Module Two: History of Outdoor Recreation

On-line Lesson

Leisure Linked to Evolution

PITTSBURGH (AP) - An anthropologist form John Hopkins University say s it may have been leisure, not hard work, that spelled the crucial difference in our evolution from ape-like creatures.

Alan C. Walker outlined the theory here at a symposium on early man at the Carnegie Museum of Natural history. The idea, which Walker and his colleagues have been discussing for only a matter of weeks, rest on  the current belief that mankind's early ancestor's ate a mixed diet that included a fair amount of scavenged or hunted meat.

Walker and a research assistant, Linda Perez, have noted that carnivores have much more leisure time than herbivores. They speculate that an omnivorous diet gave our early ancestors the leisure to develop a primitive culture and communication.

Many anthropologists believe it was cultural improvements in food gathering and child care that give some ape-like creatures an evolutionary advantage in competing for sparse resources. This, they argue, favored the development of enlarged brains. Walker and Ms. Perez began exploring the theory after noting that the amount of time spent eating by African herbivores increases proportionately with their body weights. A small plant-eating monkey, the gray cheeked mangabey, spends only three our of every 24 hours eating. But heavier plant-eaters like impala and buffalo spend progressively more time gathering food.

At the top of the scale, the elephant spends more than 20 hours a day eating - "even working the night shift," Walker said. By contrast carnivores like the lion, leopard, and jackal usually spend less than five hours a day hunting and eating regardless of their size, he said. This is true even though some carnivores, like the jackal, supplement their diet with grass and insects.

Fossils show that the early African ape-like creatures from which humans may have arisen stood 4 to 5 feet tall. Based on a chart developed by Walker and Perez, they would have had to spend most of their daylight hours gathering food if they were exclusively herbivores. "If leisure time helped make us human by giving us time to talk to our infants, swap stories and attend to our culture, it wouldn't have made sense to evolve towards a herbivore," Walker said.

The theory would help explain why one species of vegetarian human-like creature became extinct. the creature, Australopitheous robutus, had broad flat molars, resembling those of some modern plant-eaters. It disappeared about a million years ago. Anthropologists have noted that primitive gathering and hunting peoples who survive today sometimes have more leisure time than 40 hour-a-week workers in developed societies. that leisure time was lost, scientists think, when humans became farmers and cattle-raisers. 

Historical Background for Outdoor Recreation in America

Early 1900's

The increased population shift from farms to cities characterized the early 1900's. The lack of open spaces or parks left no place for the children or adults to recreate. The creation of the first recreation professional association, Playground Association of America (1906) was in response to the growing demand for parks.

The U.S. government was very active in creating new bureaucracies, U.S. Forest Service, National Park Service, Bureau of Biological Survey (predecessor of the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service) and the General Land Office (predecessor of the Bureau of Land Management), to manage the federal lands.

The Great Depression was a benefit in disguise. The Public Work Administration (PWA), Works Progress Administration (WPA), and the Civilian Construction Corps (CCC), were federal employment programs that built many of the outdoor recreation facilities in the national parks. Many of these are still in use today. 

Post-World War II

The end of the second world war (1945) saw a tremendous increase in the demand for outdoor recreation areas and facilities from the returning soldiers. Many new legislative acts were passed. Worthy of note was the first national outdoor inventory, the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Committee (ORRRC) was created in 1958.

The 1960's produced the greatest decade in national outdoor recreation initiatives. Several of particular importance were the Multiple-Use Act, Land and Water Conservation Act, Wilderness Act, Highway Beautification Act, Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, and National Trails System Act.

The 1970's emerged with strong wilderness and environmental management policies as well. The Land Law review Commission recommended a more active outdoor recreational role for federal lands. As a result the National Park Service added it's first urban park, Gateway National Recreation Area near San Francisco, CA.. The second Nationwide Outdoor recreation Plan, 1973, was conducted. In 1978 the Bureau of Outdoor Recreation was combined with other departments to create the Heritage Conservation and Recreation agency. It was short-lived and was dissolved in 1981. Congress passed the Alaska Interests Land Conservation Act in 1980. This effectively doubled the acreage in the National Park system.

The 1990's produced little in the way of protection or advances in wildlife or wildland protection. It barely avoided the repeal of the Clean Air and Water acts which were up for reinstatement.

Natural Resources Related Organizations

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