newfound gap road great smoky mountains national park right there at the north carolina, tennessee state line taken in 1931. that's kind of a scary road today. it cannot imagine what it was like as a dirt road in 1931. in 1934. he accompanied a team surveying the proposed natchez trace parkway through mississippi and took this photograph of the ruins of an antebellum plantation also on that same trip. he photographed ccc men restoring the battlefield at vicksburg. he traveled to the big bend of texas in 1936 became a national park in 1944 and then to the north cascades of washington state in 1937 did not become a national park until 1968. so he's laying a lot of visual groundwork for the future. another project that he was involved with was in 1934 president roosevelt declared that the national parks year if you know much about president roosevelt, you know, he was a stamp collector and he asked that the secretary of the interior and the postmaster general get together to issue a series of postage stamps depicting scenes from the national parks, that would be adapted from photographs another way to promote visitation of the national parks by everyday americans and so of those 10 images two were images taken by ansel adams five of them were by george grant and this is one example you see here on the right is george grant's photograph from zion national park in utah in 1929, and then there to the left you see the eight cent stamp that was adapted from that photograph for the national parks here and i was helen said he received very little recognition. individually for his work as a staff photographer for the park service in nearly everything. he ever had published. the credit line was often just national park service and of the 30 to 40,000 images that he produced in his working career. it's been estimated that 90% of them were never published they're involved in the park service archives. but he was he never viewed himself as a fine art photographer. he saw himself as a photojournalist a documentary photographer an editorial photographer and he was an assignment photographer. whatever the park service needed. he was able to produce for them. it might be just beautiful landscapes for brochures and and promotional materials. also, it would be people enjoying the parks again. that's part of the impetus to promote park visitation think of it almost like propaganda photography if you would but he was also asked to take portraits. he never saw himself as a portrait photographer, but he was scaled at it and you will see a few of those in a few minutes, you know, so take technical images for museum exhibits and for official and scientific reports. so whatever was needed. he had the skills and the capability to produce his book his images appeared in books newspapers and magazines including at least two instances where his work was featured prominently in national geographic. this particular image is one that i think blends the beautiful landscape photography. this is a place called ricksecker point in mount rainier national park in washington state a beautiful landscape on its own, but then you see the people enjoying that landscape from that that pull out. i love it's a timeless image and a timely image at the same time. and just as hell and alluded to we are not the only people that have occasionally mistaken a george grant image for an ansel adams. it's interesting because their work reflected their different backgrounds, but at the same time it expressed their common love of the american landscape. if you know much about ansel adams, you know that he was trained as a classical musician a pianist. and people have often described his photographs as symphonies of light and shadow. and they really and truly can stand on their own and ansel adams fine art photograph almost doesn't need a caption. it's just beautiful hanging on your wall if you can afford it. but george grant came to his photography from the avenue as a master craftsman. he brought that skill set of high technical quality and composition. but also his photographs were always intended to be part of a larger narrative to be embedded with words or to support and exhibit not necessarily as fine art to hang on a wall although that did happen in many instances. they were colleagues and contemporaries. we know for a fact that they did know each other and often worked for the same senior officials within the department of the interior and the park service the one tantalizing piece of evidence that we had was in the park service archives. we found george grant's continuing federal employment application that he had to complete after world war ii that he had to list character references and two of those references one was edward steichen a renowned photographer of that era and the chief photographer for the us navy in world war ii and ansel adams so that told us that they knew each other. we looked and looked for more direct links, but we're not successful in finding those. two examples they would often photograph the same subjects and here's two examples. you can see the top right? this is george grant's photograph. he took at the dedication of hoover dam in 1939 and below. that is ansel adams photograph of the hoover dam taken in 1942. we kind of like to think that ansel got the hoover dam and looked and said, i think george took my picture from right about here. so this is where i'll stand can't say that for a fact, but we'd like to think that so what were the tools of his craft if you're a photographer today? it's pretty simple. you've got your digital camera your cell phone. you gotten say hundreds of pictures and pick out three or four and say these are great. this was hard tedious work