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[00:01.00]STEVE EMBER:This is Steve Ember.
[00:02.30]SHIRLY GRIFFITH:And this is Shirley Griffith with the VOA Special English program EXPLORATIONS.
[00:10.14]Today we tell about two areas that are popular with visitors to the United States.
[00:18.73]We tell about one of the most important places in the history of the American Revolution.
[00:27.77]It is Valley Forge National Historical Park,in the eastern state of Pennsylvania.
[00:35.61]And we tell about a place of fierce beauty.It is Mount Rainier National Park in the northwestern state of Washington.
[00:47.29]STEVE EMBER:The American Indians who lived in the northwest called the great mountain"Takhoma."
[00:54.57]One tribe said it was a female monster that would eat people.
[01:00.45]Other old stories among the Indians said the mountain could produce huge amounts of fire.
[01:09.28]In Seventeen Ninety-Two,British explorer George Vancouver became the first European to see the huge mountain.
[01:19.21]He named it after a navy friend,Captain Peter Rainier.
[01:24.54]Today the people who live in the northwestern city of Seattle call it"The Mountain."
[01:31.82]Mount Rainier is almost one-hundred kilometers from Seattle.
[01:37.02]Yet it can be seen from almost any place in the city.
[01:41.67]The beautiful,snow covered mountain seems to offer the city its protection.
[01:49.40]SHIRLY GRIFFITH:The Mountain's offer of protection is false.Mount Rainier is not just a mountain.It is a sleeping volcano.
[02:00.64]Steam and heat often rise from the very top of the huge mountain,causing snow to melt.
[02:10.22]Mount Rainier is four-thousand-three-hundred-ninety-two meters all.
[02:17.20]Its top is covered in snow all year.More than twenty-five thick rivers of ice called glaciers cover a lot of the mountain.
[02:30.97]In some areas,these glaciers are more than one hundred meters thick.
[02:39.14]STEVE EMBER:Mount Rainier always has been a popular place to visit.
[02:44.03]Many people go to enjoy the beautiful forests that surround the mountain.
[02:50.22]Others go to climb the mountain.
[02:53.90]Hazard Stevens and Philemon Van Trump became the first people known to reach the top of Mount Rainier.
[03:01.84]They reached the top in August of Eighteen-Seventy after a ten hour climb through the snow.
[03:10.44]In Eighteen Ninety,a young schoolteacher became the first woman to reach the top.
[03:17.96]Her name was Fay Fuller.For many years after her successful climb,
[03:25.35]she wrote newspaper stories asking the federal government to make Mount Rainier a National Park.
[03:34.18]Many people who visited the mountain also wanted it to be protected forever by the government.
[03:42.46]On March Second,Eighteen-Ninety-Nine,President William McKinley singed a law that made Mount Rainier a national park.
[03:53.25]It was the fifth national park established in the United States.
[03:59.55]SHIRLY GRIFFITH:Today,National Park Servic e experts say about tenthousand people climb the huge mountain each year.
[04:11.22]Less than half that number reaches the top.The mountain can be extremely difficult to climb.
[04:21.05]Severe weather is possible at almost anytime.Snow and ice cover parts of the mountain all year.
[04:31.83]More than fifty people have died trying to climb Mount Rainier.
[04:38.26]Mountain climbing experts often use it as a difficult eat for persons who want to climb some of the world's highest mountains.
[04:50.49]STEVE EMBER:You do not have to climb the huge mountain to enjoy Mount Rainier National Park.
[04:57.67]More than two-million people visit the park each year.
[05:02.45]Many walk on the hundreds of kilometers of paths.
[05:07.23]The paths lead through flat meadows filled with wild flowers and up through forests of large old trees.
[05:17.05]Other visitors drive around the park to experience its natural beauty.
[05:23.79]They often see black tailed deer,elk,and mountain goats.
[05:30.32]The park is large.It is almost one-hundred-thousand hectares.
[05:36.62]Many lakes,rivers,roads,two hotels and six camping areas are inside the borders of the park.
[05:48.09]SHIRLY GRIFFITH:Experts agree that Mount Rainier will become a very active volcano at sometime in the future.
[05:57.46]They say the real problem is that they do not know when.
[06:03.65]They also agree that the great heat produced by an explosion of the volcano would melt the ice rivers that are part of the mountain.
[06:16.09]This could happen in only a few minutes.
