1. Wyoming
   Kansas
2. Louisiana
   Maryland

Featuring most of Earth's geysers and hot springs, Yellowstone National Park is known as the first national park. The park was established in 1872 and is home to wolves, bears and herds of elk and bison.

1. West Virginia
   California
2. Kentucky
   Arizona

California's Sequoia National Park is particularly renowned for the General Sherman Tree, currently the biggest tree on Earth by volume. The towering redwood reaches 274.9 feet high with a base circumference of 102.6 feet.

1. Rhode Island
   Florida
2. California
   Vermont

The 2010 Yosemite National Park quarter was the third unveiled as part of the America the Beautiful Quarters Program facilitated by the United States Mint. The tails side of the Yosemite National Park quarter features an image of Yosemite's El Capitan, the world's biggest granite monolith.

1. North Carolina
   Alabama
2. Wisconsin
   Washington

Washington state's Mount Rainier National Park is 365 square miles of mountains and forests. Indigenous Indians call the region "Tacoma." George Vancouver, a British pioneer who spotted the volcanic peak while surveying Puget Sound in 1792, named the park after Admiral Peter Rainier.

1. Indiana
   Oregon
2. Connecticut
   Idaho

The volcanic caldera at Crater Lake National Park is the hollowed-out remnant of a mountain known as Mazama that's filled with blue water. The resulting lake was formed nearly 7,700 years ago when an eruption caused the mountain's 12,000-foot peak to collapse.

1. Nevada
   Texas
2. South Dakota
   Maine

Several hundred wild bison call South Dakota's Wind Cave National Park home. The park has sent over 1,500 bison to Native American tribes and organizations throughout the United States to assist with breeding new herds.

1. Georgia
   Massachusetts
2. Colorado
   Ohio

President Theodore Roosevelt established Mesa Verde National Park in 1906 as the first national park to "preserve the works of man." The park's archaeological sites include 600 cliff dwellings. The Ancestral Pueblo people inhabited the land from 550 A.D. to 1300 A.D.

1. Delaware
   Alaska
2. Wisconsin
   Montana

Glacier National Park's Lake McDonald is 6,680 feet wide, 440 feet deep and 10 miles long. Upper McDonald Creek is one of the park's 563 streams and stretches almost 26 miles. Of the park's 150 glaciers that existed in the mid-1800s, only 25 remain today.

1. Mississippi
   Michigan
2. Colorado
   Nebraska

The Artist-in-Residence Program at Rocky Mountain National Park welcomed three youth artists and three professional artists. The primary aim of the 2016 program was to involve young people in the arts and national parks.

1. Kentucky
   Hawaii
2. Nevada
   New York

The summit at Haleakala National Park is 10,023 feet high. There are species in the Summit District of Haleakala National Park that are not found anywhere else on the planet, such as the Haleakala silversword.

1. Maine
   Ohio
2. Hawaii
   Kentucky

Established in 1916, Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is evidence of 70 million years of volcanic activity. Different features at the park include the 13,677-feet-high Mauna Lao volcano, the Earth's largest.

1. California
   Delaware
2. Pennsylvania
   Montana

California's Lassen Volcanic National Park is one of the rare places on Earth where there are all four types of volcanoes: shield, composite, plug dome and cinder cone. The park also contains over 150 miles of hiking trails.

1. Alaska
   Hawaii
2. South Carolina
   Connecticut

Denali National Park was created to protect populations of Dall sheep, moose, caribou and grizzly bears. In 1980, the park was renamed Denali, which means "the High One." Denali is home to the highest mountain in North America, the 20,320-foot-high Mount McKinley.

1. New Hampshire
   Iowa
2. Montana
   Maine

Maine's Acadia National Park is one of the smallest national parks in the United States, measuring 39,706 acres. Members of the eastern gentry first allowed access to Acadia's land that was financed by John D. Rockefeller, who feared the area would be destroyed by logging.

1. Colorado
   Wyoming
2. Alaska
   Arizona

In 1901, Arizona Senator Ralph Cameron obtained toll rights to the main path leading to the Grand Canyon and charged visitors $1 for access. In 1987, Congress relieved the park, its visitors and its inhabitants of overhead aircraft traffic and noise by passing the National Park Overflights Act.

1. Missouri
   Utah
2. Louisiana
   Iowa

President William Taft established Utah's Zion National Park on July 31, 1909. Through the years, Zion's Virgin River has carved out Zion Canyon as well as massive cliffs and rock configurations.

1. Arkansas
   Indiana
2. Wisconsin
   Montana

Native Americans have long believed that the hot mineral springs at Hot Springs National Park have therapeutic powers. The area was designated a national park in 1921, and the springs received federal protection as early as 1849.

1. Delaware
   Utah
2. New Hampshire
   Connecticut

The canyon at Bryce Canyon National Park in South Central Utah can be easily reached. A six-mile bike path and hiking trail connect the canyon rim to Bryce Canyon City. The park's most prominent features are its wind-carved rock formations.

1. Wyoming
   Colorado
2. Nevada
   Iowa

Yellowstone National Park borders northwestern Wyoming's Grand Teton National Park on the north. Established in 1950, Grand Teton has 320,000 acres that include massive granite walls that emerge from the Jackson Hole valley.

1. Mississippi
   Hawaii
2. West Virginia
   New Mexico

Chihuahuan Desert plants at Carlsbad Caverns National Park include agave, ocotillo, prairie grasses, torrey yucca and prickly pear cactus. The park also boasts 331 species of birds, including black-chinned hummingbird and turkey vulture.

