The National Park Service (NPS) is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations. It was created on August 25, 1916, by Congress through the National Park Service Organic Act.
It is an agency of the United States Department of the Interior, a federal executive department whose head, the Secretary of the Interior, is a Cabinet officer nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Most of the direct management of the NPS is delegated by the Secretary to the National Park Service Director, who must also be confirmed by the Senate.
The 21,989 employees of the NPS oversee 398 units, of which 58 are designated national parks.
Read more about National Park Service: History, Directors, National Park System, Special Designations, Budget, Nomenclature of The National Park System, Visitors To The National Parks, Youth Programs, Accessibility, Concessions, Cooperators, I.e., Bookstores, Offices, Special Divisions, International Affairs, Initiatives, Related Acts
Famous quotes containing the words national, park and/or service:
“All experience teaches that, whenever there is a great national establishment, employing large numbers of officials, the public must be reconciled to support many incompetent men; for such is the favoritism and nepotism always prevailing in the purlieus of these establishments, that some incompetent persons are always admitted, to the exclusion of many of the worthy.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“The park is filled with night and fog,
The veils are drawn about the world,”
—Sara Teasdale (1884–1933)
“For those parents from lower-class and minority communities ... [who] have had minimal experience in negotiating dominant, external institutions or have had negative and hostile contact with social service agencies, their initial approaches to the school are often overwhelming and difficult. Not only does the school feel like an alien environment with incomprehensible norms and structures, but the families often do not feel entitled to make demands or force disagreements.”
—Sara Lawrence Lightfoot (20th century)