that these men in this era who were taking these photographs his most frequently used tool was his five by seven view camera like this. it's a wooden box with a with a lens and a bellows and the hood over the top like you might have seen the old time photographers. it's a it's a heavy piece of equipment. you have a heavy tripod when he's going in the field with this camera. it's about 30 to 40 to 50 pounds of equipment that he's logging into the backcountry with him. so that was his principle tool. when he was on trips into the remote backcountry like on horseback or on foot, he would likely take a smaller camera a 120 roll film camera produced perfectly acceptable image a little bit smaller lighter weight lighter tripod easier to manage in the backcountry. at the very end of his career for one particular assignment when he was asked to photograph archaeological work for the missouri river basin project up in south dakota and nebraska and in the upper midwest, he requested was given permission to acquire a leica 35 millimeter rangefinder camera for that pure documentary work. he retired in 1954 and died 10 years later in 1964. and after his death, he was recognized as an imminent photographer of the national park service and park services historians today will tell you that george grant's photography is the benchmark against wins all other national park service photographers were measured. as we are now celebrating the centennial of the national park service. let us consider george grant's relevance today. grant's images are a visual symbol of the national park service original charter. to conserve the scenery as you see in this rocky mountain national park picture in colorado taken in 1938 and the natural and historic objects and the wildlife they're in. the grand tetons in wyoming in 1936 and to provide for the enjoyment of the same. this young couple is really enjoying the grand canyon in arizona picture taken in 1929. in such manner and by such means as we'll leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations. this is at crater lake in oregon in 1941. i don't think we dress that way for tours these days anymore. grant's photographs still invite us to visit our wonderful national parks. these are a few of them 170 iconic black and white images that we have in grants. of grants that are in our book and this was at bryce canyon and utah that he took in 1929. and nearby at capitol reef in utah in 1935. i especially love this photograph of the sand dunes near stove pipe wells and death valley national park in california. he took this in 1935 and then in 1937 george entered this photograph in a competition with 300 photographers including ansel adams. and grant one. the first place in the inaugural new york explorers club photography competition i love the sheer cliffs of canyon deshae at the national monument. he took this in 1940. and this is truly a picture of people enjoying our national parks this horseback party viewing the yellowstone river falls at yellowstone national park, wyoming in 1933. and love this picture of the sequoia tree at sequoia national park in california 1940, and i'm sure your eye goes right away to this vehicle. going under the tunnel of create carved from the sequoia tree, but did you notice this gal? you know grant loved to hide people in the landscapes of his pictures and we called this. his where is waldo imagery? he made several trips to the olympic peninsula both when it was prior to becoming a national park and then after it was a national park if you know some of the history there was a i guess they knocked down drag out war between the forest service in the park service over whether to create olympic national park, but george made several trips made some exquisite photographs in the olympics. this happens to be one at the saul duck river falls in the rain forest area of olympic national park, and i had the good fortune with my son to cross that bridge or at least a successor to a few years ago and take a photograph from nearly the same location. i'd like to think my pictures as good as george's but i'm not going to brag on that. while he spent most of his field seasons in the west and he would usually be in in a field season from spring until fall traveling in the west. he would occasionally make trips in the east coast. he's based in washington dc so you would think that he would get assignments in the east occasionally and in the spring of 1937. he made a trip down the east coast, georgia and florida all the way to the dry tortugas is the far end of the florida keys and it was here we made this wonderful photograph. i love the symmetry of it at fort jefferson at the dry tortugas in that particular trip. he was also the official photographer for the dedication of the going to the sun road at glacier national park in montana in july of 1933. and he took this photograph of 4,000 people at the decay dedication ceremony at logan pass all standing together singing america the beautiful i can't think of a more appropriate location to sing america the beautiful than right there. but just an exquisite setting for that that ceremony. now this particular image that ohana prakash campground at mount rainier national park in washington state. if you've ever been camping in a state park or national park, this is a very familiar image. we have all enjoyed sitting around the picnic table enjoying maybe meeting new people or or sharing lunch and sharing stories and and experiences. you can see your other campers have got their laundry on the line. i mean, we've all probably done that. there's your tent your automobile. it's just an iconic. campground shot but it also tells different stories sort of underneath that