Pioneer photographer William Henry Jackson’s photographs from the 1871 Hayden Survey were instrumental in persuading Congress to designate Yellowstone as a national park—America’s first and greatest experiment in the preservation of an extraordinary landscape. Yellowstone National Park: Through the Lens of Time is an extended visual essay presenting Jackson’s images paired with breathtaking color rephotographs of each view from photojournalist Bradly J. Boner. These contemporary comparisons to Jackson’s originals reveal just how well that experiment has stood the test of time.
Yellowstone is always changing. The Grand Canyon is getting deeper and wider as the Yellowstone River carves a chasm into the earth. The flows of the great hot springs at Mammoth are creating new layers of delicate, colorful cascades and leaving the old terraces to crumble in decay. Roads, bridges, and pathways wind through the park, and there are restaurants, campgrounds, and hotels. Yet even with the impact of humanity, Yellowstone remains remarkably intact, evidence that the effort to preserve and sustain the park for future generations has been a success.
Combining more than 100 gorgeous “then and now” sets of photographs—the first complete published collection of Jackson’s images from the 1871 Hayden Survey and a result of Boner's three years of work rephotographing them—with history, extensive notes, and personal tales, Yellowstone National Park: Through the Lens of Time pays homage to the park’s early history and its present state, and offers a glimpse into the future. The great experiment of Yellowstone—which captivates millions of visitors from all corners of the globe each year—has transcended generations and should be maintained for generations to come.
The University Press of Colorado and the author gratefully acknowledge the generous contributions of the many donors to the Kickstarter campaign supporting the publication of this book.
In the arid American West, settlement was generally contingent on the availability of water to irrigate crops and maintain livestock and human residents. Early irrigation projects were usually the cooperative efforts of pioneer farmers, but by the early twentieth century they largely reflected federal intentions to create new farms out of the western public domain. The Yuma Reclamation Project, authorized in 1904, was one of the earliest federal irrigation projects initiated in the western United States and the first authorized on the Colorado River. Its story exemplifies the range of difficulties associated with settling the nation’s final frontier—the remaining irrigable lands in the arid West, including Indian lands—and illuminates some of the current issues and conflicts concerning the Colorado River. Author Robert Sauder’s detailed, meticulously researched examination of the Yuma Project illustrates the complex multiplicity of problems and challenges associated with the federal government’s attempt to facilitate homesteading in the arid West. He examines the history of settlement along the lower Colorado River from earliest times, including the farming of the local Quechan people and the impact of Spanish colonization, and he reviews the engineering problems that had to be resolved before an industrial irrigation scheme could be accomplished. The study also sheds light on myriad unanticipated environmental, economic, and social challenges that the government had to confront in bringing arid lands under irrigation, including the impact on the Native American population of the region.The Yuma Reclamation Project is an original and significant contribution to our understanding of federal reclamation endeavors in the West. It provides new and fascinating information about the history of the Yuma Valley and, as a case study of irrigation policy, it offers compelling insights into the history and consequences of water manipulation in the arid West.
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