America's Coming of Age
Dr. Ketcher's 8th grade project
By: Aurora Calma
Roosevelt and Conservation
"To waste, to destroy, our natural resources, to skin and exaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very properity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed"
When Theodore Roosevelt was a young boy, he wanted to be a scientist who revels in and examines nature. He soon realized how much humans can have an effect on nature.
He saw this when he witnessed the great herds of buffalo be reduced to less than 500 existing buffalo. Roosevelt, an avid adventurer and lover of nature, dedicated himself to protecting both wildlife and natural resources. He recognized that without fast action, the rich natural resources and incomparable landscapes of the US would disappear as quickly as the buffalo. As president, Roosevelt provided federal protection for almost 230 million acres of land, an area equivalent to the entire Eastern Seaboard from Maine to Florida. He sat aside 150 national forests, the first 51 federal bird reservations, five national parks, the first 18 national monuments, and the first four national game preserves. Roosevelt also appointed as the first Chief of the U.S. Forest Service