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The United States in 1872.

When Yellowstone was established, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho were territories, not states.

For this reason, the federal government had to assume responsibility for the land, hence the creation of the national park.

American Pulitzer Prize-winning author Wallace Stegner wrote: National parks are the best idea we ever had.

Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst.

Even with the creation of Yellowstone, Yosemite, and nearly 37 other national parks and monuments, another 44 years passed before an agency was created in the United States to administer these units in a comprehensive way — the U. S. National Park Service ( NPS ).

Businessman Stephen Mather and his journalist partner Robert Sterling Yard pushed hardest for the creation of the NPS, writing then-Secretary of the Interior Franklin Knight Lane about such a need and spearheading a large publicity campaign for their movement.

Lane invited Mather to come to Washington, DC to work with him to draft and see passage of the National Park Service Organic Act, which the 64th United States Congress enacted and which President Woodrow Wilson signed into law on August 25, 1916.

Of the sites managed by the National Park Service of the United States, only 58 carry the designation of National Park.