Last updated: December 18, 2023
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50 Nifty Finds #37: Planting a Seed
Even as the 1916 eagle emblem continued to be used on buttons and badges, by 1920 the National Park Service (NPS) adopted another symbol—the sequoia cone. Despite its broad use on uniforms, on signs, and in print materials throughout the 1920s and 1930s, not everyone thought that it was a good symbol to represent the diversity of national parks and monuments. By 1940 most—but not all—of its uses as an emblem had ceased. The sequoia cone remains part of the NPS uniform, connecting rangers of today with those of the past.
It's a Sign
Three years after the eagle emblem was created, another emblem was in use. Notes from an informal conference between superintendents and engineers on November 18, 1919, offer a tantalizing reference to this unidentified emblem, recording,
It was understood that all [road] signs except danger signs and mileage signs should bear the name of the Service and the name of the park, and that wherever possible, if it seems practicable in working out these designs, the design or symbol of the Service which Mr. Punchard has prepared will be impressed on the sign. (Emphasis added)
The notes refer to Landscape Engineer Charles "Punch" Punchard Jr. He had worked as a landscape architect in private business before he was appointed in June 1917 as the landscape architect for the District of Columbia in the Office of Public Buildings and Grounds. Due to declining health, he was transferred to drier climates in the West. He arrived at Yellowstone National Park on August 1, 1918. Punchard spent most of the next year inspecting western national parks. At the 1919 meeting it was agreed that "anything regarding landscape—cutting vines, design of buildings, change in landscape, etcetera—is under Mr. Punchard's supervision. His word is final in those matters." His health continued to decline, however, and he died in Denver, Colorado, on November 12, 1920. He was only 35 years old.
Although the 1919 meeting notes don't describe Punchard's NPS symbol, minutes from the 1923 National Park Conference suggest that Punchard's design was a sequoia cone. The conference report noted,
After some discussion it was decided that green and white, the Park Service colors, should be retained on the signs, but that they would be reversed, using a green background with white letters and narrow piping of white inside the border...The pine cone was again adopted as the emblem of the National Park Service on the larger signs, with the understanding that the "US" would be eliminated and the word "The" used instead. This cone is only to be used on general signs where the words "National Park Service" and "Department of the Interior" [are] used, such as on park boundary and general information signs. Superintendent Albright made the suggestion that were necessary to put the cone on large signs a transfer stencil be used, to save time and money. (Emphasis added).
It seems likely that the pinecone was really a sequoia cone, unless two different species of cones were used as emblems in less than four years. It also seems reasonable that Horace Albright's comment about the stencil reflects a change from 1919 when the emblem was pressed into the metal signs. No examples of an early pressed sign have been found.
The NPS History Collection includes three signs with the sequoia emblem. Unfortunately, little is known about where and when they were used. The boundary sign (below) has "The National Park Service" written across the cone, suggesting it dates to around 1924. The painting scheme isn't reversed as described above, however. No white on green signs or photographs of those signs have been found, suggesting that the recommendation wasn't implemented. It's possible, however, that missing sign standards addressed that issue or reversed course. Photographs suggest the change from "US National Park Service" was short-lived. No copies of the 1926 NPS sign manual have been found.
The NPS History Collection includes three signs with the sequoia emblem. Unfortunately, little is known about where and when they were used. The boundary sign (below) has "The National Park Service" written across the cone, suggesting it dates to around 1924. The painting scheme isn't reversed as described above, however. No white on green signs or photographs of those signs have been found, suggesting that the recommendation wasn't implemented. It's possible, however, that missing sign standards addressed that issue or reversed course. Photographs suggest the change from "US National Park Service" was short-lived. No copies of the 1926 NPS sign manual have been found.
A large, diamond-shaped "Be Careful with Fire" sign in the collection does feature a green sequoia cone with "US National Park Service" in white letters. However, the rest of the sign is white with green letters. This sign doesn't fit any known pattern and is therefore difficult to date more precisely than 1920s to 1930s. Although this sequoia cone is arguably easier to read, it is the green on white sequoia cone that is most common on park signs.
