Before and during the early years of the National Park Service (NPS), publicity for national parks was spearheaded and funded by railroads, hotel operators, automobile associations, friendly newspaper and magazine editors, and others in the tourism industry. In the 1920s the NPS wrote and published stories and reports about the national parks, but it wasn’t until 1934-National Park Year-that it began its own program using graphic arts to encourage people to visit national and state parks. NPS employee, artist, and landscape architect Dorothy Waugh designed these 16 or 17 posters between 1934 and 1936.
A Portrait of the Artist
Dorothy Della Waugh was born on Sept. 23, 1896, in Burlington, Vermont, to Frank and Alice Waugh. She was one of six children. In 1902 the family moved to Amherst, Massachusetts, when her father took a position as head of the department of horticulture at Massachusetts Agricultural College. He became a professor in landscape architecture at Massachusetts State College. Her mother was a former art critic. In a family of successful and talented children, Dorothy excelled as a writer and illustrator. Her younger brother Sydney became a renowned sculptor.
Source: U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service
