Wilderness Forever: 50 Years of Protecting America’s Wild Places Photo Exhibition

A Red Fox frolicking in the fall colors of Denali National Park and Preserve, Alaska. (Dee Ann Pederson Houston, Texas, USA/Courtesy of National Museum of Natural History)

These are some of more than 5,000 entries to go on display in “Wilderness Forever: 50 Years of Protecting America’s Wild Places,” a new photo exhibition at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, which will run through summer 2015.

Please click the photos for larger images:

Proxy Falls cascade down towards the moss-covered forest of Three Sisters Wilderness in Oregon. (Thomas Goebel, age 18, Jensen Beach, Florida, USA/Courtesy of National Museum of Natural History)

A brown bear found in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska holds a freshly caught salmon in its mouth. (Robert Amoruso, Orlando, Florida, USA/Courtesy of National Museum of Natural History)

An adult male Snowy Owl, wide awake at the day’s first light in Otis Pike Fire Island High Dune Wilderness Area, New York. (Scott Joshua Dere, Cedarhurst, New York, USA/Courtesy of National Museum of Natural History)

A herd of mountain goats huddle together on top of Mount Evans, Colorado during a lightning storm.(Verdon Tomajko, Superior, Colorado, USA/Courtesy of National Museum of Natural History)

The Milky Way sparkles over Second Beach in the Olympic Wilderness, Washington. (Joe LeFevre, Oswego, New York, USA/Courtesy of National Museum of Natural History)