National Parks

Discover the rich history of America's national parks with essential titles selected by RCL editors. Resources for College Libraries (RCL) features core titles for academic libraries, curated by Choice/ACRL subject specialists. In this list, preview a selection of the 90,000+ titles available at rclweb.net.

Updated June 30, 2025
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America's Largest Classroom: What We Learn from Our National Parks
Thompson, Jessica L.
Paper Book
Over the past 100 years, visitor learning at America's national parks has grown and evolved. Today, there are over 400 National Park Service (NPS) sites, representing over eighty million acres. Sites exist in every US state and territory and are located on...
National parks : the American experience
Runte, Alfred
Paper Book
Revised with a new epilogue, "We the People," this fifth edition of National Parks: TheAmerican Experience continues the highly engaging story of how Americans invented and expanded the concept of national parks. A prominent adviser to the Ken Burns Emmy Award-winning documentary,...
Desert solitaire
Abbey, Edward
Paper Book
At last, one of the most popular books on the American West is available once again in hardcover. In celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the publication of Desert Solitaire, the University of Arizona Press is pleased to publish a new edition featuring a new introduction by...
Science, Conservation, and National Parks
Ackerly, David D.
Paper Book
As the US National Park Service (NPS) marks its centennial in 2016, parks and protected areas worldwide are under increasing threat from a variety of factors, including storms and fires of greater severity, plant and animal extinctions, the changing attitudes of a public that has become more...
Preserving nature in the national parks : a history : with a new preface and epilogue
Sellars, Richard West
Paper Book
This book traces the epic clash of values between traditional scenery-and-tourism management and emerging ecological concepts in the national parks, America's most treasured landscapes. It spans the period from the creation of Yellowstone National Park in 1872 to near the present, analyzing the...
National parks, Native sovereignty : experiments in collaboration
Hill, Christina Gish
Paper Book
The history of national parks in the United States mirrors the fraught relations between the Department of the Interior and the nation's Indigenous peoples. But amidst the challenges are examples of success. National Parks, Native Sovereignty proposes a reorientation of relationships between...
America's public lands : from Yellowstone to Smokey Bear and beyond
Wilson, Randall K.
Paper Book
How it is that the United States--the country that cherishes the ideal of private property more than any other in the world--has chosen to set aside nearly one-third of its land area as public lands? Now in a fully revised and updated edition covering the first years of the Trump administration,...
Building the national parks : historic landscape design and construction
McClelland, Linda Flint.
Paper Book
The Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency, was founded in 1942 by William 'Wild Bill' Donovan under the direction of President Roosevelt, who realized the need to improve intelligence during wartime. A rigorous recruitment process enlisted agents from both...
Yellowstone : the creation and selling of an American landscape, 1870-1903
Magoc, Chris J.
Paper Book
Examines the American myths and late-Victorian values behind the movement both to preserve the Yellowstone wilderness and to extract its natural resources--codifying the ultimate American landscape.
Uncertain path : a search for the future of national parks
Tweed, William C.
Paper Book
In this provocative walking meditation, writer and former park ranger William Tweed takes us to California's spectacular High Sierra to discover a new vision for our national parks as they approach their 100th anniversary. Tweed, who worked among the Sierra Nevada's big peaks and big trees for more...

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