In 1932 a new contract was awarded for porcelain enamel metal road signs. Its provisions may have been in place earlier, as this is an annual contract and other years have not been found. The contract describes different types of signs but, for most, they were to have a "milk white background with leaf green letters, border, insignia, and symbols." The reverse was to be painted solid green. This description matches a large diamond-shaped "Scenic View" sign in the collection (shown above). The sequoia cone symbol is white on green and uses the "US National Park Service" language. It is not clear when the "The" substitution for "US" from 1923 was removed, but photographic evidence suggests this sign was common from at least 1931 to 1936. Photographs of the Yosemite sign shop in 1935 and 1936 park reports show that many different types of signs, including directional and stop signs, featured one large or two smaller sequoia cones.
The sequoia cone continued to be used as a symbol in the NPS throughout the 1930s. Its use in signs was almost exclusively limited to specific types of road or directional signs. Mount Rainier National Park is the only park known to use the symbol on an entrance sign. The 1932 photo of the west entrance arch includes a sequoia cone design carved into the wood at each end.
On October 9, 1937, Director Arno B. Cammerer appointed a committee to consider "all questions involving the sign and marker system" and update the 1926 manual. The committee quickly decided that a new manual, rather than an update, was needed. When the new Sign Manual was approved in 1940, the sequoia cone emblem was absent. Signs of the type seen above are illustrated without an NPS symbol, and no reference to it is made in the text of the manual.
Wearable Emblems
A sequoia cone emblem was part of the first official NPS uniform issued in 1920. The uniform included hand-embroidered insignia for the right sleeve of the uniform coat to identify the rank and position of the employee. The sleeve insignia for permanent rangers included them (one for permanent rangers, two for assistant chief rangers, and three for chief rangers). At this time, however, the sequoia cone was just one motif to designate rank. Acorns and oak leaves were used on the sleeve insignia for superintendents and deputy superintendents. Oak leaves with other motifs were used for most other officers, although the NPS director and deputy directors had maple leaves.
Office Order 152, issued on May 15, 1928, limited the use of sleeve insignia to the ranger force. The ranger insignia—with their sequoia cones—remained in the 1936 uniform regulations. They may have been removed in 1938, but no copies of those regulations have been found. When the 1940 uniform specifications were issued, ranger sleeve insignia were no longer part of the NPS uniform.
In 1928 the NPS submitted a design to a manufacturer for a hatband prototype. Although no detailed descriptions of it are available, Thomas C. Vint noted at that 1928 superintendents’ conference that “there has been considerable criticism of the sequoia cone because it is significant of California alone.” Another at the conference commented, “The sequoia cone doesn’t look like anything.” Suggestions for bison, pack horse, and ranger on a horse emblems were made. Frank Pinkley, custodian of the Southwestern National Monuments, said, “I object to all of the designs. I think we have to have one that would cover the entire Service and I would like to suggest some kind of geometric design.”
Perhaps because agreement couldn’t be reached, by 1929 the sequoia cone was featured on the earliest NPS hatbands known to exist. Although the tooled leather design for the official hatband authorized on January 1, 1930, was different, it continued to feature a sequoia cone design. A silver sequoia cone ornament was also added. Both sequoia designs remain part of the uniform today. In 1981 the ornament was changed from silver to gold plated. Since 1984 it has been made of solid brass.
The hatband design inspired a tooled leather belt also featuring sequoia cones. The design was probably drawn by Vint around 1939 (the belt was part of the 1940 uniform regulations). Although the sequoia cone design element on the belt has been modified over time, it's still there—another early emblem hiding in plain sight.
A silver sequoia emblem was also used on the front of the sun helmet, as introduced in the 1940 uniform regulations. Although it was removed from the uniform in September 1953, some employees continued to wear it until the late 1950s.
