I'm Trailer Trash... And I Have The License To Prove It!

Spartan Manor.

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthope...r-1890426073

I can't imagine how nice it would be to visit the Grand Canyon in 1941 ... only a handful of tourists at the overlooks and quiet nights in the campground.

And the campgrounds were free (up until 1965)

Before WWII most people didn't have decent automobiles and access to some of the national parks was by train. Both Grand Canyon and Yosemite were serviced by tourist train--the Grand Canyon train runs to this day but Yosemite's is long gone. Many parks had post offices, leading to park oriented postal history. Is it coincidence that the earliest postmarks in the postal history article below coincide with the tourist railroad's inauguration?

A few links for your Holiday perusal--Happy Fourth!

BurnsideBob



Grand Canyon Train: https://www.thetrain.com/the-train/schedule-route/

Yosemite Train: https://www.nps.gov/yose/blogs/trac...railroad.htm

Yosemite Postal History: http://nostalgia.esmartkid.com/yosemitepostal.html

I had no idea these existed. Very cool. Thanks for posting them. Just one more thing for me to hunt high and low for.

They are scarce. I've known about them for at least 40 years, and have only seen a tiny handful of examples.

Thought you might like to see an example I picked up at Nojex.
Issued at Yellowstone, then used again three days later at Grand Teton Park.

Love the extra messages stamped on the license by the Rangers.
Chip

Lovely example, Chip. I like the larger format of the permit compared to most that you see.

Plz do not poke bearz. Kthksbai

I'll never forget the 2013 story of a 12 year old girl who was attacked by a black bear and survived to tell her story.

Abby Wetherell was out for a run near her grandfather's cabin. A black bear knocked her off her feet and she suffered deep wounds on her back and thigh. "I was just thinking, 'This is it, I'm not going to live, I'm going to die right here," Abby said. Abby was able to free herself and run away, but the bear quickly caught up with her and knocked her down again.

She told reporters, "I thought that if I pet it, perhaps the bear would like me and stop attacking." And in what has to be one of the greatest understatements of all time Abby said, "that didn't work!".

Apparently, the bear was scared off when a screaming neighbor startled it. Abby was taken to the hospital where she received more than 100 stitches.
Don

Black bear are ever present at my house in Western MA. They literally hang out on my porch and lay under apple trees eating the "drops" that are fermenting and which have a high alcohol content. They get bombed. This past Summer my wife stepped out onto the porch with our three German Shepherds and turned to her right to see a black bear standing and looking back at her from ten feet away. The dogs went crazy and in the blink of an eye the bear ran past her brushing her arm in the process, went down the stairs and hopped the fence. The local store that throws food in their dumpster has a double electric fence around it. Tourists at the State Forest up the road love to approach them for selfies. They learn as cubs to dumpster dive and my neighbor used to put bowls of food out on her porch for the bears to feed. Dumb, dumb and dumber. They scare the heck out of me. When I had a dumpster, the bears were constantly raiding it. Firing my 9mm into the air dispersed them at first but as soon as they realized that the noise was not accompanied by physical harm, they ignored the pistol shots. Smart.

Has the bear rumor network reached your state?

An adult Yosemite bear figured out if it hopped up and down on the roof of an SUV, it could pop the sliding door (and screw up the SUV) and get at the goodies inside. Other bears learned to do this. They apparently still haven't figured out that the box of baby wipes or Kleenex on a seat is not a box of cookies, so no points for humans for only hiding your snacks.

Bears destroying vehicles are a big problem around here now. They just screw around with the handles until they get in and trash the vehicle. Also, this year a friend of mine went out onto his second-floor deck only to find a bear standing on it. The bear shimmied back down a post. And someone else I know had a bear rummage through their second-floor bathroom. He ate all of the mint toothpaste that was in the medicine cabinet! He had used the inside stairs to "visit". Shooting them is illegal but IF someone did there is a cook at a local private club that makes some awesome bear steaks and stew.

Need we say more?

Black bears are nothing compared to Brown Bears.
Regardless of the color, a good rule of thumb is the one on the permit -
"Keep a safe distance from bears."