About Xanterra Parks & Resorts.

For Immediate Release
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DENVER, January 4, 2012 – America’s parks are presidential. At least many of our national leaders must think so. Over the years, many sitting U.S. presidents have made treks to national and state parks.

Sometimes they visit for official business, but often they come for fun too.

Concessioner Xanterra Parks & Resorts has hosted numerous U.S. presidents and their families in national parks such as Yellowstone and Grand Canyon as well as lesser-known state parks including Maumee Bay State Park in northwestern Ohio.

Travelers thinking about a getaway the weekend before President’s Day, Feb. 20, may want to consider taking a page from a presidential playbook and visiting a national or state park.

Xanterra’s national and state park operations include Yellowstone National Park in northwestern Wyoming, where two lodges are open during the winter; Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona; California’s Death Valley National Park and Zion National Park in Utah. Xanterra also operates summer-season-only lodges in Oregon’s Crater Lake National Park; summer-season foodservice operations in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park and year-round foodservice and gift shop operations at Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota and Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. In addition, Xanterra operates five lodges at Ohio State Parks and Grand Canyon Railway.

Zion Lodge is offering a special two-night package for the holiday. Available Feb. 17 and 18 or Feb. 18 and 19, the President’s Weekend package includes a lodge room, deluxe president-themed dinner for two on Feb. 18 and breakfast buffet for two each morning. There is a two-person and two-night minimum for this package. Rates begin at $259. Taxes and gratuities are not included in that rate. As of early January, there were still many lodge rooms available for that weekend.

There is also still plenty of availability at Yellowstone’s Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel and limited availability at Old Faithful Snow Lodge. Grand Canyon lodges have plenty of availability, including rooms at the historic El Tovar, which has frequently been the home-away-from-home for visiting presidents. And Ohio State Park Lodges also have rooms available at Maumee Bay, Punderson Manor, Mohican, Salt Fork and Deer Creek State Park Lodges.

Park historians from Xanterra Parks & Resorts and the National Park Service shared the following anecdotes about the visits of previous U.S. presidents:

• President Gerald Ford was already familiar with Yellowstone National Park when he visited in 1976; he had been a 23-year-old National Park Service ranger in 1936. Ford once said his time in Yellowstone was “one of the greatest summers of my life.” One of his duties was to meet and greet VIPs at the Canyon Lodge. He also protected other park rangers who fed bears at the bear-feeding truck, a popular visitor attraction at the time. The park long ago stopped feeding bears and other wildlife.

• Instead of staying in one of Yellowstone’s lodges, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt chose to stay at the private home of Harry Child, the owner of the Yellowstone Park Company, which operated the park lodges and other concessions. His reason: he did not want the general public to see him in his wheelchair. Designed by Robert C. Reamer, the same architect who designed the Old Faithful Inn, the large home is a single-floor prairie-style structure, so it can easily accommodate a wheelchair. Recently passing its centennial, the home is occupied today by the general manager of Xanterra Parks & Resorts, operator of the lodges and other concessions in the park.

• Bill Clinton visited both the Grand Canyon (in 2000) and Yellowstone (in 1995). President Clinton stayed in the Mary Colter Suite of the Grand Canyon’s El Tovar and had lunch at Yellowstone’s Old Faithful Inn. President Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton also took a stroll around Old Faithful Geyser.

• President Barack Obama visited both Grand Canyon and Yellowstone National Parks with his family in August 2009. National Park Service rangers accompanied the family to various viewpoints along the Grand Canyon’s South Rim and provided them with a brief overview of the park’s geology and human history. Xanterra’s executive chef in Yellowstone made the Obamas a meal of sustainable cuisine items, many from the dining room menu at Old Faithful Snow Lodge.

• Long before he became president, actor Ronald Reagan visited Death Valley -- when it was still a national monument -- in 1948 when he was a regular host of the wildly popular “Death Valley Days.” Sponsored by 20 Mule Team Borax – which was appropriate because the discovery of borax was pivotal in the history of the region – “Death Valley Days” was originally a radio program and then also achieved stunning success as a television program, airing for 16 years before its final episode in 1968. Death Valley was designated a national park 1994.

• Grand Canyon Railway has hosted numerous U.S. presidents before, during and after their terms. Those presidential passengers included Theodore Roosevelt in 1903, 1911 and 1912; William Howard Taft in 1909; Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1940 and Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1950.

• In 1883, President Chester Arthur rode a horse from the southern to the northern entrance of Yellowstone and met supporters at the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel entrance before departing the area aboard the newly completed Northern Pacific Railroad. Although it was still under construction and lacked a complete roof, President Arthur dined at the Mammoth Hot Springs Dining Room before his departure.

• President Theodore Roosevelt made his final visit to Yellowstone National Park in 1903. Although he was on a two-week vacation, he managed to squeeze in some business too. Roosevelt, Harry Child and Robert C. Reamer reviewed plans for the Old Faithful Inn, which was completed the following year. During that trip he also laid the cornerstone for the Roosevelt Arch at the northern entrance to the park. The arch bears the inscription: “For the benefit and enjoyment of the people.” President Roosevelt also visited the Grand Canyon – in 1903, before it was a national park and again in 1911.