Newsworthy
In January 1932 a sequoia cone emblem debuted in the NPS Park Service Bulletin employee newsletter. The illustration was drawn by Junior Architect William Max Haussman, who joined the NPS in 1931. He began at Colonial National Monument (now a national historical park), where his projects included designing and supervising projects for the Yorktown Sesquicentennial programs. When he retired in 1963, Haussman was chief of the National Capital Parks Office of Design and Construction. Hausmann’s sequoia cone remained on the Bulletin cover through December 1934, after which photographs were used instead of cover art. His illustration for the heading on the first page of the newsletters continued in use through November 1939.
The history of another NPS sequoia symbol once believed to be an early Servicewide logo bears discussion as new research has identified its more limited use. In 1938 the NPS held an employee contest to design a book plate for its library books. The November-December 1938 Park Service Bulletin illustrated eight of the 35 submissions received. Number four featured a round emblem with a sequoia cone in the middle.
When the results of the employee votes were announced in the May 1939 Bulletin, the sequoia design was not in the top three. It seems likely that the artist who drew it was informed of that decision earlier, because in February 1939 it became the header illustration for the editorial page in The Regional Review.
Its use was an interesting choice given that the magazine was an internal newsletter that reviewed events and featured activities in parks in the eastern United States (which isn't known for its sequoia trees). It was published by NPS Region One from July 1938 to August 1941, when a plan was approved to combine it with Region III Quarterly and create a national NPS magazine. World War II intervened, however, and those plans were cancelled in January 1942.
Although the artist’s name has not been confirmed, it may have been drawn by Region One Assistant Landscape Architect Samuel O. Smart. Smart was the art editor for The Regional Review from August 1938 until May 1940. His art is featured throughout the magazine, from cover illustrations to “other pictorial contributions” that complimented the articles. Smart left the NPS for the private sector in June 1940.
A Special Gift
Arguably one of the most telling examples of the status of the sequoia cone as a symbol of the NPS is its use in a gift to former NPS Director Horace M. Albright. When he announced that he was leaving the NPS for private industry in 1933, a committee was created to determine the most appropriate ways to recognize his contributions and the support of his family. One of the gifts presented to them was a grandfather clock.
A silver plate added to the top of the clock was inscribed, "Presented to the Albright Family December 1933 by the National Park Service Field Personnel." In the middle of the plate was a large sequoia cone. It seems the field staff at the time accepted it as a symbol of the NPS.
Unofficially Official?
Despite the use of the sequoia cone on signs, uniforms, and in some print materials—and descriptions that it had been "adopted as the emblem of the National Park Service"—many didn’t see it as official emblem. One of the recommendations from the Special Meeting of the National Park Superintendents held in Washington, DC in January–February 1936 was that the "Service [should] officially decide upon some distinctive emblem for the National Park Service, such as the sequoia cone."
Although the sequoia cone design disappeared from everything except the hatband and belt by 1940, a new emblem wasn’t immediately created. World War II delayed adoption of a new NPS symbol. Bureau staff didn't return to Washington, DC, from their war-time offices in Chicago until 1947. It wouldn't be until 1949 that the NPS began looking for something new—a design effort that took another couple of years and led to the emblem that park visitors are familiar with today: the NPS arrowhead..
Sources
Assembled Historic Records of the NPS Collection (HFCA 1645). NPS History Collection, Harpers Ferry, WV.
National Park Service. (1938, November-December). Park Service Bulletin, Vol. VIII, No. 8. NPS History Collection (HFCA 1645), Harpers Ferry, WV. Available digitally at http://npshistory.com/newsletters/courier/bulletin/v8n8.pdf
National Park Service. (1939, May). Park Service Bulletin, Vol. IX, No. 4. NPS History Collection (HFCA 1645), Harpers Ferry, WV. Available digitally at http://npshistory.com/newsletters/courier/bulletin/v9n4.pdf
National Park Service. (1991, May 1). Historic Listing of National Park Service Officials. NPS, Washington, DC. Available digitally at https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/tolson/histlist.htm
Workman, R. Bryce. (1991). National Park Service Uniforms: Badges and Insignia. Harpers Ferry Center, Harpers Ferry, WV.