You are looking at Pinchot Lake, the defining geographical feature of the Gifford Pinchot State Park. A short drive south from the Harrisburg state capital, this recreational area is named after America’s famed environmental conservationist. Gifford Pinchot (1865-1946) worked with the likes of Theodore Roosevelt and female conservationist Mira Lloyd Dock to promote the planned management of the natural resources of the United States. He was farsighted enough to realize the importance of the non-human environment, and his admonitions to take care of it have even more pressing truth than ever: “Unless we practice conservation, those who come after us will have to pay the price of misery, degradation, and failure for the progress and prosperity of our day.” Besides having a State Park and a National Forest in Washington named after him, Pinchot’s legacy lives on in the environmentally supportive actions of his descendants. His son is one example: Gifford Bryce Pinchot went on to found the National Resources Defense Council, one of our nation’s leading environmental agencies.
Source(s): Quote from “Today in science history,” @todayinsci.com; state park is my image; image of Pinchot from foresthistory.org. My colleagueSusan Rimby wrote a book about the Progressive leader and conservationist Mira Lloyd Dock, and it is published by Penn State University Press.
