Big Hole National Battlefield Administrative History

Chapter Four:
Transition to Mission 66

In September 1949, while en route between Yellowstone National Park and Big Hole Battlefield National Monument, Assistant Chief Ranger B. R. Finch "was interested to find" that 18 miles of the road between Divide and Wisdom had been oiled and surfaced. An additional 18 miles, he learned, were to be surfaced by the spring of 1950. Soon, a new, paved, all-season highway would pass directly west of the national monument, connecting Wisdom with the Bitterroot and Missoula valleys and placing the monument on a primary thoroughfare between Glacier and Yellowstone national parks. "If and when such a highway is constructed," Finch noted, "the present improvements at the monument will be entirely inadequate to withstand the impact of increased visitor use . . . [The battlefield] will not remain an isolated area visited only by a few people during the summer months."

Specifically, Finch noted that the present parking area would accommodate only 20 cars. Enlargement of the parking area was not feasible without expansion of the monument boundaries. Second, if the monument became accessible year round, a permanent ranger position would have to be established; increased personnel would require increasing housing facilities on an expanded administrative site. Finally, expansion of the land base for purely administrative reasons provided an opportunity to acquire additional land of historical significance.

For years, the adequacy of 200 acres to effective and accurate interpretation had been debated. The adequacy, however, of existing space and infrastructure to the logistical demands of a high volume of visitors had never before been at issue. Despite this changing impetus for a "reorientation of . . . thinking as to boundaries, development, and future disposition," [55] Finch's final recommendation echoed Superintendent Toll's advice of fourteen years earlier. "Unless the Park Service is willing to make the necessary improvements, it would seem logical to turn the area over to the State of Montana." [56]

In response to Finch's memorandum, Yellowstone Superintendent Rogers assigned Regional Historian Mattes, a representative of the Landscape Division, and Finch to yet another comprehensive evaluation of the national monument's historical significance, current conditions at the site, and likely impacts of the new highway development. Armed with this data, Merriam hoped to achieve "general agreement" on a "definite program of action." [57]

Mattes, Yellowstone Resident Landscape Architect Mattson, Finch, and Yellowstone Chief Naturalist David Condon visited the battlefield on September 14, 1950. In response to the visit and subsequent study, and with the concurrence of the Yellowstone Superintendent and Region II officials, this team reiterated that the battlefield was representative of a phase of western history that had gained significance with the passage of time and that it was suitably located and sufficiently endowed with elements of high drama to interpret that story. Paraphrasing Mattes, Superintendent Rogers wrote:

It is true that the Big Hole Battlefield National Monument up to the present time has been a marginal area in respect to its use by the public but it actually is the historic site where the interpretation of the story which encompassed much of the West can be told. For this reason we think to round out the National Park Service preservation of significant western historical areas and to best tell the western Indian story. [58]

Still others remained skeptical that the battlefield had that much merit. In 1954, despite Mattes "comprehensive evaluation," Big Hole battlefield was included in a report of the Advisory Board on National Parks, Historic Sites, Buildings, and Monument's Survey Team charged with identification of Park Service units of state rather than national significance. Big Hole Battlefield was one of 7 "substandard" properties proposed for Congressional disestablishment. [59] In the wake of the Survey Team's report, five national monuments and a recreation area were transferred by act of Congress from the National Park Service to their respective states or to another federal agency. Two of the units had been inherited from the Department of Agriculture or the War Department in 1933 and had therefore not been subjected to prior NPS evaluation of their appropriate place in the Park Service system. In every case, both the National Park Service and the receiving party supported the transfer of authority and public and political opposition was minimal. [60]

In company with these divested sites, Big Hole Battlefield National Monument was an inheritance from the U.S. Forest Service and the War Department. Historically, the isolated site had received few visitors (restricting the impact of interpretive efforts). In contrast, however, to the divested units, local and Park Service response to the proposed action was immediate and a strong argument had been made for national significance. Montana's congressional delegation, Governor Hugo Aronson, and the Beaverhead Chamber of Commerce protested, noting in part that "the battlefield is one of the most important tourist attractions in the area." Mattes, Rogers, and Baker also formally recommended to the Director that the monument be retained in the national park system, on the basis of its important association with western expansion. [61]

By November 1955, the immediate threat of disestablishment had dissipated. Yellowstone Superintendent Rogers reported that "now that the status of the monument has been established, it is imperative that plans for development and protection be made." These boundary recommendations were presented in Big Hole's first Mission 66 prospectus. Roughly defined, they included purchase or administrative transfer of the Nez Perce Encampment Area, the Howitzer Capture Area, and the Horse Pasture/Twin Trees Area (excluded from Hill and Mattson's 1939 maximum boundary recommendations), and adequate land for "public use and orientation from which visitors may obtain a panoramic view of the entire battlefield." [62]

Finally, in October 1959, four years after Rogers reported the status of the monument secure, the Advisory Board on National Parks officially recognized the national historical significance of the monument, under the subtheme "Military and Indian Affairs" of Theme XV, Westward Expansion and Extension of the National Boundaries to the Pacific, 1830-1898. Approval of a final development prospectus and congressional revision of the boundaries, based upon this formal determination of national significance, dominated the years between 1959 and 1963.