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The Great Smoky Mountains gets a new boss! Born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, Cassius Cash admits that he didn’t exactly grow up communing with nature—the closest he came to the wilderness was watching Wild Kingdom. He attended college thinking he’d become a doctor, but when recruiters from the U.S. Forest Service offered him an internship, he jumped at the chance, remembering his boy scout days with Troop 511.
He began his federal career in 1991 as a wildlife biologist for the U.S. Forest Service, and went on to work with that agency for 18 years in various leadership positions before joining the National Park Service in 2010. While with the U.S. Forest Service, he was an administrative officer in Nebraska, a district ranger in Georgia, and a civil-rights officer in Mississippi. Before transferring to Boston, he served as the deputy forest supervisor at the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest in southern Oregon.
His experiences range from working with spotted owls in the Pacific Northwest to preserving some of Boston's most iconic cultural resources. An avid hiker, Cash said he sees his new post at the Smokies as an opportunity to come back home.
“I was always fascinated with animals,” he says. “I just didn’t see anyone who looked like me doing those jobs. It was like stumbling onto a dream.” In his next two decades with the Forest Service, Cash helped protect spotted owls and preserve public lands, and worked as a civil rights officer in Mississippi, where he led programs introducing inner-city youth to the forest. In 2010 he moved north to preside over a very different public space: downtown Boston’s national parks.
Cash was tasked with overseeing the Boston National Historical Park, which links the stops along the Freedom Trail, and the Boston African American National Historic Site, a collection of 15 Beacon Hill businesses, churches, and homes along the Black Heritage Trail that were inhabited by Boston’s free African-American community in the 19th century. Cash realized that the two parks shared a common theme:
“When you look at the outcomes to each of the stories, the abolitionist movement or the Revolution, they both end in freedom,” he says. So in 2012, when the new national-park visitor center opened in Faneuil Hall, Cash began marketing the two paths as “Boston’s trails to freedom.” The center’s programming now incorporates concepts from both trails.
The two parks’ attendance figures have more than doubled since 2009, with rangers leading more than a dozen tours a day. Cash says he encourages them to engage visitors in thinking critically about the city’s history.
“Why is Boston known for the busing issue rather than having the first integrated schools in the country?” he says. “If we don’t have stories that are deeper and more inclusive, then you’re going to lose a generation.” Cash has proposed legislation to rename the two sites “Freedom National Historical Park,” to highlight the city’s role in American history.
On February 9th of 2015, Cassius Cash took his office at Headquarters in the Sugarlands to become 22nd superintendent of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. With his past track record with the USNPS, his is bound to be a very successful tour of duty in the most visited national park in the country. He is also the first African American to hold this top position in the park.
“Great Smoky Mountains National Park is surrounded by incredible communities with a long tradition of supporting the park,” said Cash. “I look forward to meeting and working with park neighbors as we continue building relationships and partnerships that enable us to protect this special place together.”
Cash was transferred from his position as the superintendent for Boston National Park and Boston African American National Historic Site in order to take his office in the Smokies.
"In Boston I've learned what it means to work with neighborhoods and preserve iconic cultural resources," Cash said. "When the position at the Smokies became available, I saw that as a chance to return to my first love of protecting natural resources for the next generation."
He and his wife, Vonda, and their youngest daughter plan to live in the Gatlinburg area. Their oldest daughter is attending school in Colorado.
"This will be a new reality for me and my family," Cash said. "It's a dream come true."
Cash holds a bachelor of science degree in biology from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, and later studied wildlife management at Oregon State University.
Cash will replace acting superintendent Clay Jordan, who will return to his previous position as chief ranger for the Smokies. The park's last permanent superintendent was Dale Ditmanson, who retired on Jan. 3, 2014, after a 36-year career with the National Park Service.
"My predecessor did an excellent job leaving the park a better place than he found it," Cash said. "I intend to do the same. I can only do that by working with the local communities and park staff."
Cash said he looks forward to being at the Smokies in 2016 when the National Park Service holds its centennial celebration to recognize its achievements over the past 100 years.
"The main thing I plan to do is listen and learn," Cash said. "The folks in the community and the park have been around a long time. We won't be reinventing anything; we'll be moving forward."
As with any dedicated ranger of the highest calibre, Cassius wants to do right by the park, to leave it better than he found it.
