Grand Canyon National Park became a U.S. national park in 1919.
President Woodrow Wilson signed the Grand Canyon National Park Act on February 26, 1919. The law protected the canyon and transferred its administration into the national-park system after decades of earlier federal protection.
The Grand Canyon had first received national-park-style protection as a forest reserve in 1893 and later as a national monument in 1908. Those earlier designations are why accounts sometimes mention 1893 or 1908 when discussing its conservation history.
The park encompasses the canyon carved by the Colorado River across northern Arizona. Its immense scale, exposed geological layers, and distinctive rims make it one of the best-known units in the National Park Service.