Public lands, explained through story and consequence.
Parkography tracks the practical and political life of national parks and public lands, from camping bans and pass changes to water shortages and visitor rules. It also turns park history into narrative stories about places like Mammoth Cave, Yellowstone, Mount Rushmore, and Theodore Roosevelt National Park.
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Parkography covers national parks and public lands as places shaped by history, policy, money, weather, risk, and human behavior. It is not just scenic appreciation. The show regularly moves from headline to consequence, explaining what a camping ban near Zion could mean, why Grand Canyon water shortages keep recurring, or how a change to Yosemite’s dining experience reflects a wider question about affordability inside famous parks. The news episodes are brisk and practical. They track agency restructuring, lawsuits over firearms rules, proposed park designations, visitation records, pass changes, access fees, closures, and public-land protections. The tone is clear-eyed rather than ceremonial. Parkography cares about parks, but it also notices when systems strain, rules get ignored, or public access becomes uneven. Historical episodes widen the frame. Theodore Roosevelt National Park becomes a story about illness, reinvention, ranching, and the Badlands landscape that helped form a public figure. Mammoth Cave becomes a layered account of saltpeter mining, difficult underground labor, early tourism, and the guides who carried visitors into the dark. Yellowstone can be both a news site and a survival narrative, from thermal-boardwalk enforcement to Truman C. Everts spending 37 days alone after the 1870 expedition. Mount Rushmore is treated as a monument with a complicated origin, not merely a familiar image on a hillside. The show’s best moments come when travel information, conservation stakes, and American memory occupy the same sentence. It is useful for trip planners, but it is not limited to logistics. It is historical without sounding sealed in the past. It is newsy without turning parks into abstractions. Parkography gives listeners a fuller map: who manages the land, what rules are changing, which stories sit under the trail, and why protected places are never as simple as they look from the overlook.
Made for: Parkography is for national park travelers, public-land watchers, history listeners, and anyone following how access, conservation, policy, and tourism collide across protected landscapes.
What sets it apart: The show pairs practical park news with researched historical storytelling, moving comfortably between agency decisions, visitor rules, survival accounts, and the deeper origins of iconic places.
Parkography (formerly known as the America’s National Parks Podcast) is the new home for the powerful stories, rich history, and breathtaking landscapes of America’s national parks and public lands. Through immersive storytelling, vivid soundscapes, and in-depth research, we explore the people, places, and pivotal moments that shaped the wild places we cherish today. From iconic landmarks to hidden corners, Parkography brings the soul of America’s public lands to life—one story at a time.
Based on 5 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Parkography connects public lands to the expeditions, technologies, government decisions, and visual records that shaped how Americans understand them.
Parkography treats America's public lands as places where landscape, policy, technology, and memory meet. Jason Epperson moves between narrative history and interviews, shifting from a stranded expedition member's ordeal in Yellowstone to conversations with photographers Chris…
A raw bird in Yellowstone, camel-hair socks, mammoth glass plates: your park history just got stranger.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A conversation that pairs public-lands photography with a candid look at AI and the work behind a good shot.
Parkography treats the conversation with Chris Greer and Paul Daniel, the creators of the PBS series Viewfinders, as a careful look at how America's landscapes are seen, shot, and shaped in post-production.
A conversation that treats the natural world as wider, stranger, and more intimate than a warning label.
The episode makes a case for approaching the natural world with curiosity instead of doom, and it gives that idea enough room to land. It moves from Nate Hedgie's childhood dislike of being dragged on a hike to his later adventures across North America in a small camper van,…
A survival story that turns Yellowstone into a map, a trial, and a legend.
Parkography presents Truman C. Everts' 37 days alone in Yellowstone as both survival story and early-map history, opening with Henry Washburn's 1870 expedition, the naming of Old Faithful, and Everts' disappearance at Two Ocean Pass.
A camel corps story where logistics, testing, and ambition matter more than legend.
This episode treats Jefferson Davis's camel corps as more than an oddity and gives it the close reading it deserves. It tracks the May 10, 1855 order to Brevet Major Henry C.
Carleton Watkins helps frame Yosemite's scale before it became a national park.
Parkography treats Yosemite as a place shaped by seeing, with Carleton Watkins helping define how the valley was understood before it became a national park.
Water news where systems meet consequences.
Phoebe Judge narrates true crime history and interviews the authors who uncovered it.
Dramatized deep dives into American history, from the Galveston hurricane to Harper Lee's Mockingbird.
Dana Schwartz narrates the violent lives of monarchs, warlords, and queens.
Tracy Wilson and Holly Frey narrate overlooked history, from Courbet's realism to IUD regulation.
Carlton Watkins arrived in California in 1851 with no photography background, then learned daguerreotype and ambrotype work in San Francisco and San Jose after Robert Vance showed him the basics.
Parkography’s “The U.S.
Jason Epperson talks with Nate Hedgie, host and senior producer of Outside/In at New Hampshire Public Radio, about reporting on the outdoor beat and making environmental stories feel less like warnings of apocalypse.
A critique of common complaints about national parks, using Yellowstone as an example, and promotion of RV travel as a solution.
Parkography follows Truman C.
A roundup of recent news affecting US national parks and public lands, including camping restrictions, mining policy, visitor misconduct, and infrastructure issues.
A news roundup covering the Forest Service's move to Salt Lake City, a lawsuit over guns in parks, a potential new national park in Arizona, and other national park news.
This episode of Parkography explores how Theodore Roosevelt's early health struggles and personal tragedies shaped his transformation into a rugged cowboy and eventual president, focusing on his time in what is now Theodore Roosevelt National Park.
National park news covering Big Bend closures, sequoia protection, Mount Rushmore fireworks return, and 2025 visitation statistics.
This episode explores the lesser-known history behind Mount Rushmore, starting with the story of Doan Robinson, the state historian who conceived the idea to boost tourism.
This episode explains the different types of passes for U.S.
This episode explores the early history of Mammoth Cave, from its discovery by a hunter to its development as a tourist destination with guided tours.
A harrowing account of Truman Everts' 37-day survival alone in Yellowstone after getting separated from the 1870 Washburn expedition.
Chris Greer and Paul Daniel explain how Viewfinders turned public-lands photography into a PBS series with Jason Epperson on Parkography.