🇺🇸 WEEKLY AMERICAN HERITAGE: Olympic National Park

(Explore the history and landscape of the United States as we celebrate the 250th anniversary of American Independence. Get out your atlas and almanac and follow along!)

Washington is our homeschool state-of-the-week, so why not spend a few minutes today with your students learning about one of Washington’s most important natural and historical places: Olympic National Park, which preserves the history, wildlife, and spectacular scenic landscape of the Olympic Peninsula.

“With its incredible range of precipitation and elevation, diversity is the hallmark of Olympic National Park. Encompassing nearly a million acres, the park protects a vast wilderness, thousands of years of human history, and several distinctly different ecosystems, including glacier-capped mountains, old-growth temperate rain forests, and over 70 miles of wild coastline.”

Since the 1880s, the Olympic Peninsula’s spectacular mountains, rain forest, and unique wildlife have captured the attention of visitors, park advocates, and naturalists. By 1890 naturalist John Muir, Washington Congressman James Wickersham, and Lieutenant Joseph O’Neil, who led the first well-documented exploration of the peninsula’s interior, each respectively proposed creation of a national park on the Olympic Peninsula.

In 1897 the area received its first national designation, as Olympic Forest Reserve, by President Grover Cleveland in response to concern about the area’s disappearing forests. Eight years later, in 1909, President Teddy Roosevelt designated a part of the reserve as Mount Olympus National Monument to protect the habitat of Roosevelt Elk, whose population was in steep decline.

In 1937 President Franklin Roosevelt visited the Olympic Peninsula and added his support to establishment of a national park. The following year he signed the act designating Olympic National Park. An additional area of Pacific coast was added in 1953.

Olympic National Park’s outstanding attributes have also led to international recogn­ition. In 1976 the park was designated an International Biosphere Reserve in the Man and the Biosphere Program by United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

International recognition came again in 1981 when the park was declared a World Heritage Site by the World Heritage Convention, joining it to a system of natural and cultural properties that are considered irreplaceable treasures of outstanding universal value.

Interwoven throughout the park’s diverse landscape is an array of cultural and historic sites that tell the human story of the park. More than 650 archeological sites document over 13,500 years of human occupation of Olympic National Park lands. Historic sites reveal clues about the 200-year history of exploration, homesteading, and community development in the Pacific Northwest. (nps.gov)

You can find a wealth of additional information about this park’s history, landscape, location(s), and visitor facilities on the webpage for Olympic National Park from (naturally enough) the National Park Service, and also on the park’s page on Wikipedia.

Explore America’s National Parks, National Historical Parks, National Historic Sites, National Monuments, and more via Wikipedia and via the U.S. National Park Service’s website today.

What American treasures will you and your students be exploring in your homeschool this Hercules Term? 🇺🇸

❡ The great globe itself: This is one of our regular Homeschool Geography posts featuring important natural and historical sites in the United States. Print your own copy of our River Houses American Heritage Calendar and follow along with us, and add your name to our weekly mailing list to get great homeschool teaching ideas delivered right to your mailbox all through the year. 🌎

❡ We set to-day a votive stone: If you want a great long-term history and geography project for your homeschool, explore the Historical Marker Database online (hmdb.org) and make a plan to find all the markers that are listed in your local area. Add any new ones you know of that are missing, and add new photos or descriptions for the ones already included. Your students will gain a better appreciation for your local community and will learn a wealth of new information about history and geography. 🏛️

❡ Print this little lesson: Down at the bottom of this post you’ll find a special “Print” button that will let you create a neat and easy-to-read copy of this little lesson, and it will even let you edit and delete sections you don’t want or need (such as individual images or footnotes). Give it a try today! 🖨️

❡ Books in the running brooks: You can always turn to your River Houses atlas and almanac for more information about any of our homeschool states-of-the-week. The almanac has detailed profiles of all the U.S. states and territories, and the endpapers of the atlas are indexes that will show you where all of the individual national and regional maps may be found. 📚

❡ Homeschool calendars: We have a whole collection of free, printable, educational homeschool calendars and planners available on our main River Houses calendar page. They will help you create a light and easy structure for your homeschool year. Give them a try today! 🗓️

❡ Support our work: If you enjoy our educational materials, please support us by starting your regular Amazon shopping from our very own homeschool teaching supplies page. When you click through from our page, any purchase you make earns us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for helping us to keep going and growing! 🛒