Oh! Say! Let us fly, dear
Where, kid? To the sky, dear
Oh you flying machine
Jump in, Miss Josephine
Ship ahoy! Oh joy, what a feeling
Where, boy? In the ceiling
Ho, High, Hoopla we fly
To the sky so high!
Words by Alfred Bryan
Music by Frederick Fischer
John Muir described his first view of Yosemite Valley near where Yosemite Creek takes “flight over the vast cliff” and soars to the Valley below as one of his “most memorable day of days.” He later referred to that experience as a “great life-long landscape fortune.” (Quotes from: My First Summer in the Sierra (1911) page 160) Combined with his love of bird life and his rich description of bird behavior, it’s likely his overall observations and his many forays along the rim of Yosemite Valley moved him to think more than once about what it would be like to take flight himself and soar over the “Grand Valley.”
In fact, his keen notes on the flying antics of the “strangest, noisiest, and most notable bird” in Yosemite, the Clarke crow (Nucifraga columbiana), suggests Muir may have experienced some level of envy toward this bird’s agility to jubilantly explore the pathless airspace over Yosemite. In 1898, he wrote in The Atlantic of the Clark crow:
“. . . [he] makes a tremendously loud and showy advertisement of himself, swooping and diving in deep curves across gorges and valleys from ridge to ridge, alighting on dead spars, looking warily about him, and leaving his dry springy perches, trembling from the vigor of his kick as he launches himself for a new flight, screaming from time to time loud enough to be heard more than a mile in still weather.”
These are keen notes, indeed, from a keen observer!
Muir himself had a few of his own ‘flying antics’, although one of his unforgettable experiences did not demonstrate the kind of control displayed by the Clarke crow. In a 1901 edition of The Atlantic, he retells the story of an early ‘flying’ event while exploring Yosemite. One morning after a powerful snowstorm passed through Yosemite Valley, he intended to hike in deep snow up a glacial canyon (near Glacier Point) to get a wide-angle view of the Valley’s peaks and forests draped in its “new robes” of white. Yet, Muir never made it to the top. His sojourn upward took an unexpected turn downward when an invigorating avalanche glided him back down the steep mountain terrain.
This adventure of soaring down the small glacial canyon courtesy of that unexpected avalanche--launch likely aided in his description of the jubilant flight of the Clarke crow, the ‘strangest bird’ in Yosemite. He further describes his quick descent by saying that “this flight in a milky way of snow flowers was the most spiritual of all my travels; and, after many years, the mere thought of it is still an exhilaration.” He concluded that, compared to his one minute “flight” down this small canyon below Glacier Point, “even the flapping progress of the birds seems coarse.” He summed up his ride by saying that he “moved away through space, softly as a cloud. The snow gave no sound from pressure, and on I sailed . . .”
“Moving through space” likely captured the mind of Muir in more ways than one when writing for The Atlantic in the late 1890’s and early 20th century. As an ingenious inventor of mechanical clocks, thermometers, and other devices, he must have been aware of the race to build flying machines, not only by the Wright Brothers in the United States (and the US Government) but by several European aviation pioneers as well.
Clément Adar, an inventor and engineer known as the “father of aviation” took his first brief flight in 1891 in France. The Wright brothers began experimenting with wing-warping as a means of controlling their ‘flying machines’ in 1899. Their first sustained and controlled flights followed in December 1903.
As one newspaper clipping website noted, the years leading up to 1903 displayed the “world's awe, skepticism, fear, and hope generated by humankind's first significant forays into the skies. Twelve years of feats, constant record breaking, challenges, accolades, affronts, utopian predictions and predications of doom are documented . . .”
So, for someone willing to hike in four feet of snow to see a panoramic vista of Yosemite Valley, Muir must have wondered what it would be like to soar untethered like a bird over Yosemite Valley.
Muir never took this “great life-long landscape fortune” of sensational vistas for granted. He desired to share Yosemite’s impressive sights from high above the Valley floor with any who visited the Park. For example, in his book titled, The Yosemite, he makes recommendations in chapter 12 on how best to spend one’s time in Yosemite for one-, two-, and three-day excursions. His appreciation of the landscape comes into view as if one has entered a cockpit of an airplane with him as he describes the ascent. He says:
“The trail leaves the Valley at the base of the Sentinel Rock, and as you slowly saunter . . . nearly all the Valley rocks and falls are seen in striking, ever-changing combinations. At an elevation of about five hundred feet a particularly fine, wide-sweeping view down the Valley is obtained, past the sheer face of the Sentinel and between the Cathedral Rocks and El Capitan. At a height of about 1500 feet the great Half Dome comes full in sight, overshadowing every other feature of the Valley to the eastward. From Glacier Point you look down 3000 feet over the edge of its sheer face to the meadows and groves and innumerable yellow pine spires, with the meandering river sparkling and spangling through the midst of them.
"Across the Valley a great telling view is presented of the Royal Arches, North Dome, Indian Cañon, Three Brothers and El Capitan, with the dome-paved basin of Yosemite Creek and Mount Hoffman in the background. To the eastward, the Half Dome close beside you looking higher and more wonderful than ever; . . . and beyond all, marshaled along the eastern horizon, the icy summits on the axis of the Range and broad swaths of forests growing on ancient moraines . . .”
He took many on such ascents as a guide, including President Theodore Roosevelt in March 1903, leading him to some of those cherished viewpoints. Glacier Point, in particular, became the setting for the well-known photo of both men standing near a precipice overlooking Yosemite Valley and beyond. It should not surprise anyone that Theodore Roosevelt became the first American President to fly in an airplane (a Wright Brothers Type AB) in October 1910. No telling how much the conversations between the two men and being lifted to such heights with Muir impacted Roosevelt’s decision to fly.
Muir confirmed his love of high places and untethered flights in a letter he wrote to his dear friend, Jeanne Carr. He stated, “I revolve in pathless places and in higher rocks.” (Quote from: John Muir In His Own Words: A Book of Quotations, page 16, quote 82) Others also shared Muir's delight of higher elevations. Some even desired to document Yosemite's heights from an airplane. Although Muir did not live long enough to see how the dream of soaring over Yosemite in a flying machine would come true, his love of "pathless places" would influence many in the years to follow.
Visit next month to read more in Part 2 about the first airplane to fly in Yosemite Valley and how Glacier Point remains the highest rock for enjoying “pathless places” in Yosemite.
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