Get Out! Film touts real national treasures

ASHEVILLE -- The way Dayton Duncan sees it, I own a little bit of the Grand Canyon. And you do, too.

That doesn't mean, of course, that I can start planning my dream house on the North Rim. But I have virtually unlimited access to Grand Canyon National Park's boundless beauty. If I choose, I can end my trip at the gift shop, or I can roam to my heart's content into the deepest reaches of the canyon, and unless I do something really stupid: say, try to body surf down the Colorado River, no authority-type is going to get in my face and escort me off the premises.

"The National Parks are the Declaration of Independence applied to the landscape," Duncan said. "Whether you live in a big city or small city, each American is an equal owner of the most spectacular canyon on Earth, to the remnants of ancient civilizations. All of these things belong to us by virtue of being an American."

Buddies with Burns

Duncan is a longtime collaborator with Ken Burns, whose wonderful documentaries on such topics as the Civil War, baseball and jazz never fail to stir my inner patriot. Their latest project is The National Parks: America's Best Idea.

The six-part documentary will air on consecutive nights in September on PBS.

Duncan was in Asheville recently to preview about 50 minutes worth of snippets from the documentary. The film's title refers to a quote by writer Wallace Stegner, who called the national parks "the best idea we've ever had."

In a brief talk before the preview, Duncan hammered home the point that the idea to set aside land for everyone to enjoy was revolutionary.

"For the first time in human history, special places were set aside not for the elite or the ruling class, but for everyone. Like baseball and jazz, it is an American invention," Duncan said.

The best idea

The documentary examines how this idea was executed and the people who made it happen.

"This is the history of national parks, with the emphasis on history," he said. "This is not a travelogue, although we believe we have the best footage of any film we've ever done."

That history is filled with colorful characters, some of whom -- John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt, for example -- are well-known. Perhaps more interesting are the lesser-known people, such as Horace Kephart, a loner; and George Masa, a Japanese immigrant. Both played a pivotal role in the formation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year.

Thousands of people in Western North Carolina and east Tennessee joined the quest to protect the Smokies from rampant logging.

"The story of the Smokies is the story of people falling in love with a place so much, they decide to dedicate their lives to preserving that place so that other people they will never meet will make that spiritual connection with something larger than themselves," Duncan said.

Exploring that bond with these "treasure houses of nature's superlatives" is ultimately at the heart of the documentary, he said.

I know that in my life, the days that came close to feeling perfect were spent in national parks, whether it was hiking the North Rim of the Grand Canyon with my brothers and sister or looking over Maine's rugged coastline with my daughter on my knee in Acadia National Park.

Thousands, maybe millions of people, have had similar feelings in those same parks.

The documentary is a tribute to the people who made those feelings possible. The best way we can pay them back is to unplug for a few days and visit the parks. After all, they belong to us.

Foot notes

□ Great Outdoor Provision in Thruway Shopping Center will have two events in June. The first is a visit from Tonya Riggs, one of about 20 women who have reached the summit of Mount Everest. Riggs will be presenting a video and slide show at 7 p.m. on Tuesday at the store.

On June 25, Danny Bernstein of Asheville will discuss her guidebook, Hiking the Carolina Mountains. The talk wiil begin at 7:30 p.m.

Both events are free.

□ The Sauratown Trails Association has a new map of its 35-mile trail system. Wayne Horton, a land surveyor from Winston-Salem, prepared the map. It is available at several stores, including Borders and Great Outdoor Provision. For more information, visit www.sauratowntrails.org.

■ Lisa O'Donnell can be reached at 727-7420 or at lo'donnell@wsjournal.com.