The Morning of Creation (1946-1980)

Following World War II, the parks are overwhelmed as visitation reaches 62 million people a year. A new billion-dollar campaign – Mission 66 – is created to build facilities and infrastructure that can accommodate the flood of visitors. A biologist named Adolph Murie introduces the revolutionary notion that predatory animals, which are still hunted, deserve the same protection as other wildlife. In Florida, Lancelot Jones, the grandson of a slave, refuses to sell to developers his family's property on a string of unspoiled islands in Biscayne Bay and instead sells it to the federal government to be protected as a national monument. In the late 1970s, President Jimmy Carter creates an uproar in Alaska when he sets aside 56 million acres of land for preservation – the largest expansion of protected land in history. In 1995, wolves are re-established in Yellowstone, making the world's first national park a little more like what it once was.

Writing:
  • Dayton Duncan

Stars:
Release Date: 2009-09-27
Seasons: 1
TMDb: 8.2/10
  • Country: US
  • Language: English
  • Runtime: 120

Other episodes for this season

The Scripture of Nature (1851-1890)
Episode 1 - The Scripture of Nature (...
The Last Refuge (1890-1915)
Episode 2 - The Last Refuge (1890-191...
The Empire of Grandeur (1915-1919)
Episode 3 - The Empire of Grandeur (1...
Going Home (1920-1933)
Episode 4 - Going Home (1920-1933)
Great Nature (1933-1945)
Episode 5 - Great Nature (1933-1945)
The Morning of Creation (1946-1980)
Episode 6 - The Morning of Creation (1946-1980)