picture this photograph was taken in august of 1941 and i look at that picture. i look at the people and i realized it's four months before pearl harbor and i see this photograph as really and truly a last summer of innocence before world war ii. that that's another message it communicates to me. i mentioned that he would take portraits and hear a few examples a wonderful regal portrait of bird rattler a chief of the blackfoot nation. he photographed him at the dedication of the going to the sun road in 1933. at the top, right? this is adam keith grizzled old cowboy and a backcountry ranger at grand teton in 1930. i'm old enough to remember gabby hayes some of you in the audience might remember gabby hayes the movie and tv actor. i believe adam keith was the model for gabby hayes. this is the official portrait of horace albright when he was the director of the park service in 1933 and horace albright told many people that this photograph by george grant was the best picture anyone ever took of him. and then this wonderful environmental portrait of emmet harrison a navajo that he took at mesa verde national park in 1929. so what about here in the east? what about right where we are here today? and we've used a lot of pictures of the west and we've explained that george spent most of his time in the west, but he did take some pictures here one of the assignments. he was asked to come east for was to photograph the dedication of the memorial house at george washington birthplace national monument in virginia. and here is the photograph the group portrait of the participants in that dedication and may of 1932 and then another photograph of the home and the boxwood gardens that same day those boxwood gardens have grown up quite a bit since 1932. we were there back in september. surprisingly enough in the park service archives. we were able to locate two photographs by george grant with shenandoah national park a scratched my head and goes an hour or two away from it. why only two pictures but we can't reach back in time and solve that question, but these are two of the images the top left. this is park superintendent james lassiter with george pollock. who was the owner of skyland and he took this picture in 1936 and then the lower image you can see skyland over here in the corner of the photograph taken from up on the hills nearby, maybe close to the appalachian trail where? my nephew just threw hiked it last year. he did some civil war battlefield photography. here's a photograph from fredericksburg and sponsor spotsylvania near chancellorsville the site where the the wounding of stonewall jackson and then down you see in 1942 this photograph from the chambersburg pike entrance of gettysburg national military park interestingly enough the park service historians have told us that they think george took many more photographs of the civil war battlefields and revolutionary war battlefields in the east but those photographs have been lost. so they're hiding someplace in a warehouse possibly. and then this marvelous photograph they can just a few blocks from right here. probably from the top of the washington monument george took this photograph of the national mall during world war ii in 1943, and you can clearly see it as lined with temporary war buildings. so it's very different image and you might see today, but that's what it looked like in 1943. so really and truly that is this this photograph by george the tracks in the sand is is emblematic of our effort and our journey to discover who was george grant and learn about his life in his photography and i love this quote. he was asked to speak to the first chief naturalist conference for the national park service in november 1929, and he said you have pictures almost anywhere you look if you haven't already adopted photography as a hobby it is because there must be a screw loose somewhere. so he did have a good sense of humor. so what i'm going to do is i'm going to invite tim to come up and share his perspective on on george grant and his role in the park service. so we'll give us just a moment to flip through this and we'll go. okay. now i want to thank brennan helen. davis no relation. we forgot to mention. for inviting me get involved with this i have. a bit of a come from a bit of a different perspective and i think it shows even in the concept of the talk, i think because i think i'm coming from it as a southern national park service and also as a photographer and historian of photography so one thing i don't see grant so much as an unknown elder. i was just thinking that as we were talking which i switched it around a little bit. as i'm missing link is a missing link between that 19th century of exploration photography william henry jackson, timothy o'sullivan. and the 20th century post atoms. landscape photography that we think of today and he's he's very much. with a foot in both worlds and also it's interesting. he's not. certainly, not unown to us park service people. he's he's very known but what ren and helen have done is they've called attention to him. we've used this photographs. i've used this photographs and books and magazine and articles and presentations. everybody uses them. but nobody really thinks about george grant. they're usually on credited. so i think it's a particularly appropriate in this centennial year that they've focused attention on this important aspect of national park service history that's been known but overlooked and also to place him in in the context and again for from my perspective. he has he has more in common. he may not be as robust as william henry jackson and and some of these folks who are tramping around the west know just after the indian