In 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt visited Yosemite Valley with naturalist John Muir. Roosevelt later wrote that the experience revealed 'the...

Let's begin by understanding the meaning of this sentence. We'll use our understanding of pause points and segment the sentence as shown - understanding and assimilating the meaning of each segment bit by bit!

Sentence Structure

• In 1903,
  • President Theodore Roosevelt visited Yosemite Valley
    • with naturalist John Muir.
• Roosevelt later wrote
  • that the experience revealed 'the sublime beauty of wilderness
    • in its most pristine form[?]'
• [?] Roosevelt's experience with Muir influenced his subsequent conservation policies
  • and led to expanded protections for natural areas.

Understanding the Meaning

Let's start reading from the beginning:

'In 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt visited Yosemite Valley with naturalist John Muir.'

• This gives us the historical context - Roosevelt took a trip to Yosemite with John Muir, who was a famous naturalist.

The next sentence begins: 'Roosevelt later wrote that the experience revealed 'the sublime beauty of wilderness in its most pristine form...''

• So Roosevelt wrote about this trip afterward
• What he wrote (the quoted part) describes the wilderness as having 'sublime beauty' in its 'most pristine form'
• 'Pristine' means untouched, pure, natural

This is where we have the blank - right after the closing quotation mark.

Let's look at the choices:

• We're deciding what punctuation goes after the closing quote
• The options are: comma, colon, semicolon, or period
• All choices capitalize 'Roosevelt's'

To see what works here, let's read what comes next and understand what it's saying!

'Roosevelt's experience with Muir influenced his subsequent conservation policies and led to expanded protections for natural areas.'

• This sentence tells us about the consequences of the trip
• Roosevelt's experience → influenced his policies → led to more protections
• It has its own subject ('Roosevelt's experience') and its own verbs ('influenced' and 'led')

Now let's look at what we have:

Part 1: 'Roosevelt later wrote that the experience revealed 'the sublime beauty of wilderness in its most pristine form.''

• This is a complete sentence
• It tells us what Roosevelt wrote

Part 2: 'Roosevelt's experience with Muir influenced his subsequent conservation policies and led to expanded protections for natural areas.'

• This is also a complete sentence
• It tells us what impact the experience had

What do we notice about these two parts?

• Each one is a complete sentence - it has its own subject and verb and expresses a complete thought
• They're making different points:
  • Part 1: What Roosevelt wrote about the beauty of wilderness
  • Part 2: How the experience affected his policies
• Part 2 isn't explaining what's in the quote or continuing the 'Roosevelt wrote...' structure - it's a separate statement about consequences

When you have two complete, independent sentences like this, they should be separated as two distinct sentences with a period.

The period goes after the closing quotation mark (ending the first sentence), and then the new sentence begins with a capital letter.

So the correct answer is: D) form.' Roosevelt's

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Separating Two Complete Sentences

When you have two complete, independent sentences - each with its own subject and verb, each expressing a complete thought - they should generally be written as separate sentences with a period between them.

How to recognize two complete sentences:

1. Test each part independently:
   • 'Roosevelt later wrote that the experience revealed 'the sublime beauty of wilderness in its most pristine form.'' Complete
   • 'Roosevelt's experience with Muir influenced his subsequent conservation policies and led to expanded protections for natural areas.' Complete
2. Check if the second part continues the grammatical structure of the first:
   • If Part 2 were still part of the 'Roosevelt wrote...' structure, it might look like: 'Roosevelt later wrote that... and that his experience influenced...'
   • But that's not what we have - Part 2 starts fresh with its own subject
3. Consider the relationship:
   • Part 1: What Roosevelt wrote (about beauty)
   • Part 2: What the experience caused (policy effects)
   • These are different enough to be separate sentences

In this question:

• The quotation naturally ends the first complete thought
• Period after the closing quote mark
• New sentence begins with capital letter
• Result: Two clear, properly separated sentences