A recent visit to Yellowstone National Park—marked by a fight near Old Faithful and disorder in a crowded parking lot—prompted a comparison with the park’s lawless early years. The account argues that the problems now facing Yellowstone echo a period when growing visitor numbers met weak enforcement and inadequate funding.

The National Park Service workforce has fallen by nearly 25 percent since 2025, according to the article, while the parks continue to draw large crowds. Yellowstone has seen about 4.5 million visitors, compared with roughly 3 million at the time of the writer’s first visit two decades earlier. The account also points to more litter being removed from the park’s geysers, including items such as fidget spinners, fake nails and a baseball cap.

Yellowstone’s record of visitor misconduct stretches back to its founding. After the park was established in 1872, vandals chipped away at mineral deposits, poachers killed wildlife, squatters built cabins and visitors threw rubbish, timber and soap into geysers. The arrival of the railroad in 1883 brought larger crowds, along with reports of pickpockets, horse thieves and armed robberies targeting stagecoaches.

The article traces much of that disorder to a lack of federal funding and enforcement. In 1880, game warden Harry Yount was tasked with patrolling more than 3,300 square miles largely on his own. He resigned after 14 months, arguing that the job required a properly funded ranger service. The government later tried volunteer vigilantes and the U.S. Army before the National Park Service was created in 1916, bringing professional rangers into park management and enforcement.

The writer also notes that today’s disruptive visitors remain a visible minority. During a six-mile hike through quieter areas of Upper Geyser Basin, the writer and his wife encountered fellow visitors enjoying the park and following its rules. The central warning, the account says, is that rising crowds combined with shrinking budgets and staffing can leave parks more vulnerable to lawlessness.

Sources: Outside.