We`re spirited people protecting America`s Wilderness since 1935 through the potent combination of science, advocacy and education.

Our Mission

Deliver to future generations an unspoiled legacy of wild places, with all the precious values they hold: Biological diversity; clean air and water; towering forests, rushing rivers, and sage-sweet, silent deserts.

What We Do

We bring to bear our scientific expertise, analysis and bold advocacy at the highest levels to save, protect and restore America`s wilderness areas.

We are advocates for the land. At the heart of the work we do is the land ethic, which defines a set of principles in how humans should relate to the land:

"A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise." - Aldo Leopold

Our work is steeped in science and infused with a passion that has lasted for generations, just as the work that we do must last for generations. Since 1935, we have helped protect more than 105 million acres of America`s wildest places.

Our goal is to ensure that future generations will enjoy, as we do today, the clean air and water, wildlife, beauty and opportunities for recreation and renewal that pristine forests, rivers, deserts and mountains provide.

Our Programs Include

Protecting the last great American wilderness area, the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, from oil and gas drilling;

- Staving off logging and road building on 58 million acres of roadless lands;

- Curbing the abuse of our lands by off-road vehicle users;

- Protecting wild places within the lower 48 states from rampant oil development.

How We Succeed

Some 75% of the funds we receive are used directly for conservation.

We have a vision for America`s wild land legacy - to gain lasting protection for another 100 million acres of wild places on America`s national lands, including her remaining roadless forests, the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and some 20 million acres within Utah, Idaho and Montana.

We identify, inventory and protect America`s most fragile wild places.

We helped pass the Wilderness Act of 1964. Our former president, Howard Zahniser, wrote the Act.

We devote our expertise and leadership to coalition efforts, creating a broad base of support for conservation campaigns and reaching out to diverse communities.

As members of The Wilderness Society, a quarter of a million Americans are investing in their legacy of wild places.