Glacier National Park Timeline

French, English, and Spanish trappers came to Glacier in search of beaver.

Lewis and Clark Expedition came within 50 miles of the area that is now Glacier National Park.

Lifespan of George Bird Grinnell, early naturalist who promoted and explored Glacier.

George Bird Grinnell hired noted explorer (and later well regarded author) James Willard Schultz to guide him on a hunting expedition into what would later become the park.

Railroad over Marias Pass was completed in 1891, allowing homesteaders to enter the area.

The mountains east of the Continental Divide were acquired in 1895 from the Blackfeet for mining purposes; no large copper or gold deposits were ever located.

Waterton Lakes National Park officially becomes a National Park in Canada.

The Glacier National Park area was made a Forest Preserve which was still open to mining and homesteading.

Glacier officiated as a National Park.

Canada and the United States declare Waterton Lakes National Park and neighboring Glacier National Park the world’s first International Peace Park.

After 11 years of work, Going-To-The-Sun Road, the main thoroughfare through Glacier National Park, is completed.

There were 150 known glaciers in the Glacier Park area in 1850.

Glaciers in the park have shrunk marginally beginning at the close of the Little Ice Age in 1850.

Wilderness Study submitted to Congress which identified 95% of the area of the park as qualifying for wilderness designation.

Around 1980, wolf population began to rise, indicating a nature recolonization of the animal in Glacier Park.

The U.S. Geological Survey established a headquarters in Bozeman, Montana and continues to research a number of environmental factors in Glacier Park today.

A forest fire in 2001 led park officials to close a few park roads temporarily to allow thousands of Western toads to migrate to other areas.

Following a five year drought and a summer season of almost no precipitation, forest fires obliterate 10% of the park area.

Biologists estimate that grizzly bear population in the park is a little over 300.

U.S. Geological Survey shows that 37 glaciers remain in Glacier Park, although only 25 of these are considered to "active glaciers" of at least 25 acres in area.

Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer and British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell signed an historic agreement promise=ing to protect the Transboundary Flathead River Valley from all types of mining and oil and gas extraction.

Environmentalists estimate that all of the remaining glaciers in the park will be gone by 2020 if current melting trends continue.