Announcer there are more than 400 National Parks across america, covering 85 million acres of land with locations in every state. People 325 million visited these sites last year. Over the next 90 minutes, we will feature a mixture of Natural Beauty and history at eight different parks across the country. We began outside cleveland at the cuyahoga National Park. Situated along the river, we will learn how the canal system in ourayed a major role nations westward expansion during the 1840s. The ohio and erie canal is part of a system that was put in place in the early years of america, between 1825 and 1832. It is a water transportation route that connected lake erie with the ohio river, which is part of a larger idea. A National Water transportation route. In the early days of america we had colonies situated right along the atlantic seaboard. Our leaders at that time so i problem. The problem was, we needed that country to expand westward. However, there was a big obstacle. The appalachian mountains. Our first president happened to be a canal engineer. He had an idea. To create this transcontinental water transportation route using two canals, the earache canal through new york state, the ear can now erie canal, the ohio and erie, that would ultimately connect the erie canal, lake erie, the ohio river, sippy, all the way to the gulf of mexico. In the early days we did not have a big federal government. In terms of implementing the ee rica now the canal, it depended on the states. Fortunately, the state of new york had a champion who became their canal commissioner and got the job done for the state of new york. Then he rose to become the governor of new york. Ohio, facing a similar challenge in terms of funding, found itself on the verge of bankruptcy. The canal project is worth more than all of the value of the land in ohio. How do you find this thing . Believe it or not, the state of new york back the bonds. And it was Dewitt Clinton who for the groundbreaking. Why . Well, guess what . It made a lot of beneficial difference to the state of new york including the fact that new york city became the only port that could export and import goods, making at the Financial Capital of america. In ohio, we had a fellow by the name of alfred kelley, who became the canal commissioner and took it on as his lifelong legacy to make sure that canal got built on time and under budget. The ohio and erie canal is 309 miles in length. It goes from cleveland to portsmouth ohio. The actual construction of the canal began in 1825. By 1827, the first boat from akron to cleveland docked through the canal port in cleveland. By 1832 the entire system was complete from cleveland all the way to the ohio river. It made a tremendous difference. For the nation, it allowed us to rationalize our economy. It allowed us to have internal trade. Prior to that all of those seaboard states depended on exporting in terms of making money and delivering goods and services. This helped america expand westward. By doing so, i mentioned new york city became a Financial Capital of the country. Ohio rises from wilderness to become the third most populous and third richest state in the union by the 1860s. Canal life was a slowpaced life. Canal boats generally went about four or five miles per hour. We are standing in a lock right now. There would have been numerous locks to allow those boats to navigate the terrain and topography. These became elevators, watered elevators that lifted or lowered the boats as they made their journey. Often times, would find cattle and people sleeping in the same boat. Some were travelers. Some were goods being delivered. A pretty hectic life, but at a slow pace. Predominantly predominantly the , goods that moved along the canal, especially ohio eastward, were grain, things of this nature. We became the breadbasket of america for a reason. This was a good place to grow things. And new england became the early days of the industrial revolution, a good place to make things. Basically, we had this barter, trade system that was part of our National Economy that had, on one hand food, on the other hand services, goods, machines, etc. The canal in ohio pay for itself. What is significant, in cleveland we had our waylock. ,that is how you made money. You would have a canal boat get weighed. Its the difference between its original weight and what it docked at that you made your money. In 1874, when the canal was bought, the canal land in cleveland, to basically put in railroad tracks, we took that canal and moved it. We still used the weigh canal in 1874. That being said, we were still making money on that canal. Railroads arrived in 1851. Ironically the guy who helped , bring the railroads to cleveland, same guy who championed the canal. Alfred kelly. The canal is pretty much had a Immediate Impact on the canal. However, the canal did stay in use all of the way up until 1913. It had a different use. It started to become a place where people would go leisurely on the weekend. They would have a boat. They would travel up and down the canals. Many times, the canal us, when they were put in place they , would have General Stores or taverns. People would go pubcrawling on a sunday afternoon using a canal boat. Especially, the river valley became the center of storage. It became a port. It became a Manufacturing Center of the city itself, so that is where the wealth of cleveland grew, and it was all based on the fact that you had that canal. As time went on and manufacturing obviously rose, the city of cleveland grew, and we became the fifth largest city in the country. We had