Cougar Mountain’s Anti-Aircraft Peak Trailhead is, as of last week, known as the Harvey Manning Trailhead.

While the peak will still be named for the anti-aircraft missiles that graced it during the Cold War, the trailhead has been given a name with a little more present day significance. Harvey Manning was a passionate environmentalist in his home region of King County, and worked to preserve nature on the Eastside.

In fact, King County media relations coordinator Doug Williams said it is thanks to Manning that so much of Cougar Mountain has remained untouched and undeveloped.

“He was one of the giants of conservation and preservation for open space in King County,” Williams said.

As an advocate for keeping nature natural, Manning successfully lobbied the state government in Olympia to save spaces from being turned into housing and retail developments. Manning’s efforts were especially significant because he was active during the 1980s, when so much of the Issaquah area was becoming built up.

Manning himself lived in Bellevue very close to Cougar Mountain, and did not want to see his mountainous backyard become a panorama of shopping malls and neighborhoods.

Williams said that Manning enocouraged his fellow citizens to get active in the political process through letter writing and phone calls to local representatives, as well as by speaking up during political gatherings.

Manning’s work was so instrumental in ensuring that the Eastside retained its greenery for future generations that May 21, 1985 was declared Harvey Manning Day in King County. This was also the day that Cougar Mountain Park was dedicated.

Manning not only pursued his love of nature through politics, but also through his hobbies.

“He wrote some of the most definitive trail guides for Washington,” Williams said.

An avid hiker, Manning helped to found the Issaquah Alps Trails Club and served as its premier president. In fact, it was Manning who came up with the term Issaquah Alps.

“He often took people on hikes to show them the beauty of the area,” Williams said.

The trailhead was officially reborn under its new name at a trailhead dedication ceremony last week. Randy Revelle, who, as King County senior deputy executive in 1985 had originally proclaimed Harvey Manning Day, was in attendance. Current Deputy Executive Fred Jarrett, Issaquah Alps Trails Club members and Manning’s daughters were also there.

King County Parks made the decision to honor Manning with the trailhead; this isn’t the first time that the county has made such a change. Wilderness Peak Trailhead, also on Cougar Mountain, was in 2013 renamed the Jim Whittaker Wilderness Peak Trailhead in honor of the Washingtonian who became the first American to climb Mount Everest.