Author of Beyond Yosemite Valley marks America’s 250th Birthday by honoring one of the country’s best ideas: caring for lands that belong to everyone
July 3, 2026 – YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK, CA – Taylor Stanton started climbing Mount Dana before sunrise, moving by headlamp through the cold, thin air above Tioga Pass.
The plan came together the night before. Stanton finished work, packed his gear, and drove through the dark toward Yosemite’s eastern entrance. He slept for a short stretch in his car near the trailhead, then started up the mountain before the first light reached the Sierra Nevada.
He climbs Mount Dana every year. This time felt different.
Stanton is a local Yosemite author, alpinist, and public lands advocate. His book, Beyond Yosemite Valley, encourages visitors to see more of the park than its most crowded and familiar places. His work with the Foundation for America’s Public Lands is rooted in the same belief: public lands matter most when people know them, use them, and take responsibility for their care.
On this morning, those parts of his life came together on the trail.
As Stanton climbed, he saw other headlamps moving across the mountain. Some were ahead. Others followed below. A construction worker. A software engineer. A teacher. People with different lives had all shown up in the dark to climb the same rocky slope and watch the sun rise over Yosemite’s high country.
By the time Stanton reached the summit, morning light had begun to spread across the Sierra Nevada, the range John Muir called the Range of Light. Mount Dana rises above 13,000 feet near the eastern edge of Yosemite National Park. From the top, the high country opens in every direction.
At the summit, Stanton raised an American flag to mark the country’s 250th year. For him, the moment was less about ceremony and more about gratitude for one of America’s strongest ideas: public lands kept open, accessible, and cared for across generations.
“Taking care of public lands and keeping them open and accessible to all Americans is one of the greatest achievements of our country,” Stanton said. “Mount Dana is one of the tallest mountains in Yosemite, and it reminds us that there is more to see, and more to care for, beyond the park’s most popular places.”
Stanton’s book asks Yosemite visitors to look beyond the obvious stops. His public lands work asks people to see the work behind every trailhead, campground, meadow, access road, wildlife corridor, and quiet place where families return year after year.
“These places do not take care of themselves,” Stanton said. “They need people who love them enough to protect them, maintain them, and make sure the next person can experience them too. And that is especially true for the iconic places beyond the parks, the public lands stewarded by the Bureau of Land Management.”
The Foundation for America’s Public Lands is the official charitable partner of the Bureau of Land Management. The BLM manages 245 million acres of public land, roughly one-tenth of the land in the United States. These lands include deserts, rangelands, river corridors, cultural sites, wildlife habitat, and recreation areas used by millions of people every year.
Since beginning grantmaking in 2024, the Foundation has helped drive nearly $16 million in impact across 88 projects. That work has supported campground improvements, off-highway vehicle recreation areas, rangeland health projects, and local stewardship efforts in communities connected to public lands.
Stanton said Mount Dana offers the kind of experience that makes public lands personal. It is hard. It is beautiful. It asks something of the people who climb it. And it gives them something they remember.
“Yosemite is more than the Valley or one famous view,” Stanton said. “Places like Mount Dana remind us how much there is to discover when people give their public lands more time and attention.”
As a local author, Stanton wants people to experience more of Yosemite. As a public lands advocate, he wants them to help care for the places they love.
“Public lands belong to all of us,” Stanton said. “Keeping them accessible and healthy is one of our nation’s great achievements, and it is also a shared responsibility. If we want future generations to have these same places, we have to keep showing up for them.”
About Taylor Stanton: Taylor Stanton is a local Yosemite author, alpinist, public lands advocate, head of communications for the Foundation for America’s Public Lands, and author of Beyond Yosemite Valley. His work encourages people to explore, understand, and care for America’s public lands.
Source & photos: Taylor Stanton – Foundation for America’s Public Lands