Special Event

Our National Parks, Past and Present: A Conversation

December 2, 2024, 6:00-7:00PM PST
Rothenberg Hall @ The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens
The Huntington and the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West present a program focused on recent campaigns to preserve natural land in the form of national parks and monuments, discussed within the longer history of such efforts.  How are the goals of the conservation movement and government agencies different now than they were in the late 19th century? How can we continue to improve our interactions with the landscapes that surround us? The newly expanded San Gabriel Mountains National Monument, located in Los Angeles’ backyard, builds on the history established at Yellowstone and Yosemite, but it differs from those parks. In particular, ideas about pristine “wilderness” and Indigenous land rights have evolved in the past 150 years. Together we will consider what that evolution means for the 21st century.

This program derives from the exhibition “Storm Cloud: Picturing the Origins of our Climate Crisis,” which traces the rise of environmental awareness throughout the long nineteenth century. The show focuses on the work of British and American writers and artists who helped garner public and government support for conservation, including the establishment of the earliest national parks in the U.S.

About the Speakers

Join us for a conversation among Rep. Judy Chu, who has long worked on the San Gabriel Mountains designation; Kimberly Morales Johnson (Gabrieleno/Tongva), Tribal Secretary of the San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians; and Megan Kate Nelson, historian and author of Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America. The discussion will be moderated by Josh Garrett-Davis, The Huntington’s H. Russell Smith Foundation Curator of Western American History.

Logo design for Western edition with blue coast and brown and green coast view from above

Western Edition Season 4 Podcast

More than 50 million viewers begin each new year looking to Pasadena, tuning into the Rose Parade to see flower and seed-coated floats cruise slowly down Colorado Boulevard. But to nearly 1450,000 of those viewers, the “City of Roses” is home, a complex suburb of downtown Los Angeles with a deep history. Pasadena has played a greater role in American and Pacific histories than most of its residents even know.

This new season of Western Edition digs deep into the “Crown City” of the San Gabriel Valley with  six little-known Pasadena stories, from Simons brickyard to Vroman’s bookstore, St. Barnabas church to the Shoya House at The Huntington. It also considers Pasadenans from the past, from John Brown’s children to John Birch’s followers.