144 years later…
John Muir left San Francisco by foot “on or about the first of April,” as he writes in his field notes in 1868, bound for what was then Yosemite reserve—not yet a national park. He walked on to be the man we now know today as the “Father of Our National Parks.” One of the world’s best listeners when the world was perhaps most musical he used pen and paper to record music, like this one of a small grey bird called the water ouzel (Cinclus mexicanus):
“He is the mountain streams’ own darling, the hummingbird of blooming waters, loving rocky ripple-slopes and sheets of foam as a bee loves flowers, as a lark loves sunshine and meadows… What may be regarded as the separate songs of the ouzel are exceedingly difficult of description, because they are so variable and at the same time so confluent. Though I have been acquainted with my favorite ten years, and during most of this time have heard him sing nearly every day… The more striking strains are perfect arabesques of melody, composed of a few full, round notes, embroidered with delicate trills which fade and melt in long slender cadences. In general way his music is that of the streams refined and spiritualized. The deep booming notes of the falls are in it, the trills of rapids, the gurgling of margin eddies, the low whispering of level reaches, and the sweet tinkle of separate drops oozing from the ends of mosses and falling into tranquil pools.”
LISTEN
Live concerts like this one are performed everyday at our national parks—but unfortunately they are quickly vanishing due to the unprecedented increases in air traffic. Air traffic will at least double by the year 2025 according to FAA forecasts.
The goal of One Square Inch of Silence is to create the world’s first acoustic sanctuary off limits to all aircraft—thereby initiating a National Quiet Places system—and guarantee present and future generations a true wilderness experience. With your generous support we will accomplish our goal by 2016 Centennial of the National Park Service.
Earth Day, 2012, is the seventh anniversary of One Square Inch of Silence.
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