Big Meadows — A Natural Opening With a Political Stage
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Transcript
Big Meadows is an unusual high-elevation opening inside a park now covered overwhelmingly by forest. Its exact ecological origins are complex, but geology, fire, grazing and human use all contributed to the landscape visitors see. The meadow also became a political stage. President Franklin D. Roosevelt formally dedicated Shenandoah National Park here on July 3, 1936, while New Deal crews were still shaping roads and trails. That pairing is revealing. The park celebrated nature through a landscape already marked by long human use and recent federal construction. Big Meadows is both habitat and ceremony ground.