Gallery Editors' Note

摘要

In the Gallery essay for this special issue of Environmental History, Sara Dant examines a less well-known moment in the history of the Wilderness Act. While many environmental historians understand that on the morning of September 3, 1964, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Wilderness Act into law, they remain unaware, Dant reminds us, that during this same Rose Garden ceremony he also signed the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) Act, which insured accessibility to outdoor recreational resources and resulted in the construction of numerous urban parks and city playgrounds. To analyze the relationship between these twin pieces of environmental legislation, Dant creatively investigates the official White House photographs from the Rose Garden signing ceremony. After some sleuthing that would make Sherlock Holmes proud, she concludes that while the LWCF may have been an afterthought for those in the Rose Garden back in 1964, since then it has exerted a more powerful influence on the daily lives of American citizens than its more famous legislative counterpart.