John Muir, (born April 21, 1838, Dunbar, East Lothian, Scot.—died Dec. 24, 1914, Los Angeles, Calif., U.S.), U.S. naturalist and conservationist. Muir emigrated from Scotland with his family to Wisconsin in 1849. An 1867 accident caused him to abandon an industrial career and devote himself to nature. He began his efforts to establish a federal forest conservation policy in 1876. His writings swung public opinion in favour of Pres. Grover Cleveland’s proposal for national forest reservations and influenced Pres. Theodore Roosevelt’s conservation program, and he was largely responsible for establishing Sequoia and Yosemite national parks (1890). He was the chief founder and first president of the Sierra Club (1892–1914). In 1908 the U.S. government established the Muir Woods National Monument in Marin Co., California.
