My dad, Walt Sr., was a park ranger. We moved to the Valley in October 1951. He spent the next four summers as district ranger at Tuolumne Meadows. I attended sixth through eighth grades at Yosemite School. My sister, Anita, attended Mariposa High. In fall 1955, my dad was reassigned as district ranger at Wawona. He remained there until he retired in 1970, after 40 years in the National Park Service.
Walt Gammill Sr in Yosemite
My dad was the first person to see the Wawona Tunnel Tree on the ground after it fell during the winter of 1969. As I was growing up in the park, I went with him on most of his backcountry horseback patrols. With him, I saw the Yosemite backcountry from Benson Lake to Wawona. My wife, Laurie, and I were married in the Yosemite Chapel in March 1969.
In 2013, we spent the month of May as Conservancy volunteers at the old Galen Clark Museum in Mariposa Grove. We shared that space with visitors from 38 different countries! On one blustery day, when folks crowded inside to escape a spring snowstorm, I listened as a young mother read from a storyboard to her children in French, while on the other side of the room, a tour guide spoke of the area’s history to his group in German. Yosemite is an international treasure, and I consider myself so privileged to have been able to experience it so completely.
Walt Gammill, Jr – donor and volunteer