From Mount Rainier National Park:

On July 20, Mount Rainier National Park will become the official owner of the vintage 1937 Kenworth Touring Motor Coach pictured above. This coach transported visitors to Mount Rainier between 1937 and 1962 from the historic Winthrop Hotel in Tacoma and Olympic Hotel in Seattle. The bus is being donated to the park by owners Art Redford and Frank Pupo of Gig Harbor. The coach was purchased by Art Redford in 1985.

An informal donation ceremony will be held at Longmire in front of the historic Longmire Gas Station at 2:00 p.m. on July 20. Mr. Redford and Mr. Pupo plan to drive the coach from Tacoma to Longmire for the ceremony.

According to the owners, the “coach” is one of only five built by Kenworth between 1937 and 1938. Three still remain active, one in Sitka, Alaska, one in Montana and the one pictured above.

During the past several years, the owners have generously allowed the park to use the coach for its Centennial celebrations in 1999, in 2007 when the park reopened after the six-month closure due to the destructive November 2006 floods, and again in May 2008 when the historic Paradise Inn reopened to the public after two years of rehabilitation.

The park plans to have the coach on display at various times throughout the summer.

The future job status of Mount Rainier National Park superintendent Dave Uberuaga remains unchanged, and unclear.

Uberuaga, a 25-year veteran at Mount Rainier, has been serving since January as interim superintedent at Yosemite National Park while the National Park Service looked for a new superintendent at the iconic California park. When we last spoke in May, Uberuaga told me he hoped to learn by June whether he would be staying onboard at Yosemite or returning to Mount Rainier.

Obivously that announcement has yet to be made.

I was wondering if the announcement Friday that Jon Jarvis, a former Mount Rainier superintendent, has been nominated to become the next director of the National Park Service might break the logjam.

In an e-mail to me, Uberuaga said things remain the same. Uberuaga said he hopes Jarvis can move things along, but is unsure how much authority Jarvis will have until he is confirmed.

I also asked if he would be interested in Jarvis' old position as Pacific regional director for the Park Service.

Uberuaga reiterated that he plans to return to Mount Rainier unless given the Yosemite position. In saying no, he wrote, "I think the fun and challenges of running a national park on the ground is just the best and most rewarding."

Randy King has been serving as acting superintendent at Mount Rainier while Uberuaga is at Yosemite.