1. Maryland
   Florida
2. North Dakota
   Maine

Landscape architect Ernest F. Coe had the vision for Everglades National Park in 1928. On December 6, 1947, the U.S. government established the park, which is home to one of the most extensive wetlands on Earth.

1. North Carolina
   Nevada
2. Texas
   Louisiana

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park was established in 1934 and covers over 800 square miles in the Southern Appalachian Mountains region. Sixteen mountain peaks at the park ascend higher than 6,000 feet.

1. Iowa
   Virginia
2. Michigan
   Oklahoma

Skyline Drive twists 105 miles through Shenandoah National Park, which makes for scenic driving. The park is 75 miles from Washington D.C. and offers crisp views of the famed Blue Ridge Mountains.

1. Washington
   Arizona
2. South Carolina
   Vermont

Olympic National Park spans across diverse ecosystems, including the Olympic Mountains and forest terrain. United States Congress established the 922,651-acre Olympic National Park in 1938.

1. Alabama
   Vermont
2. Nebraska
   California

General Grant National Park was established in 1890 and made part of Kings Canyon National Park, which was formed in 1940. Kings Canyon's General Grant Tree has a trunk volume of 46,608 cubic feet.

1. Michigan
   Nebraska
2. Montana
   Delaware

Ninety-nine percent of the land in Michigan's Isle Royale National Park was designated a wilderness zone under the Wilderness Act, in 1976. In 2018, the park's administrators initiated a plan to reintroduce wolves.

1. Nebraska
   Delaware
2. Wyoming
   Kentucky

Mammoth Cave is a 400-mile-long network of limestone tunnels; the park estimates that 200 caves in the region are disconnected from the main cave, which is the most popular in the world. Roughly 2 million people visit the park annually.

1. Louisiana
   Georgia
2. Texas
   Iowa

Established in 1944, Big Bend National Park comprises 802,000 acres and is home to 75 mammal species and over 440 types of birds. The Rio Grande River provides a crucial water supply for sustaining the park's ecosystem.

1. Arizona
   Hawaii
2. Montana
   Alaska

Arizona's Petrified Forest National Park was registered as a protected national monument thanks in large part to locals who were worried about the theft of the region's fossilized wood. Petrified Forest became a national park on December 9, 1962.

1. Pennsylvania
   Utah
2. West Virginia
   Montana

In 2015, the International Dark-Sky Association awarded Gold-Tier International Dark Sky Park status to Canyonlands National Park. The park's dark skies are a perfect stage for clear views of the Milky Way galaxy.

1. Kentucky
   Idaho
2. Texas
   Georgia

Nicknamed "Mr. Guadalupe Mountains," Roger Eugene Reisch was the only employee at Guadalupe Mountains for several years when it was administered by Carlsbad Caverns National Park. He remained the park's ranger after President Lyndon B. Johnson signed legislation authorizing the region in October 1966.

1. Wyoming
   Delaware
2. Washington
   Indiana

The North Cascades Act, signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson on October 2, 1968, commissioned 685,000 acres of the national park. The authorization also established 550,000 acres at nearby Pasayten Wilderness to the east and broadened Glacier Peak Wilderness to the south an additional 464,000 acres.

1. California
   Hawaii
2. Texas
   Montana

Initially established in 1968, Redwood National Park was expanded in 1978. The state parks Jedediah Smith Redwoods, Prairie Creek Redwoods and Del Norte Coast Redwoods in addition to Redwood National Park comprise a World Heritage Site and an International Biosphere Reserve.

1. North Dakota
   Tennessee
2. Minnesota
   Nevada

Although the United States Congress established Voyageurs National Park in 1971, it did not open until 1975. The park gets its name from the birchbark canoe-paddling French-Canadian voyageurs of the 1700s and 1800s.

1. Georgia
   Utah
2. Alabama
   Ohio

Authorized as a national park on November 12, 1971, Southern Utah's 120-square-mile Arches National Park is 76,359 acres and encompasses over 2,500 red sandstone arches. The park also features slickrock domes, massive balanced rocks and spires.

1. Utah
   Delaware
2. Iowa
   New York

In 1971, an act of U.S. Congress changed Capitol Reef National Monument to a national park; at the same time, the region expanded from 38,172 acres to 241,904 acres. The park is named for its huge white domes that resemble the U.S. Capitol Building.

1. Pennsylvania
   Iowa
2. Nevada
   South Dakota

Badlands National Park holds 75 million years of geological history. The region was once covered by an inland sea called the Western Interior Seaway. When waters subsided 37 million years ago, Badlands became a Black Hills sediment repository.

1. Maryland
   Texas
2. North Dakota
   Montana

The U.S. Department of the Interior has teamed up with NASA since 1998 to test innovative remote sensing technology that has identified and mapped leafy spurge shrubs at Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Wildlife at the park includes prairie rattlesnakes, prairie dogs and about 200 species of birds.

1. California
   Michigan
2. Nebraska
   Alabama

The islands of California's Channel Islands National Park are Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, San Miguel, Anacapa and Santa Rosa. President Jimmy Carter authorized the area as the 40th park of the U.S. national park system on March 5, 1980.

1. Louisiana
   Colorado
2. Florida
   Indiana

Roughly 5 percent of the 173,000 acres that comprise Florida's Biscayne National Park is land. Located in Miami-Dade County, Biscayne National Park was established to protect its ecosystem from heightened industrial and residential development.