Mt. Rainier National Park Day Trip from Seattle (Hot Hike in the Snow!)

Mt. Rainier National Park is a true gem in the State of Washington. This iconic peak can be seen from Seattle on a clear day and is one of the United States most historic and scenic National Parks.

00:00 Mt. Rainier National Park Day Trip from Seattle
02:41 Mt. Rainier National Park Skyline Trail
03:59 Mt. Rainier National Park Reflection Lake

History of Mt. Rainier National Park

https://www.nps.gov/mora/learn/historyculture/mount-rainier-history.htm

Mount Rainier National Park is part of the traditional lands of indigenous people who have been here for generations. The Cowlitz, Muckleshoot, Nisqually, Puyallup, Squaxin Island, and Yakama people are the original stewards of this place and we learn from their examples of stewardship and respect for the land.

From the American Indian tribes who gathered resources in the area for millennia to the bustling park that exists on the land today, a wide variety of groups have found meaning and importance in the mountain now called Mount Rainier. All of these groups mapped their values on the landscape and contributed to a broader sense of what the area should be. Though these values were often very different and sometimes conflicted, they are all held together today in a delicate balance by the park. The mountain is a product of its past in more than just a geological sense: understanding the human history of Mount Rainier is crucial to realizing the intricacy of the mountain today.

Creation of the park
A wide variety of groups came together to help establish the park in 1899. Scientists, mountaineers, conservation groups, local businesses, and large railroad companies all saw some possible benefit from a national park around Mount Rainier. They combined their often disparate interests into a lobbying campaign starting in 1893. It stressed the potential for tourism from the nearby cities of Seattle and Tacoma, the unsuitability of land for other commercial purposes like agriculture, grazing, or mining, and a need to preserve the unique glacial landscape for further study. After hesitant congressmen received assurances that the park would not come as an added expense to the government, the bill passed in 1899. Mount Rainier became the nation’s fifth national park and the first to be established after the Forest Reserve Act of 1891 that created the U.S. Forest Service. This resolved any questions as to whether the nascent national park and national forest systems would be administered as separate entities with different objectives.

Early Years
Development at the park grew at a torrid and often chaotic pace. Visitation ballooned from 1,786 in 1906 to 34,814 nine years later and park administrators struggled to keep up with the constant demand for more roads, lodging, and other services. The advent of automobiles increased the accessibility of the park but also created new challenges. Mount Rainier was the first national park to allow cars and by the time a road was built to Paradise Park in 1910, one third of the ranger force was being used for traffic control. Concurrent with the growth in tourist activity was an increased commercial interest in the natural resources of the park. During the first fifteen years of the park’s existence and in the absence of established regulations, mining, water development, and timber schemes sprang up but met with limited success.

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