Jonathan Jarvis

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Jonathan B. Jarvis served as the 18th Director of the National Park Service, leading the agency from October 2, 2009, to January 3, 2017, during President Barack Obama’s administration. He was preceded by Mary A. Bomar (with Dan Wenk serving as acting director) and succeeded by Michael T. Reynolds as acting director.

Born on June 26, 1953, in Virginia, Jarvis graduated from Natural Bridge High School in 1971 and earned a biology degree from the College of William & Mary in 1975, where he was a member of Sigma Chi. He worked as a maintenance mechanic and welder at the Blue Bird bus company from 1971 to 1975 before joining the National Park Service as a park ranger in 1976 at the National Mall and Memorial Parks.

Jarvis later served as superintendent of Mount Rainier National Park in Washington, and as superintendent of Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in Idaho and Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve in Alaska during the 1990s. He then became regional director for the Pacific West Region before his 2009 nomination to head the Park Service.

As director, Jarvis highlighted climate change as a major threat to national parks, introduced healthier food guidelines for parks in 2013, and banned drones from flying over park lands in 2014. He moved to remove Confederate flag merchandise from park bookstores and gift shops in 2015, helped establish the Manhattan Project National Historical Park at Hanford, Washington, and oversaw the creation of Stonewall National Monument in New York City in 2016. His tenure faced criticism from Congress and watchdog groups over harassment and mismanagement concerns, and in 2016 he was reprimanded for an ethics violation related to publishing an unauthorized book with a nonprofit group that ran stores in parks.

Jarvis retired on January 3, 2017, and was succeeded by acting director Michael Reynolds. On October 24, 2017, he became the executive director of UC Berkeley’s Institute for Parks, People, and Diversity. In 2018, University of Chicago Press published his co-authored book, The Future of Conservation in America: A Chart for Rough Water. He endorsed Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.