Yard, Robert Sterling

About the author

Robert Sterling Yard, a conservationist and journalist, co-founded the National Park Service. The Book of the National Parks (1919) blended lyrical nature writing with advocacy, galvanizing public support for protected landscapes. Yard's prose immortalized sites like Yellowstone and Yosemite as America's cathedrals, merging ecological urgency with romantic nationalism. His campaigns laid groundwork for modern environmental policy.