John Muir, 1838 - 1914
Portrait by Underwood & Underwood (29 May 1912)
Born: 21 April 1838, Dunbar, East Lothian, Scotland, UK
Died: 24 December 1914, Los Angeles, California
Daniel Muir was a strict and religious man who was fond of the lash, and son John was a spirited and curious boy who was its frequent recipient. By the time the Muirs moved to Wisconsin in 1849, John could recite the entire New Testament and most of the Old but was fond of hunting birds nests and fighting. The family established Fountain Lake Farm near Portage, Wisconsin, then moved to Hickory Hill Farm. Muir attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison for several years but never advanced past freshman status due to his eclectic class choices. In 1864, possibly in fear of the draft, he left for Canada where he and brother Daniel worked in a lumber mill on Lake Huron. In 1866 Muir took a job as an industrial engineer in a carriage-parts plant at Indianapolis, an accident there drove a tool into one eye causing blindness for several weeks. Taken aback by that he set out on foot towards the south, seeking the "wildest, leafiest, and least trodden way I could find". He intended to continue into South America but came down with malaria in Florida and booked sea passage to San Francisco. He immediately went into the Yosemite Valley, working there for a season as a shepherd, then built a cabin such that Yosemite Creek went through one corner. After reading from a battered volume of Ralph Waldo Emerson for three years he was delighted when Emerson visited Yosemite. They spent a day together and Emerson offered Muir a teaching position at Harvard, which was declined. In 1878 Muir married Louisa Strentzel and they moved into a large home on her family's orchard. Muir was devoted to the family and the farm but it clearly wasn't what his spirit needed so after six years his wife would "shoo him back up" to the mountains for a while and he devoted most of his time at the farm to writing. In 1890 Muir attempted to have Yosemite transferred to the custody of the National Park Service, and in 1892 he formed the Sierra Club. In 1903 President Theodore Roosevelt came to Yosemite with his entourage but asked Muir to show him "the real Yosemite". The two left the others and spent a day together and a night under the stars, waking to fresh snow; in 1905 Yosemite Valley and Mariposa Grove were transferred to the federal park system. His final battle was to block a dam that would flood the Hetch Hetchy valley, which Muir felt was even more stunning than Yosemite, to provide drinking water for San Francisco. Roosevelt saw that no action was taken, William Howard Taft suspended Interior Department approval of the project, but Woodrow Wilson authorized the dam in December of 1913. He was profoundly disheartened by this development, and the following year he came down with pneumonia.
Biography from Wikipedia and Sierra Club with Google Earth
Additional quotes from Wikiquote. Wikiquote entries are often "sourced" and may include items longer than those included here, particularly for poets, lyricists, and dramatists.
John Muir quotes:
Quotes found : 73 — (15 per page, this is page 1 of 5) 1 2 3 4 5 Next
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- A few minutes ago every tree was excited, bowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship. But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease. Every hidden cell is throbbing with music and life, every fiber thrilling like harp strings, while incense is ever flowing from the balsam bells and leaves. No wonder the hills and groves were God's first temples, and the more they are cut down and hewn into cathedrals and churches, the farther off and dimmer seems the Lord himself. permalink
John Muir - Another glorious day, the air as delicious to the lungs as nectar to the tongue. permalink
John Muir - My First Summer in the Sierra (1911) - Any fool can destroy trees. They cannot run away; and if they could, they would still be destroyed, chased and hunted down as long as fun or a dollar could be got out of their bark hides, branching horns, or magnificent bole backbones. Few that fell trees plant them; nor would planting avail much towards getting back anything like the noble primeval forests. permalink
John Muir - As long as I live, I'll hear waterfalls and birds and winds sing. I'll interpret the rocks, learn the language of flood, storm, and the avalanche. I'll acquaint myself with the glaciers and wild gardens, and get as near the heart of the world as I can. permalink
John Muir - "The National Parks and Forest Reservations" in Sierra Club Bulletin (January 1896) - Between every two pines is a doorway to a new world. permalink
John Muir - Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. permalink
John Muir - Our National Parks (1901) - Earth has no sorrow that earth can not heal. permalink
John Muir - Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where Nature may heal and cheer and give strength to body and soul alike. permalink
John Muir - The Yosemite (1912) - Few are altogether deaf to the preaching of pine trees. Their sermons on the mountains go to our hearts; and if people in general could be got into the woods, even for once, to hear the trees speak for themselves, all difficulties in the way of forest preservation would vanish. permalink
John Muir - "The National Parks and Forest Reservations", Sierra Club Bulletin Vol. 1, No. 7 (January 1896) - God does not appear, and flow out, only from narrow chinks and round bored wells here and there in favored races and places, but He flows in grand undivided currents, shoreless and boundless over creeds and forms and all kinds of civilizations and peoples and beasts, saturating all and fountainizing all. permalink
John Muir - Letter to Catharine Merrill (9 June 1872) - God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand tempests and floods. But he cannot save them from fools. permalink
John Muir - Going to the mountains is going home. permalink
John Muir - Government protection should be thrown around every wild grove and forest on the mountains, as it is around every private orchard, and the trees in public parks. To say nothing of their value as fountains of timber, they are worth infinitely more than all the gardens and parks of towns. permalink
John Muir - "The National Parks and Forest Reservations" in Sierra Club Bulletin (January 1896) - How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains! permalink
John Muir - How hard to realize that every camp of men or beast has this glorious starry firmament for a roof! In such places standing alone on the mountain-top it is easy to realize that whatever special nests we make - leaves and moss like the marmots and birds, or tents or piled stone - we all dwell in a house of one room - the world with the firmament for its roof - and are sailing the celestial spaces without leaving any track. permalink
John Muir - John of the Mountains (1938)
Quotes found : 73 — (15 per page, this is page 1 of 5) 1 2 3 4 5 Next
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