Here's the answer ... and I didn't need Wiki to find it either:
Quote:
Harold Ickes (1874-1952)
No Secretary of the Interior was a more staunch defender of the national park idea than Ickes, who served in the role from 1933 to 1946. Originally a reform Republican from Chicago, he became a fierce New Dealer under President Franklin Roosevelt. As Interior Secretary, he stopped plans for a skyline drive in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, championed the cause for Kings Canyon National Park in California to be created as a road-less park (he wanted it named for John Muir), took on the timber interests in creation of Olympic National Park, hired Ansel Adams to photograph the parks, declared 1934 the "National Park Year" with special postage stamps and posters designed to promote it, and is responsible for innumerable other achievements on behalf of the parks.
Ickes, who called himself "the old curmudgeon," was controversial. His proposals to consolidate all natural resource agencies in the federal government under his control at Interior were rebuffed even by a Congress normally friendly to FDR. He ordered managers at Shenandoah National Park to take down signs segregating campgrounds and picnic areas. With Eleanor Roosevelt, he arranged for Marian Anderson to sing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial after the Daughters of the American Revolution had refused to allow Anderson to perform in Constitution Hall in Washington, DC, because of her race. Known for a fiery temper and brusque style, Ickes was "the meanest man who ever sat in a Cabinet office in Washington," Horace Albright said, "and the best Secretary of the Interior we ever had."
Posted 01/18/2012 3:42 pm