wars, but he has more similarities with that than with the people like adams and western he's he's working for the government. he's sublimating his artistic ambitions. to his government mission and most of his work appears in poor reproductions in government reports or here jackson photograph in in harper's a lot of that grant stuff ended up in popular publications as well. and also stylistically okay. that's obviously not the button. we want to push. there we go. this kind of interest in topographic exposition in detail these medium tone high definition prints. everything is in focus. everything is clear. it's about information as the straightforward's ostensibly but of course informed by artistic composition presentation of information, that's grant on the left. and o'sullivan on the right in 19th century photographs. if we look at adams, it's a totally different animal atoms is an artist his photographs. they use the national parks. they use the national park landscapes, but in ansel adams photograph is about ansel adams. it's about as my cam title of one of his first books my camera in the national parks. he has he's got his eye on moma on an art on stieglitz's gallery. on the history of art and so he's less concerned with making an informational photograph with making it as a dramatic photograph. he uses filters to heighten contrast. he uses telephoto lens also to heighten things. he uses a lot of manipulations partly based with association with modernist photographer a modernist artists. well grant is laboring and the penn state dart room. he's he's hanging out with george o'keeffe and john marion and stieglitz and paul strand with strand and western inventing this new approach to photography was known as straight photography and then the group f-64 which is all about extremely fine rendition with big negatives. if you compare atoms and grant's photographs of the tetons on the top. you know, the one on the left is obviously much more dramatic. it's hard to take an undermatic photograph of the tetons, but grant almost exceeds here. it's you know, it's very well balanced. it doesn't scream. i'm being taken by a photographer. it shows there's a road providing access which the park service wanted to show on the bottom. you see o'sullivan. than grant then atoms photographs of. cliff canyon to shea and you see? the two on the left give you a lot more detailed information, but adams isn't about that. he's making a composition. you don't even see really three dimensions in the grant field in the adams photograph. but adams is photograph would not have worked in these kinds of publications and these educational. work that that grants photographs were used for and you can be sure adams wouldn't take a photograph of a bunch of people smiling from a ruin. you don't see a lot of people and grant's photographer and adam just photographs what that was one of grant's missions. he was photograph hired as i mentioned initially by the education department, but the nps was trying to demonstrate remember they're new. this is the 20s. what they were doing what what they had a value to the american public what they were giving as value to the congress who was giving them money pleading for more money. i'm showing that they were not they were moving from recreation. they weren't just america's playground, but they were a serious educational there were valued for more reasons than that and that they were conducting all sorts of improvement improvements. this is the progressive error their their documenting as many parked departments and social agencies did they're documenting how they're using government funds wisely and efficiently to achieve good results and this necessitates a lot of kind of bread and butter photographs. these are atoms photograph a grant's photographs in use again the education department. visual education trying to show to reach the public through photographs. it's not exciting work, but that's what was paying grant grant was being paid by this grant was actually i think the the rockefeller foundation to the to the nps education division and and the park service all bright was a huge fan of grant and they were using that money to to get grant around the same thing with the ccc works projects administration photographs. park service as today was always strapped for funds. there's not a lot of fun for photography. for promotional or artistic purposes so they would have him piggyback his promotional art and artistic photographs on these work trips to where there was money to document ccc activities and then they talked about how he did just both the crews and the work that they produced. and most of all they actually we focus mostly on his landscape photograph. but what they really wanted was. pictures of people enjoying the parks the parks are being used by the public. therefore congress should approach mommy for them. now his initial photographs were kind of please kind of um, here's he was a guy at yellowstone who could grab a camera and use it and he was not sophisticated when he started. when he starts when he comes back and he starts being hired he's even the park. there's people saying these are pretty cliche these like kind of picturesque photographs with hopelessly posed people or staring right at the camera. we you got to work on this george. you see this one. i've been one of those things also thanking our hosts here. i was able because i'm here to spend some more time digging through all the grant related material all the letters telling them what to do and what not to do and complaining about him and praising him. up at college park. another thing he did. he was almost too technically proficient for his own good out in. the glacier