ABSTRACT
Under Mather and Albright the National Park Service developed a tradition, often called the National Park Idea, which became equated with the parks themselves. As John Bodnar applies his models of official and vernacular discourse to the national parks at this time, he argues that the postwar emphasis on national unity and greatness, which was expressed through the official discourse of this tradition, left little room for the imaginative possibilities of the vernacular. The parks became he says, and we have seen, centers of the nation. He points to the aggressive patriotism post-World War I, followed in the 1930s by the highly nationalistic New Deal—in which the national parks participated through CCC projects. He also notes the past tradition of the parks as symbols of American greatness as contributing factors to this nation-centered discourse. 1 There is an attempt to repeat this following World War II—a time when Americans flocked to the parks in ever greater numbers and the Park Service had few resources to deal with them. “Mission 66” was Director Conrad Wirth's plan to win support from the government for the parks; and, within the context of the Cold War, Wirth asserted the patriotic importance of the parks for American citizens and the necessity of developing them into venues that adequately reflected the pride of Americans. The hope was that together these would revitalize the tradition established by Mather and Albright. Following closely on Mission 66, the reports of two committees, chaired by Starker Leopold and William Robbins, would lead the parks in new directions.
