Alva Review-Courier -

The creation of national parks in the United States, beginning in 1872, signaled the emerging importance of tourism as an aspect of the American economy.

Over the years, tourism in this country has increased dramatically. A larger population with more money to spend has led to a rise in the number of tourists visiting our national parks.

Every year our 63 national parks become the destination of millions of vacationers. And while most parks are in the American West, the most-visited park each year is in the eastern half of the country.

In 2021 over 14,000,000 people vacationed in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park which straddles the border of Tennessee and North Carolina.

The most popular western parks were visited by roughly four to five million vacationers each. These included Yellowstone, Zion (in Utah), Grand Canyon (in Arizona), Grand Teton (in Wyoming), and Rocky Mountain (in Colorado).

Many of the western parks are in close proximity to each other, allowing travelers to visit several in one trip. Several states, in fact, are home to numerous parks.

The state with the most national parks is California with nine such attractions. Alaska is home to eight national parks while Utah has five and Colorado has four. Both Washington and Arizona have three each. Consequently, over half of our national parks (32) are in those six western states.

In addition, as we saw last week, numerous other natural attractions that are not designated as national parks are under the auspices of the National Park Service and can be (and often are) easily added to a family’s vacation itinerary.

Interestingly, Oklahoma is one of the few western states with no national parks. That was not, however, always the case. In 1906 Congress created Platt National Park in the southeastern part of the state.

Platt’s chief attraction was mineral springs which allegedly had healing abilities. In 1976 Congress abolished the park and transferred its lands to the Chickasaw National Recreation Area. So, while the park no longer exists, vacationers still enjoy visiting the area.