Yosemite Reservations

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YOSEMITE: HISTORY IN OUR BACKYARD
Ramona Frances 9 July 2007 Madera Tribune
The idea behind creating a national park was spawned in Madera County’s backyard, or very nearly so. The home of many “firsts,” Yosemite is also where, in 1916, the National Park Service was born.
“It’s also a place where the first nonprofit organization (Yosemite Association) was formed to support a national park,” said Laurel Rematore, director of membership with the Yosemite Association.
Rematore said the National Park Service, which became the caretakers of Yosemite, was so new in the early 1920s, another nonprofit called Yosemite Museum Association was created to accept a $75,000 grant from the Laura Spelman Rockerfeller Memorial to build a museum at the park. The museum exists today and houses one of the largest collections in the national park system.
Early in the park’s history, the “National Park Service didn’t know how to accept a donation,” Rematore said. “It had never been done before. I assume they did it because it made more sense than the foundation making a donation to the government.”
A museum existing inside a national park was also a new idea.
Out of that idea, a museum was built, providing a place where visitors could learn about history, flora and fauna to better connect with the natural world.

Rematore also has a personal history connected to the park.
Her involvement with Yosemite began as a youth, and later she volunteered for the Yosemite Association which led to her new role as director of member development. Exposure to Yosemite as a youth made “all the difference to me,” she said.
Rematore tells a story of her favorite teacher, Fred Fisher, who worked as a summer ranger in Yosemite. He also taught biology. She credits Fisher for spurring her passion for Yosemite. By the late 1990s, Rematore said she knew she wanted to do more with her life.
After becoming an engineer in the aerospace industry, she decided to make a change.
“I decided I wanted to do something different for my career so what better way than to follow my heart,” she said.
She began volunteering for the association and promoting stewardship of the park. “It is really important to get the next generation involved to carry on the tradition,” she said.
Established in 1923, the Yosemite Association was the nation’s first cooperating association in our national parks and serves as a benchmark for similar organizations nationwide. In collaboration with the National Park Service and authorized by Congress, the Yosemite Association supports interpretive, educational, research, scientific and environmental programs in Yosemite National Park through publishing, retail sales, seminars, visitor services, volunteer programs and other outreach. Each year the Yosemite Association Outdoor Adventures courses offer a wide variety of in-depth classes and outdoor experiences from Yosemite’s natural and human history to backpacking, photography and writing.
The association has donated more than $4 million in programs, services and direct financial support to Yosemite. Recent contributions include: Protecting Yosemite’s bears through the purchase of bearproof food canisters rented to backpackers, providing more than 10,000 hours of volunteer labor for visitor information services and habitat restoration and operating the wilderness information center and wilderness permit reservation system.