photographs and some of these other places in order to counteract to compensate for the difficulty of taking photographs with that harsh question son. he would use phil and flash. but as you can see he would flash. and that way it lights up all the things on in the shadows, you know under people's hats and behind walls. but he overdoes it a lot and you see that they look like movie stills. this weird sort of studio quality and the one on the bottom it almost looks like they're in a diorama at the museum of natural history or something. i would just flat background and and this hyper exposed front. he also gravitated towards a certain type of visitor. and he was chastised for that isabel's story. the director of information is like george, you know, our audience is families children. we've got enough pretty girls, you know, lay off the pretty girls which is an interesting issue because actually out in the field the directors are saying, you know, we want pretty you know, that that's going to get people in our parks, but you know the park service brass one of the slightly more family oriented high level. image and then here you say again he want they want people, you know, they actually is a funny letter where their chastising them about. you want to go to white sands again, right? every photographer wants to go to white sands and take pictures of sand dunes. but they don't want the artsy ones on the left. they want somebody in it or his like prize-winning. death valley photograph get stuck in with a bunch of cactuses and other you know, western desert pictures. it's not the kind of treatment and ansel adams would be getting he does eventually get much much better at the people photographs is the pretty girls are still there. but in terms of composition and stearns of technique and and more of a sense of relaxed observational, but not hey, i am here with a photographer with the camera. and again ansel adams isn't going to take a picture of people holding up big fish, but that's what the park service needed. and also in the bottom there showing a new educational facility. the same thing with his photographs of park improvements. i mean i had the same sense. i hadn't heard where's waldo comment but a lot of these pictures ostensibly pictures documenting ccc and other improvements. this is where's waldo quality of where's the improvement? okay, there's a tunnel. it's at scottsbluff somewhere in the way down the bottom there. there's a visitor center. you can barely see those two bridges devil's tower and yellowstone. i think some of that his best work was done in glacier where combines the stuff he's one of the things his landscape photographs a lot of its photographs with the passage of time have been come both more appealing and more inscrutable. you don't realize the extent to which they are really presenting a park service agenda. they're beautiful pictures, but they're promoting. what the nps is trying to achieve again, you know, obviously they're celebrating the going to sun road. that's great achievement, but they're also showing how they can effectively marshall and contain thousands of people in this national landscape and how the road and the backcountry trail opportunities are our balanced in the park because by the by the mid 30s, there's a lot of criticism that the parks of his over developing the parks and again you got your pretty girls. here again. there's there's a whole series where they're trying to emphasize that. that parks only a tiny portion of the parks is being used. for cars and over development most of the parks steven mather and albright the first two directors thought of glacier as a trail park. horse trails now we think of it mostly as going to the sun road. the picture on the bottom left of olympic national park is showing that this is a debate that you alluded to about the creation of olympic national park. there was concern that the park service was overdevelopment, but it was really one of our first wilderness parks. so here you see a park service ranger and nothing else as a sign of man the picture on the right of skyline drive. i know a great smoky mountain national park. it's ostensibly. about you know, it's it's anonymous feature the great smokies, but it's actually also showing this horribly burned over foreground as part of an argument that we were having with the wilderness society saying you're destroying all this virgin nature and we're going virgin nature. this was like been logged over mind burned these a lot of these photographs have these agendas that you that we've lost. and and i think this this cover photograph is really propitious because it it has that message too. you spoke of it about people enjoying the parks. but it has that whole park service organic act thing is preserving scenery allowing for its enjoyment but keeping impairment to a very tiny portion and is interesting that again at this time the park service is having huge fights with the museums and the mountaineers about purported over development in mount rainier and we're saying we'll only about 10 or 15% of the park has features that are affecting you know that show human use and they're carefully designed to contain people and their rustically designed to meld with environment and to me this picture just encapsulates that now again as a as they noted. here's his grant at the apex of his career in a way, but he's completely passed over by adams who was much more gregarious much more. self-promoting. he sends us book. he did on the king's canyon area to icky's the director of the interior secretary of interior who loves it shows it to fdr fdr. she steals his copy. he has to get another one and icky's falls for keeps us always