Sequoia National Park once provided sustenance, in the form of acorns, to the Monachee Native American tribe. White settlers arrived late in the 1850s, and by 1862 the majority of the Native Americans had succumbed to a smallpox epidemic.
Naturalist John Muir led a movement of prominent Californians, including members the California Academy of Sciences, to protect the trees in this area of the Sierra Nevada from lumber interests. Their initial effort at legislation failed to pass the Senate in 1882, but by 1890 Sequoia achieved the status of America's second national park, in the same bill that protected both Yosemite and Kings Canyon (then known as General Grant National Park).
Nearly 85 percent of Sequoia National Park and neighboring Kings Canyon National Park is designated a wilderness area, meaning that it's accessible only on foot or by horseback. The Big Trees Trail and the trail leading to General Sherman are both wheelchair accessible.
Growing in the park's Giant Forest are 5 of the 10 biggest trees in the world. The best-known of these is the General Sherman. If living organisms were measured according to their volume, the 52,500-cubic-foot wood volume of this tree would make it the largest living organism on earth.
Crystal Cave, the second-longest cave discovered in the park, is the only one open to the public. Like most of the park's caves, it was formed over millions of years by water wearing away marble rock.
The Giant Forest's Crescent Meadow, at the western end of the High Sierra Trail, was one of John Muir's favorite spots.
The High Sierra Trail is a hiking trail running from Crescent Meadow across the Great Divide (the Keawah Mountain Range) to the summit of Mount Whitney, 35 miles distant on the Park's eastern border.
Moro Rock, between the Giant Forest and Crescent Meadow, may be the most photographed of the park's granite outcroppings. A climb to its top up the Depression-era rock stairway culminates in a view of the Great Divide and a large part of the park.
Tokopah Falls, on the Keawah River, is one of California's highest waterfalls outside Yosemite.
The Giant Forest became part of Sequoia National Park the week after it was established. In 1926, the park was expanded to include Mount Whitney. It grew further in 1978 with the addition of the Mineral King area to its south. The park now encompasses just over 404,000 acres, or 631 square miles.
According to the National Park Service, the Mineral King area in the southern part of Sequoia National Park has a thriving colony of marmots, the largest members of the squirrel family. During the spring and early summer, while they're raising their families, they have been known to climb into engine compartments and make meals of radiator hoses. Many of them have hitched rides to distant places courtesy of unsuspecting drivers. Anyone visiting Mineral King during the spring should take a look under the hood before leaving the park, both to check for damage and to release any feasting marmot.
