Title:
Letter from Gifford Pinchot to John Muir, 1896 Jul 23.
Creator:
Gifford Pinchot
Publisher:
University of the Pacific Library Holt-Atherton Special Collections. Please contact this institution directly to obtain copies
of the images or permission to publish or use them beyond educational purposes.
Contributor:
John Muir
Date:
1896 Jul 23
2008
Type:
Text
Format:
Image/jpeg2000
Identifier:
muir09_0349-md-1
Source:
Original letter dimensions: 24 x 15 cm.
Language:
eng
Coverage:
Missoula, Mont
Rights:
Copyright status unknown
Some letters written to John Muir may be protected by the U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.). Transmission or reproduction
of materials protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners.
Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user.
Transcription:
1 letterhead July 23, 1896 Dear Mr. Muir, I have some bad news to send you. the Commission has decided that I should
be of some service to the general cause by spending more time in the Bitter Root Mountains than was intended at first. Consequently
it will be impossible for me to get to Tacoma as early as I had hoped. and the Alaska trip is now beyond my reach. You will
know, without any words from me, how sorry I am that matters have turned out in this way. I had already written home that
I was going with you, and I know how sorry my people will be when I tell them, as I must tonight, that the plan is changed.
It is now to spend not less than twenty days in the Clearwater Salmon River country, going through to the open land 02133
2 letterhead on one trail, returning across the Bitter Root Mts. another Lieutenant Ahern is going along, and my assistant,
Graves, will also join the party. So I hope to come out with a great deal of useful information of various kinds. No one,
so far as I can hear, has ever made quite a similar trip in this region, and so I am looking forward to finding a great deal
of interesting in the forest, the topography, and the animals. Now I am wishing that we had known, for this trip might have
tempted you to stay with us. It is a wonderfully rough country, they say, and almost unknown. With much regret, and many
thanks for your constant kindness, I am Very sincerely yours, Gifford Pinchot. 02133