Galen Clark standing at the base of the Grizzly Giant. Yosemite National Park.

Before there was a National Park Service, before the idea of conservation had entered the popular conversation, there was a grove of trees. These trees, called giant sequoias, had stood watch for hundreds of years—each one centuries older than the country that they stood in. Known as Mariposa Grove, it is home to over 500 mature giant sequoias, and remains to this day one of the natural treasures of North America.

In 1864, as the Civil War raged across the eastern United States, President Abraham Lincoln signed a radical piece of legislation into law. Known as the Yosemite Grant, or more formally, the “Yosemite Valley Grant Act,” it was the first time in history that land was set aside by a national government not for profit, development, or strategic value, but for beauty, and for future generations to enjoy.

At the heart of this groundbreaking law was Mariposa Grove, this cathedral-like forest of towering trees that had already captured the hearts and imaginations of its early visitors. Walking amongst “Grizzly Giant,” “The Bachelor and Three Graces,” and “Tunnel Tree,”—silent sentinels more than 2,000 years old—visitors to this sacred place could not help but feel called to advocate for its protection at a time when conservation was still a fledgling concept.

Ansel Adams first encountered these giant sequoias as a young man exploring Yosemite, camera in hand and heart set alight by the wilderness. He returned to photograph them again and again, moved and mesmerized by their scale and grandeur.

Ansel Adams in the Sierra Nevada, ca. 1943. Photo courtesy of the Adams' Family Archives

Ansel Adams and Beaumont Newhall, in Mariposa Grove ca. 1960. Photo courtesy of the Adams’ Family Archives. — Ansel Adams and Beaumont Newhall, in Mariposa Grove ca. 1960. Photo courtesy of the Adams' Family Archives.

Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias, Original photograph by Ansel Adams, ca. 1960 — Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias (ca. 1960), Original Photograph by Ansel Adams

Sequoia Roots, Original photograph by Ansel Adams. Available as a Yosemite Special Edition Photograph, an Ansel Adams Gallery Exclusive Print

Photographing the grove required a different kind of seeing. Where his images of granite cliffs and sweeping valleys often conveyed drama and intensity, Ansel’s sequoia photographs are intimate, contemplative. They notice the textures of the bark, the shadows among the roots, the filtered light through high branches. Through his lens, he invited viewers to stand still with him in the grove’s ancient hush.

It’s no surprise that he considered Mariposa a creative refuge—somewhere to turn when he was in need of inspiration. He frequently took his close friends and fellow artists Edward Weston and Georgia O’Keeffe to sit, picnic, laugh, and create in the shadows of the sequoia canopy, eager to share this magical place with artists who could understand and capture its beauty.

Today, Mariposa Grove remains one of the most cherished parts of Yosemite National Park, a living legacy of both Lincoln’s vision and Ansel’s. It was here that two distinctly American ideas took root: that our wildest places are sacred, and that they belong to all of us.