major steel mills and Oil Refineries thanks to john rockefeller. There was a consequence environmentally to those uses. Prior to the Environmental Agency and regulations about what you could put in water, rivers, etc. , there were no water regulations, so in cleveland, you had situations where, for example, standard oil and john rockefeller, basically, they refined oil along the banks of the river, and when they did so there were certain byproducts that he could not find a use for. And therefore, they ended up in , the river. It was told and reported that at one time we had a fire in 1957 they went and measured the gunk on the top of the river and it was more than eight , inches deep of oil and other byproducts. But the story itself, although it is bad, it really has tremendously positive outcomes. It inspires earth day. It helps pass legislation that creates the United States epa. It helped pass the clean water bill and the clean air bill, so if you look at the consequences of that particular river fire, there is the positive that far outweighs the negative. Cleveland, due to that fire and the exposure it got, we pretty much are the salvo of that environmental movement. Then, in 1974, Congress Passed legislation to create the Cuyahoga Valley National park, and that became the central feature of that National Park. Anare still what is called area of concern, so there is still some work to be done in completing the job of cleaning up the need river. But the needle has gone dramatically to the positive end. We are just about through the area of concern. In 2000, thenpresident bill clinton introduced a program called the american rivers program. He basically put the invitation out to anyone who thought their river was significant enough to the story of america to compete for this new designation. We did. We competed for the Cuyahoga River as a part of that. The story was told, they went through that deliberation process to choose which was going to be the first 10 rivers to be nominated for American Heritage river status. They got to bill clinton. They gave him the list. He said, where is the cuyahoga . Didnt they apply . The answer was, they did apply, however they didnt make the cut. He goes, this program is all about the Cuyahoga River. Add the reason he said that was, it is the comeback of the Cuyahoga River that is the story today. This area that we are in right now became the Cuyahoga Valley NationalRecreation Area in december 1974. It became a National Park in the year 2000. With that comes a new idea for ringing National Parks to people. Most of us are going to get to the gates of the Arctic National wildlife refuge, but if we have National Parks nearby you can , get to those. They started making National Parks in urban areas. We have a backbone with the ohio and erie canal, the railroad, and the Cuyahoga River. This park was created out of land that has been used, in some instances abused, because it was a wasteland in some places that people did not see any potential for. And yet, we cleaned it up. We let nature do what nature does, and now we are the 11th most visited National Park. There is a huge story here. A story of can i say redemption . A story where if we allow nature to do what it does best, if we give it the chance to do what it does best and not interfere or help it, then the land can recover. Most environmental legislation , welaws and what we have now have a river that is coming back to life. Has recovered. Yes, it was degraded because of man. Man,t was also helped by and with that help, it has this area wecreate have now. Announcer from the Cuyahoga River we now travel to the , banks of the Mississippi River and gateway arch National Park in st. Louis, where a monument to americas westward expansion has become a recognizable symbol for the city that played such a vital role in it. I think most people are like i was when i first saw it. When you see it from a distance , you think, oh, that is kind of interesting. That is kind of cool. And then, the closer you get to it, you realize how massive it is, and getting up to the base of it and touching it looking up , 630 feet to the top, it really is very, very impressive. I think the closer you get to it, the more impressed you become. Right now we are standing very , close to the famous gateway arch in st. Louis. Tall, stainless steel structure that was designed back in 1947, but not built until the mid 1960s and completed in 1965. Each year we get 2. 5 million , visitors who come to see the itorial and see the arch, so is a very busy place, especially during the summer months. The gateway arch was designed by a man born in finland who came here to america when he was 10 years old with his father, who anda very famous architect, he mainly worked just with his father up to the point in time where an architectural competition was announced for what became the arch that you see behind me. The competition was for Jefferson National expansion memorial, which was a National Park service site founded by president ial proclamation in 1935 to commemorate st. Louiss role in the western expansion of the United States. So 12 years after the founding of the park, an architectural competition was held to decide what the memorial would look like. And, basically, they had about 90 acres of land to work with. 40 city blocks have been torn razed of all of their buildings, to make way for the memorial on the riverfront. Each architect that submitted a proposal could really do whatever he or she wanted. It could be a huge sculpture. It could be a series of museum buildings. They did want one central