JOHN MUIR’S home. NPS photo

■ Martinez landmark to be site of ‘informal’ chat series

By Keri Luiz
Assistant Editor

John Muir’s home, we like to imagine, was host to many a campfire chat back when the famed naturalist lived there.

Now, harkening back to that time, organizers at the National Historical Site are gearing up for a summer campfire program that will celebrate the conservation icon and his impact on the nation.

The first of three campfire chats will take place Saturday. Rangers will lead visitors in songs, skits and stories to celebrate the legacy of Muir, who had perhaps the greatest impact on the preservation of the American wilderness of any conservationist in the nation’s history.

“We’ll be singing songs, sitting around the fire with a guitar. There will be skits and games,” said park guide Daniel Prial, who launched the series.

“We just sort of play it off the cuff, feel how the group is enjoying the place. If they’re really liking games, we’ll end up playing more games.

“It’s a pretty informal program.”

Prial said the group of visitors attending can be small and intimate or on the larger side. The Muir home has hosted anywhere from 12 to four dozen visitors for the campfire events, he said, ranging in age from 3 to 97 — or so he thinks. “I don’t actually know for real if that person was 97 or not,” he said.

While Muir’s writings are credited with convincing U.S. leaders to protect Yosemite, Sequoia, Grand Canyon and Mt. Rainier as national parks — heady stuff, indeed — the campfire talks are geared toward having fun, Prial said.

“This is more to enjoy the site, enjoy some of the land that John Muir used to live on. We’ll talk about John Muir, but only in the sense of his stories and his adventures,” Prial said.

The talks are becoming popular, he said. He has seen people return to the site, recognizing people at the campfires who have visited previously, or visiting the site later because they attended a campfire event. “I’ve seen a lot of familiar faces at the campfire programs. Maybe a kid came here on a school tour and heard about the program, and brought it home to their mom or dad,” he said.

“The word is getting out. A lot of people are coming back to the site for this, or coming back to the site after seeing it.”

The family program is “a good time, hanging out with an old-fashioned campfire,” Prial said.

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