John Muir
April 12, 1838-December 24, 1914
Environmentalist, writer, and savior of Yosemite
"John Muir will never be fully appreciated by those whose minds are
filled with money getting and the sordid things of modern every-day
life. To such Muir is an enigma — a fanatic — visionary and impractical.
There is nothing in common to arouse sympathetic interest. That anyone
should spend his whole life in ascertaining the fundamental truths of
nature and glory in their discovery with a joy that would put to shame
even the religious zealot is to many utterly incomprehensible. That a
man should brave the storms and thread the pathless wilderness, exult in
the earthquake's violence, rejoice in the icy blasts of the northern
glaciers, and that he should do all this alone and unarmed, year in and
year out, is a marvel that but few can understand. These solitary
explorations were quite in contrast with the usual heavily equipped
expeditions which undertake such work. John Muir loved and gloried in
this sort of life and approached it with an enthusiasm and power of will
that made hardships and those things which most human beings consider
essentials, mere trifles by comparison. He was willing to subordinate
everything in life to this work which he had set out to do supremely
well, and it is little wonder that he attained his goal."