falling for these bright young. people like bob marshall the wilderness advocate over nps staff and in a perfect example. mickey's hires atoms to do this park serve the department, ontario mural project. and you saw some pictures of that these were these were it actually completed. because of world war i world war ii but and even greater irony tragedy is that on assignment for this atoms takes one of his probably two most famous pictures that the moon rise over hernandez as he's off to take pictures on the interior department's dime and he was he got more money at the private consultant than any photographer initial park service. so it's kind of ironic that our you know, our under unappreciated elder got bypassed and as you noted he also as a park service. in terms of the park service work has where he becomes less essential and with 35 millimeter photography. after fashion anybody comes a photographer you don't need to be able to do single image view camera film handling. and you can take thousands of photographs hundreds of photographs. you don't have to just laborious lantern slide hand coloring for public presentations. so the idea of an art photographer the park service becomes. in a way it's harder to justify harder to support you can't support himself doing that kind of bread and butter work and he has his personal issues as well. and and budgetary issues with the park service, which we're facing today the the last two main photographers for the park service full-time large format photographers. worked for the historic documentation programs they both retired. three to five years ago and haven't been replaced because on the one hand, there's a census with digital photography. anybody can take photographs or even more so than with 35 millimeter photographer and the ongoing budget images. so again, he's a link in many ways between 19th century landscape photography landscape ideas and 20th century. so again, i want to thank you for just let me talk a little bit about these things and open it up to questions. and i think tom had said please go to the microphone if let me get back to a pretty yes, hi. i'm an assistant curator over at the national postal museum. so i really found this. to be fascinating, but i've got some questions. i've got a thousand but i'm gonna try to just condense it to three. okay. oh, you early that the the park service photographers or guys taking a pictures. we're all so credited with helping to establish parks national parks first, but it's first time i'm ever hearing that that the photography played a role role in the development in the development of the national parks and the second question i have is that when he was at yellowstone. jack haynes was also a photographer and one of his pictures one of his images was used for the basis for the old faithful stamp. so i'm just curious if if hanes i mean if grant was the he was the a staff photographer, yellowstone. why didn't he take those pictures and understand that roosevelt was also there at the same time and there are a number of pictures of roosevelt that were taking by haynes. so i guess the question asked is what was the relationship between haynes and and grant because a lot of the photographs particularly 1930s are attributed to jack haynes and my final question is you mentioned that about 90% of his material has not been has not been displayed. we are entering the centennial of the national park service. it will national park service? take the lead in exhibiting his material. thank you. i'll try to answer them in order and help tim will jump in as well in regards to the influence of photography and establishing national parks. anecdotally, it's been noted that william henry jackson's photographs when this when presented to members of congress. you sort of open their eyes that they had heard stories about the yellowstone. they'd heard stories about some of these beautiful wonders of the west, but they often often thought of them as exaggerations. but photography brought reality to these images and these mental images. so i think they were instrumental in solidifying the need to preserve those landscapes and i think the work of like jackson or philip hyde and others they were able to produce images that provided public support for the creation of these parks. not really that they their photographs in and of themselves did it, but it helped to build a groundswell of public support on behalf of national parks and tim want to add anything to that. yeah. that's true. i think there was a time when people were over exaggerating we're exaggerating the influence of jackson. yellowstone and carlton watkins on yosemite but and also thomas moran paintings on formation of yellowstone and underestimating the northern pacific railroads influence, but they they certainly did have an influence and at that time more conspicuously, so in the 20th century, there's two things going on that what i was talking about about just demonstrating in general terms that instead of sort of like eclectic collection of elite diversions. there's a park system for the american people being heavily used by middle class americans because before that the parks had been reserved considered elite retreats that nobody could get to the automobile had a huge amount to do with that. and you know as you know in a lot of the photographs. now grant's photographs. they're more almost like documents for the nps. the ones that that some of the ones he was showing like the pictures of i moved on gap road and this that and the other thing for the natchez trace. and you mentioned jack haynes as an example. i know for in the documents. we've seen that when george left yellowstone in 1922 when he was a budding