Year |
Event type |
Event |
Geographical location
|
1864 |
Antecedent |
Yosemite Valley becomes protected from development and is preserved as a public trust.[1] |
California
|
1872 |
Foundation |
Sierra Club is founded by a San Francisco group of professors, businessmen, and other professionals led by Scottish-American naturalist John Muir.[1] |
San Francisco
|
1872 |
Foundation |
Yellowstone is founded as the first national park of the United States.[1] |
Wyoming, Montana, Idaho
|
1892 |
Campaign |
Sierra Club’s first conservation campaign is launched, as an effort to defeat a proposed reduction of Yosemite National Park’s boundaries.[1] |
|
1904 |
|
LeConte Memorial Lodge, a current National Historic Landmark, is built by the Sierra Club in 1903 in memory of Joseph LeConte, one of the founding members of the Sierra Club".[3] |
|
1907 |
|
A seven-year environmental struggle begins between The Sierra Club and the proposal of a reservoir in the Hetch Hetchy, a project that follows the need for additional water for growing San Francisco. However, the United States Congress would flood the valley in 1913.[1][4] |
|
1911 |
Organization |
The first official chapter of the Sierra Club starts in Southern California.[1] |
Southern California
|
1916 |
|
The Sierra Club supports bill that would create the National Park Service.[1] |
|
1919 |
|
Sierra Club appoints American photographer and environmentalist Ansel Adams custodian of LeConte Memorial Lodge in Yosemite, a position Adams would held until 1927.[5] |
|
1927 |
|
Conservationist Aurelia Harwood becomes the first female President of the Sierra Club.[6] |
|
1936 |
|
The Sierra Club grading system is created to classify hikes and climbs in the Sierra Nevada. The system divides climbs into six classes, class 1 being easy and class 6, severe. This classification would be modified in 1938.[7] |
|
1948 |
|
Sierra Club backs a plan for a ski resort at Mineral King, a subalpine glacial valley located in the southern part of Sequoia National Park. However, the project would be abandoned due to inadequate roads.[8] |
|
1951 |
|
The Sierra Club oposes federal government’s interest in damming Dinosaur National Monument in Colorado and Utah.[1] |
|
1952 |
|
"By the 1950s many of the club’s efforts involved fighting efforts to dam rivers, including the city of Los Angeles’s efforts to build dams in Kings Canyon National Park in 1952"[1] |
|
1952 |
|
As rock climbing becomes more popular, the 1938 Sierra Club classification system is modified further into the Yosemite Decimal System.[7] |
|
1960 |
|
"The Sierra Club Foundation is an American environmental nonprofit. It is affiliated with the Sierra Club. The organization's stated mission is to "help educate, inspire, and empower humanity to preserve the natural and human environment."" "The Sierra Club Foundation is the 501(c)(3) counterpart to the 501(c)(4) Sierra Club. It was established in 1960 in order to “provide financial support to the Sierra Club and other environmental organizations for tax deductible work.”"[1] |
|
1960 |
Organization |
Sierra Club Books is founded as the publishing division of Sierra Club. Along its history, Sierra Club Books would publish important books such as The Population Bomb and Fifty Classic Climbs of North America. |
|
1964 |
|
"By the 1960s the Sierra Club had chapters on both coasts and was fighting to get Congress to pass the Wilderness Act, which it did in 1964"[1] |
|
1970 |
Organization |
Sierra Club North Carolina Chapter is established.[9] |
North Carolina
|
1971 |
|
The Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund is launched as a group whose task is to handle the Sierra Club’s mounting litigation.[2] |
|
1980–1983 |
|
Sierra Club’s membership nearly doubles to 346,000 during this period.[2] |
|
1987 |
|
LeConte Memorial Lodge, built by Sierra Club, is declared a National Historic Landmark.[3] |
|
1991 |
|
The Sierra Student Coalition (SSC) is founded as the national student chapter of Sierra Club. |
Washington, D.C
|
1992 |
|
"Sierra Club du/of Canada (SCC) is the equivalent organization in Canada. It developed from Canadian chapters of the U.S. Sierra Club and incorporated in 1992. The “SCC has developed major national campaigns with four program areas: health and environment, protecting biodiversity, atmosphere and energy, and supporting a transition to sustainable economy.”"[1] |
|
1996 |
|
Environmental activist Adam Werbach becomes the youngest person ever elected as national president of the Sierra Club, at the age of 23.[10] |
|
2011 |
|
Sierra Club and Tucson–based Center for Biological Diversity file a lawsuit challenging the Bureau of Land Management oil and gas leases in Fresno and Monterey counties, arguing that BLM has failed to consider the possibility that these leases could be fracked, will all the entailing risks. By 2013, the court would agree that BLM broke the law, with BLM taking a voluntary remand to correct its deficient environmental analysis.[11]
|
|
2016 |
|
Sierra Club changes the name of LeConte Memorial Lodge to Yosemite Conservation Heritage Center after finding that Sierra Club founding member Joseph LeConte, for which the lodge was originally named, is now viewed as a racist and white supremacist.[3][12] |
|