[06:20.42]They say the melting ice would produce flowing rivers of mud and rock.
[06:28.26]People who live in the southern part of Seattle and in the city of Tacoma,Washington would be in danger.
[06:38.19]Expets carefully study the great mountain.
[06:42.32]They hope to be able to warn of any dangerous change.
[06:48.51]But for now,the great mountain provides a safe and beautiful place to visit in the Northwest area of the United States.
[07:00.18]STEVE EMBER:A very different kind of national park is found in the eastern state of Pennsylvania.
[07:07.63]It is called Valley Forge National Historical Park.It is near the city of Philadelphia.
[07:16.22]Valley Forge also is a beautiful place.
[07:20.45]Within the park are many different kinds of trees and flowers,huge areas of green grass,a beautiful,slow moving river.
[07:32.08]You can see many deer.Often you can come very near them.
[07:38.27]Deer do not run away because they are used to seeing people in the park.
[07:45.01]It is not the natural beauty that made Valley Forge a National Historic Park.
[07:51.75]It is what happened there.Many other places were important in the American War for Independence,but no other place is so filled with suffering.
[08:05.28]No battle was fought at Valley Forge.
[08:09.07]Yet,more than two-thousand soldiers of the small American army died there.
[08:16.25]They died of hunger,disease and the fierce cold in the winter of Seventeen-Seventy-Seven and Seventeen-Seventy-Eight.
[08:27.28]It was also at Valley Forge where the men of this small army learned to be real soldiers.
[08:36.86]SHIRLY GRIFFITH:What happened at Valley Forge began in August of Seventeen-Seventy-Seven.
[08:45.35]A British force threatened to capture the American capital at Philadelphia.
[08:53.29]The American commander,General Georal George Washington,moved the army to defend the city.
[09:02.23]A battle was fought at a place called Brandywine and another at Germantown.
[09:09.75]The British forces won those battles and occupied Philadelphia.
[09:17.04]By the month of December,General Washington needed to find a place his small army could easily defend.
[09:26.97]He chose Velley Forge.More than fifteen centimeters of snow fell only a few days after the army arrived.Ice covered the rivers.
[09:41.28]The soldiers began building very small wooden houses called log cabins.
[09:49.56]They would build more than one-thousand of these small homes.
[09:55.99]STEVE EMBER:The fierce winter was only one of the many problems faced by the American army.
[10:03.28]Many of the soldiers had no shoes.
[10:07.06]Most had no winter clothing.All suffered from a severe lack of food.
[10:15.14]Then,several diseases struck.Typhoid,dysentery and pneumonia were among the diseases that spread through the army.
[10:27.46]Most of the soldiers became sick.Many died.
[10:32.66]General Washington wrote letters to Congress asking for help.
[10:38.96]He asked for money to buy food and clothing.But Congress had no money to give him.
[10:47.03]Several things happened to change the small army during that long and terrible winter.
[10:54.11]General Washington knew the army had been defeated in the past because of a lack of real training.
[11:02.83]A man named Baron Friedrich von Steuben had recently come from Europe.
[11:08.58]He was an expert at training soldiers.
[11:12.58]So,each day during the terrible winter,Baron von Steuben taught the men of the American army to be soldiers.
[11:22.82]He also taught them something very important.He taught them to believe in themselves.
[11:30.89]SHIRLY GRIFFITH:As the winter passed,the army slowly changed.New troops arrived.
[11:38.41]New equipment arrived.An alliance with France brought guarantees of military support.
[11:48.55]The men who survived that terrible winter were no longer a group of armed citizens.
[11:56.73]They were well trained soldiers who no longer feared the enemy.
[12:04.01]When the American army left Valley Forge on June Nineteenth,Seventeen-Seventy-Eight,the soldiers took with them the spirit that had helped them to survive.
[12:18.98]The War for Independence would continue for another five years.Terrible battles were yet to be fought.
[12:30.21]However,the men who had survived the winter in Valley Forge knew they could win.They did.
[12:39.49]STEVE EMBER:Today,you can visit the area where Baron von Steuben trained the soldiers of the American Revolution.
[12:47.98]You can watch a movie about the American soldiers struggle to survive that long ago winter.
[12:55.50]You can see examples of the small log homes the soldiers built.
[13:01.69]You can walk on paths along the remains of the defense system and the officers'headquarters.
[13:08.98]And you can feel the spirit of Valley Forge.