feature to be in each of these designs. Some people put an obelisk in. Some people put a big kind of monolithic, rectangular block or something. Saarinen decided to go with the idea of an arch. It was only after he designed the arch that he realized, oh, it forms a gateway. It is really appropriate for the idea of a memorial to st. Loui role in western expansion, st. Louis role as a gateway to have a gigantic gateway on the riverfront. The arch is made out of stainless steel, one quarter inch stainless steel on the outside, and on the inside it is , made of carbon steel. Basically you have a sandwich. Portions it is , filled in with concrete. In the upper portions, there are tie rods they keep the sections apart. It is a unique structure, because it does not have any superstructure on the inside. There is no girders or things like that that form the shape of the arch. It is not just clad with stainless steel. Sometimes visitors are surprised because they have not read about the arch to learn they can actually go to the top of it. They think maybe it is just like a big piece of outdoor sculpture, and you can just look at it. There are little, barrel shaped cap schools that fit five persons in each one. On each leg of the arch there is eight of those capsules that form a train that run on the track. When people get into the capsule , it is hanging from the track. As they go to the top, by the time they get to the top, it is on top of the track. So in order to accommodate that and make sure people are not going to be flipped upside down, it actually shifts and turns to keep the car level. It is not a thrill ride. It does not go really fast like at six flags. It is a unique experience. A lot of people really prize the experience of writing in these capsules up to the top and getting the nice view they get from the top of the arch, from that Observation Deck at the top. Right now, we are in the midst of a multimillion dollar project that is being funded by many different entities that are partnering that National Park service to kind of revitalize the park itself and make it more accessible to people. For many years, we have been kind of an island surrounded by high speed roads, and what is going to happen if kind of a lid is going to be placed over the highways so you can walk directly from the city where you will park your vehicle, directly to the arch without having to cross any major streets. It is really just this iconographic symbol of st. Louis, sort of like the space needle is to seattle or the Empire State Building or the statue of liberty is to new york. There are certain symbols that immediately identify a place on the map to people, and the arch is one, the one, for the people of st. Louis. Announcer right now, we leave the city once considered gateway to the west and travel through the great plains and over the Rocky Mountains to the Colorado National monument near Grand Junction to hear how one man helped preserve this area on colorados western slope. I think everybody is just amazed by it is not a widely publicized presence here. The park service does not advertise. So people find out about this because they read magazine articles, or they see features like you are preparing. But it is not our typical colorado scenery. Its not what most people think of when they think of colorado. So it comes as a pleasant surprise for folks to find it here. John otto was a vagabond, not in the sense that he was a neerdowell. But he just did not have any permanent routes. He was attracted to this area 7 by the promise of employment on a waterline project, and i guess this was the type of country that was really appealing to him. He began to agitate for the creation of a National Park here. The first thing he did was, he wrote a lot of letters to prominent people and so on, trying to get this established as a National Park, and he also constructed a lot of trails for forward access into the canyons up on the ridge of the monument. I am sure the local people came out on sunday afternoon and would hitch up the wagon and for a picnic. One of the other things he did is, in 1926, he started collecting buffalo nickels from the kids in town and he used that money to transport a couple of bison in here. He wanted to establish a herd of bison in the monument. The elks club conspired to bring a couple of elk. John got some money from the chamber of commerce to build some fences to contain these animals. And for many years we had a , bison herd. The elk kind of took a look around and said, we are out of here. They went south into the high country. Oddly enough, they are coming back into the monument now. The bison we removed in 1983 because they were confined to a small area and had a really adverse impact on the resource. But that was the kind of thing that he did. He was constantly interested in hosting the area and promoting it. There was no concerted effort until john otto came here to set this aside as a National Park or a National Monument. There are a couple of distinctions between National Parks and National Monuments. One of the distinctions is legal, related to the method in which it is established, and the other is more based on its resource qualities. Otto agitated for the creation of a National Park here, but the creation of a National Park requires an act of congress. So it is much more difficult to do. A National Monument can be established by president ial proclamation. And so although john otto wanted a National Park, it was much easier to establish a National Monument. That is what happened when president taft proclaimed the area in 1911. The other dis