The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness. –John Muir

May 28, 1892. John Muir is elected as the first President of the Sierra Club. The original mission of the organization was to protect the Sierra Nevada Mountains. And my goodness, the things they’ve accomplished since then! In its very first conservation campaign, Muir and the 182 charter members led an effort to stop a reduction in the boundaries of Yosemite National Park. This Sunday, the nation’s largest grassroots organization, The Sierra Club, will celebrate its 125^th birthday.

Without the Sierra Club, we would have no Sequoia National Park, home to the giant trees that are also the largest living things on this beautiful planet.

The Grand Canyon? The Sierra Club led the fight to prevent it from being dammed in the 1960s.

The Sierra Club keeps our air and water clean and our endangered species safe. In the 21^st century, they are the leaders fronting the transition in the U.S. from fossil fuels to clean, renewable sources of energy. And we admire their courage to protect the planet in the face of political pressure to exploit and degrade.

With 3 million active members and 64 nationwide chapters, we can’t wait to see what else the organization will accomplish in the decades to come!

The Sierra Club website has all kinds of wonderful details about their long history, and ways you can support them. Check it out: http://sierraclub.org/anniversary

The Scout’s Guide to Wild Edibles author Mike Krebill was interviewed for the Sierra Club’s national Magazine, Sierra, last November. Read the article here: http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/2016-6-november-december/green-life/searchable-feast

DID YOU KNOW?: John Muir was born in Scotland and left in 1849, at 10 years old. On his thousand-mile walk from Kentucky to the Gulf of Mexico, Muir carried a book by Scottish poet Robert Burns. Muir traveled back to Scotland one other time at age 55.

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