Jonathan B. Jarvis (born June 26, 1953) served as the 18th Director of the United States National Park Service, confirmed by the

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on September 25, 2009, and serving until his retirement on January 3, 2017.

Early life and education

Jarvis graduated from Natural Bridge High School in Natural Bridge Station,

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

, in 1971. He graduated from The College of William & Mary in 1975 with a degree in biology. He was a member of the

Sigma Chi Sigma Chi () International Fraternity is one of the largest North American social Fraternities and sororities, fraternities. The fraternity has 244 active undergraduate chapters and 152 alumni chapters across the United States and Canada and has ...

fraternity. From 1971 to 1975, he was a maintenance mechanic and welder at the Blue Bird bus company.

Parks career

Jarvis became a park ranger in 1976, at the National Mall and Memorial Parks. Jarvis served for three years as the superintendent of Mount Rainier National Park in Ashford, Washington. He was superintendent of Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in

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and Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve in

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during the 1990s.

Directorship

Jarvis was serving as regional director for the Pacific West Region when, on July 10, 2009, President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

nominated Jarvis for the directorship following the resignation of Mary A. Bomar on January 20, 2009, the day of President Obama's inauguration. A career civil servant, Jarvis had been with the service for over 30 years. Jarvis wrote in 2010 that

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is "fundamentally the greatest threat to the integrity of our national parks that we have ever experienced." In 2013, Jarvis unveiled new guidelines for healthier food at national parks. In 2014, Jarvis banned the flying of drones over national parks. Jarvis pledged to remove Confederate flag merchandise from park bookstores and gift shops in 2015 after the massacre of nine black people by a white gunman at a church in Charleston,

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

. In 2015, Jarvis signed an agreement for a new Manhattan Project National Historical Park at the historic

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in Hanford, Washington. In 2016, the Park Service under Jarvis unveiled the Stonewall National Monument in

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, commemorating the

Stonewall Riots The Stonewall riots (also known as the Stonewall uprising, Stonewall rebellion, Stonewall revolution, or simply Stonewall) were a series of spontaneous riots and demonstrations against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of ...

for

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. In his time as Park Service director, Jarvis faced criticism from Congress and watchdog organizations, claiming his oversight of the service failed to address a culture of

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, bullying, and park mismanagement. In 2016, he was reprimanded for violating ethics standards after publishing an unauthorized book with a nonprofit group that operated stores in national parks. Jarvis retired from his position on January 3, 2017. He was immediately succeeded by Michael T. Reynolds, who was appointed as acting director.

Later work

On October 24, 2017, Jarvis was appointed as the executive director of

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's Institute for Parks, People, and Diversity. In 2018,

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published a book co-authored by Jarvis, ''The Future of Conservation in America: A Chart for Rough Water''. Jarvis endorsed

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in the 2020 presidential election.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Jarvis, Jonathan 1953 births Living people College of William & Mary alumni Directors of the National Park Service Obama administration personnel University of California, Berkeley people