Conservation

Pull back the curtains of history to find out how Yosemite came to be. 

By the time preservationist John Muir visited Yosemite in 1868, artists had already captured the beauty of the area, captivating the nation’s imagination. And before them, people had been living in the park for more than 4,000 years. In fact, the last Miwok village in the park was demolished in 1969. That’s 79 years after Yosemite became a national park.

While more than 5 million people visited the park last year, there's an unusual sight tucked in the northwest corner that less than 1 percent of all Yosemite visitors see. Amid towering granite domes lies the 8-mile-long Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. It's liquid gold, supplying more than 2.4 million San Francisco area residents with water.

But it also sparked one of the first national conversations on valuing wilderness over development in the early 1900s. Muir and others argued a San Francisco water source should be built outside the park. In 1913 Congress approved the dam construction. Muir died a year later of pneumonia, but the loss of Hetch Hetchy Valley echoed profoundly in his heart. He wrote, “The destruction of the charming groves and gardens, the finest in all California, goes to my heart.”

Today, if you visit the Hetch Hetchy area in Yosemite, you’ll feel the same wonder Muir felt more than 100 years ago, even with the reservoir. Away from the crowds, it’s the park’s best kept-secret.