photographer. he sought to get a job in the studio of a sale curtis in seattle. and was not successful. but a sale curtis is sort of the photographer from mount rainier. so i think george was maybe these staff photography chief photographer, but the park service was using other people's work frequently to promote the photographs and and in regard to the stamps. there was you know a number of photographers that were. looked whose work was looked at for the for the stamps and three of the images were from commercial studios that they were just selected from stock images if you would the two were from answer for financial atoms and i think the the el capitan image might have been the one that was the ansel adams was the first one it could have been a hanes image for the i can't remember it was it was the old faithful image? but george was involved in the selecting those images. so maybe it's not surprising that five of the pictures were by george. he's involved in choosing which ones to actually use and the end case was actually very concerned about they didn't want to be relying on outside photographers. there were copyright issues a lot of them were dated. i mean as you see cars and clothes changed they want to update them. they don't have to pay to update them. they don't want pay if you look at the early. there was a thing called the national parks portfolio those put together 1915 1916 to promote the creation of the national park service, and it's heavily illustrated poorly reproduced funded by the railroads again to thing that praises of the parks, but and it's all not people like haynes his father and others and in the early 20s national annual directors reports. they're using those kind of photographs they're using staff photographs that aren't that great. they're using friends in the sierra clubs photographs, ansel adams, you know when you before it becomes ansel adams is, you know has a few photographs in these reports and they don't want to do it. they want to avoid the copyright issues. they want more freedom. they want more flexibility and the park service. also mather was very into developing his own corpus of educators landscape architects engineers and photographers. so the park service wanted to have all this in-house capability. yeah, we'll go back and forth. in the last couple of days in the washington post they ran an article preparing us for corporate naming rights in the in the national parks. independent of what the funding realities are today? and considering the susceptibility of the american people for jingles and advertising and corporate names. is there any way to head this off to get the nps to reject the idea of corporate naming? it's your question. no comment. that's way about my paper. i would i would tend to concur with your concern. let me put it that way. would want to celebrate the taco bell? yeah, it's a perfect synergy. we've seen well first off. let me thank you for bringing. and our attention wonderful photography. thank you. we've seen a diversity of landscapes here the glacier national park mount rainier lots of mountains west. did grant ever go underground you mentioned mammoth cave carlsbad, of course the national park. did he ever try to photograph case? yes, he there you'll see him if you look at the book and we didn't obviously we couldn't put them all in the in the slideshow, but he did some marvelous photographs of carlsbad caverns clearly was killed at the lighting for the the features underground photographed and man with kay he photographed in oregon caves. so he was underground. yeah, so he's better than adams who just gave up. okay, i don't but but also grant was a really nice unassumed. he was god. he was extremely generous to directly some junior photographers. one reason to photograph much in the east is because someone was doing that and there was actually someone in yosemite who was doing photography there. yeah, but in view of the cave photographs, i actually found he's he's getting information from a local cave photographer. he's like, i don't know how to do this and he actually went out and found he gets all this information. they're kind of like fretting about the technical bit of in the cost of it, but he was you do that anywhere and it was a great example. i thought of him being not this egotistical cartoonist, but like asking for help. yeah and and produce very nice work. thanks. any other questions we're out of time. thank you all so much for being here if you have other questions, we will be upstairs. you're watching american history tv every weekend on c-span 3 explore our nation's past american history tv on c-span 3 created by america's cable television companies and today we're brought to you by these television companies who provide american history tv to viewers as a public service. texas recently experienced severe winter weather leading to a breakdown of the electric grid and widespread power outages next on reel america. we take you back to the mid-20th century for several films about about electricity and the power grid. first freedom and power a 1952 general electric film marking the company's 75th anniversary by celebrating american industrial and scientific innovation the film shows how the power grid works and argues that electrical heat cooling and appliances have made life easier for everyone in about 30 minutes made in cooperation with the us public health service. clean waters is a 1945 general electric film documenting the health and safety during the course of one day. how it empowers airplanes and cars. the film also promotes oil-based products such as plastic. in about 90 minutes," clean skies, clean air"
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