[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 15]
[House]
[Pages 21021-21022]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




           EXPRESSING GRATITUDE TO THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight with some hesitation, fearful 
that I might simply be accused of coming to the floor of the Congress 
to report on what I did on my summer vacation. But the truth is, Mr. 
Speaker, that I rise today with a deep sense of gratitude to the 
National Park Service, and in a deep impression imposed upon me and my 
three small children and my wife Karen during our visit to a place 
called Yellowstone.
  The first of the national parks, established in 1880, it in fact 
inspired President Teddy Roosevelt himself to establish the National 
Park Service during his administration at the turn of the century, and 
now I know why.
  With the assistance of an amateur photographer, age 11, by the name 
of Michael Joseph Pence, who I am sure is eagerly watching at this very 
hour, I hope to introduce you to some of the experiences of Yellowstone 
of our family and the remembrances of those who first explored it.
  It was, in fact, General Washburn in 1870 who was commissioned by 
Congress to survey Yellowstone thoroughly for the very first time, and 
the Pence family expedition was filled with the same wonder this past 
August. In fact, it was September 14, 1870, when General Washburn 
wrote, ``There is daily crowded upon my vision so much novelty and 
wonder which should be brought to the notice of the world and which, so 
far as my individual effort is concerned, will be lost to it if I do 
not record the incidents of each day's travel, that I am determined to 
do so and omit no details.''
  Images like this, at the base of the Upper Falls in Yellowstone, 
bespeak the extraordinary glory and splendor that General Washburn 
experienced in his expedition, and my family certainly experienced in 
ours.
  Of course, here are the geysers, not just Old Faithful, captured here 
memorably by my 11-year old son, but literally dozens of active geysers 
described by General Washburn as a geyser ``exposed to the sun, whose 
sparkling rays fill the ponderous column with what appear to be the 
clippings of a thousand rainbows.'' So it was on September 19, 1870, 
and so it is today.
  But my greatest memory came, as it does for many Americans, at a 
place called Inspiration Point. It is a place, perhaps the very best 
view of the falls and the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone. It was there 
in August of 1870 that General Washburn wrote of this very picture and 
image, Mr. Speaker, ``The place where I obtained the best and most 
terrible view of the canyon was a narrow projecting point situated two 
miles from the lower fall. Standing there, rather lying there for 
greater safety, I thought how utterly impossible it would be to 
describe to another the sensations inspired by such a presence. As I 
took in this scene, I realized my own littleness, my helplessness, my 
dread exposure to destruction, my inability to cope with or even 
comprehend the mighty architecture of nature.'' August 1870.
  These visions inspired General Washburn's expedition, and they 
inspired the expedition of the Pence family this August and my young 
son, an amateur photographer.
  But as I close, Mr. Speaker, in the words of General Washburn when he 
left Yellowstone he wrote, ``We are all overwhelmed with astonishment 
and wonder at what we have seen, and we feel we have been near the very 
presence of the Almighty.''
  And so it is that as Americans in this generation, as in the past and 
in the future, because of the contribution of the National Park Service 
and its extraordinary stewards in the Yellowstone Park of Montana and 
Wyoming, Americans of this next century and every century, it is my 
hope, will be able to feel that same great presence amidst His great 
architecture of nature.

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