• President Barack Obama spent three nights at Maumee Bay State Park Lodge in October 2008, where he prepared for the final presidential debate with Senator John McCain. The northwestern Ohio lodge is situated on Lake Erie. The president dined on eggs and bacon at the lodge’s Water’s Edge Restaurant, which offers sweeping views of the lake.

• William G. Harding enjoyed playing cards and visiting with close associates – sometimes called the “Ohio Gang” by newspaper reporters – in a cabin in Ohio’s Deer Creek State Park that was owned by his chief strategist and the U.S. Attorney General at the time, Harry M. Daugherty. The restored and furnished “Harding Cabin” is now available for rent, and is particularly popular with small groups such as wedding parties. The cabin overlooks Deer Creek Lake and features sleeping accommodations for up to eight people, a full kitchen, laundry facilities, fireplace, private boat dock and screened-in porch overlooking the lake.

• The state of Ohio was birthplace for seven presidents and long-time home to an eighth, which earned the state the label “Mother of Presidents.” Several historic sites, memorials and museums dedicated to those presidents are located within an easy drive of Ohio State Park Lodges managed by Xanterra. They are the James A. Garfield National Historic Site in Mentor, 45 minutes north of Punderson Manor State Park Lodge; William McKinley National Memorial in Canton, 60 minutes from Salt Fork and Mohican State Park Lodges; Warren G. Harding Home in Marion, 45 minutes west of Mohican; and William Harrison Tomb & Memorial, 90 minutes south of Deer Creek.

• President George Herbert Walker Bush visited both the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone. His visit to Yellowstone in 1989 occurred the summer after the historic Yellowstone fires. He was briefed by park officials about Yellowstone fire science.

• During his visit, President Jimmy Carter traveled to one of the islands on Yellowstone Lake to fish with National Park Service officials. After his presidency, Carter returned to the park and had pizza in the employee pub at Lake Lodge. He even signed the wall of the pub, and his signature is still visible today.

• President Warren Harding visited the park in 1923, shortly before he died. Staff in the park named a geyser after him and observed a moment of silence in his honor.

• Calvin Coolidge visited Yellowstone in 1927. Although Yellowstone Superintendent Horace Albright tried to engage President Coolidge in park-related politics, Coolidge was more interested in fishing than talking.

• Calvin Coolidge was also pivotal in granting funding for Mount Rushmore. In 1927, he visited Custer State Park in South Dakota’s Black Hills, not far from the site where sculptor Gutzon Borglum planned to carve the giant faces of Mount Rushmore. Borglum hired a plane to fly over the lodge where Coolidge was staying and dropped a wreath from the plane with an invitation for Coolidge to attend a dedication ceremony for the mountain. Coolidge not only agreed to attend but following the ceremony, he promised federal funding for the project.

• In 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed the bill that designated Yellowstone the world’s first national park. It was a move that has been called America’s best idea. President Grant never visited Yellowstone.
For lodging reservations and to book tours and packages in Yellowstone National Park, visit www.YellowstoneNationalParkLodges.com or call (1) 307-344-7311 or toll-free (1) 866-GEYSERLAND (1-866-439-7375). For lodging reservations at all other lodges visit the individual websites or call 1-800-236-7916 or 1-303-297-2757.

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Xanterra Parks & Resorts® (consisting of several affiliated Xanterra entities) operates lodges, restaurants, tours and activities at national parks and state parks and resorts. Xanterra Parks & Resorts is the country’s largest park concessioner. Xanterra Parks & Resorts has operations in the following locations: Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Zion, Crater Lake, Rocky Mountain and Petrified Forest National Parks, Mount Rushmore National Memorial, Furnace Creek Resort in Death Valley National Park, Kingsmill Resort in Williamsburg, Va. and five Ohio State Park Lodges as well as the Geneva Marina at Ohio’s Geneva State Park. Xanterra Parks & Resorts also operates Windstar Cruises as well as Grand Canyon Railway in Williams, Ariz.

Xanterra Parks & Resorts has been committed to the preservation and protection of the environment for many years. Through its environmental program, “Ecologix,” Xanterra Parks & Resorts has been recognized repeatedly for environmental leadership in the hospitality industry and is the recipient of many honors, including major awards from the U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Environmental Protection Agency, Travel Industry Association of America, American Hotel and Lodging Association, National Parks Conservation Association, Conde Nast Traveler, National Geographic Traveler, Colorado Department of Public Health, State of Arizona, Arizona Department of Environmental Quality and Utah Department of Environmental Quality.

For more information about Xanterra Parks & Resorts, links to individual properties and reservations numbers, visit www.xanterra.com.

Xanterra Parks & Resorts
6312 S. Fiddlers Green Circle
Suite 600 North
Greenwood Village, CO 80111

Media contact:
Mesereau Public Relations
1-720-842-5271
mona_mesereau@msn.com 
tom_mesereau@msn.com